The Department of Finance (DoF) has officially launched the Green Climate Fund Philippines’ website to ensure transparency on the country’s projects on mitigating climate change.

The DoF on Friday said the website allows the public to view details of climate projects and track them from conception to implementation and evaluation.

The Green Climate Fund (GCF) is the world’s largest fund for developing countries that helps create solutions to the effects of climate change.

The GCF provides various financing methods and was established through partnerships with global and national commercial banks, multilateral and regional finance institutions, equity funds institutions, United Nations agencies, and civil society organizations.

Powerful message

“It is our desire that this partnership with the GCF will deliver a powerful message and serve as a promising model to the international community in striking collective action in addressing climate change,” DoF Secretary Ralph Recto said.

In March last year, the Philippine Climate Change Commission said the country received $26.3 million from the GCF. This was followed by another $10-million grant announced by the DoF in May.

The country is now implementing eight GCF projects for climate change mitigation worth a total of $137.7 million.

Meanwhile, there are five projects for climate change adaptation amounting to $2.2 million.

“The projects that will be developed with the GCF will not only have a lasting impact on our local communities but also globally in building a more secure and sustainable world,” Recto said.

‘GCF Handbook’

Aside from the launch of the GCF Philippines’ website on Friday, the DoF also introduced the GCF Handbook for the Philippines during the National Stakeholders Conference on the GCF in the Philippines.

The handbook contains guidelines on streamlining and broadening access of the government to a range of GCF financing.

As a main policy, the GCF stresses that the climate projects and specific policies should be government-led and it should ensure that the projects will be revenue-generating.

The conference was led by Finance Undersecretary Joven Balbosa of the International Finance Group.