Mr. Stephan Contius, Head of Division KI II 4, Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation & Nuclear Safety at the 6th Thai-German International Climate Initiative or IKI Cooperation Meeting
“How can international cooperation best contribute to national targets?”
“How to accumulate contributions, bridge cooperation and overcome challenges?”
Using these questions as a guide, the 6th Thai-German International Climate Initiative or IKI Cooperation Meetingwas conducted in March 2016 and attended by representatives from the Thai government and the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety (BMUB). The aim was to improve the cooperation of projects in Thailand funded under the IKI of BMUB. Moreover, both governments exchanged their climate targets and priorities to set the scope for further cooperation. The meeting was jointly hosted by the Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning (ONEP) and GIZ.
On the German side, the focus of the current call for proposals (March-June) remains within low carbon strategies, Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Action (NAMA), renewable energy, energy efficiency, transport, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) as well as Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs). BMUB will also support adaptation projects within national adaptation strategies, e.g. ecosystem-based water and land-use management and biodiversity.
On the Thai side, the Thailand Climate Change Master Plan as well as other related development and sectorial plans were presented, namely the 12th National Economic and Social Development Plan 2017-2021, the Green Growth Strategy 2015-2020 and the Environmental Quality Management Plan 2012-2016. Similar to the German focus, climate resilience will be achieved through a low carbon and sustainable development pathway. Building on the three pillars of adaptation, GHG mitigation and capacity building, the short-term goals of the plan include the development of an INDC roadmap. Eleven indicators have been determined to measure the progress of the defined short-term goals. The point was made that in order to achieve the targets, the private sector needs to be more involved in the near future.
The meeting is part of the agreement between the two countries made in September 2013 to organize annual exchanges on topics related to climate change from different sectors. During the visit of BMUB to Thailand, a field visit to Nakhon Si Thammarat was also organized. The delegation visited the work being undertaken on climate policy actions and ecosystem-based adaptation in watersheds.
Since 2008 the BMUB IKI has been financing climate and biodiversity-related projects in developing countries. This initiative is the key element of Germany’s climate financing and funding commitment in the framework convention on biological diversity. So far BMUB has funded around 500 projects in more than 100 countries with a total amount of 1.7 billion EUR.
BMUB IKI profile in Thailand:
- 11 bilateral projects with a total fund of 25.8 million Euro
- 29 regional and global projects with a Thailand component
“The IKI Climate Policy Project helps to drive our national climate policies to the sub-national and local levels. It is very important for us. With ONEP capacity alone we wouldn’t be able to carry on such effective implementation.”
(Mrs. Angkana Chalermpong, Head of the UNFCC Focal Point, MNRE.)