The section provides information about the methodological framework, data sources and country classifications that underpin the figures presented. Further details, notably on methodological issues and steps that have to be addressed to complete the analyses, are included in previous publications in this series (see in particular Annexes in (OECD, 2020[5])).
Climate Finance Provided and Mobilised by Developed Countries: Aggregate Trends Updated with 2019 Data
Climate Finance and the USD 100 Billion Goal
2. Framework and data
Abstract
2.1. Methodological framework
The accounting framework used in this short update report is consistent with the one used for previous OECD reports. The framework was initially developed in 2015 to estimate climate finance provided and mobilised by developed countries to developing countries in 2013-14 (OECD, 2015[6]). The framework was used subsequently in (OECD, 2019[7]) and (OECD, 2020[5]), which extended the estimated period to 2017 and 2018, respectively. It is also consistent with the outcome – agreed by all countries - of the UNFCCC COP24 as regards the modalities for the accounting of financial resources provided and mobilised through public interventions (OECD, 2019[7]). For a full description of the methodological framework, please refer to (OECD, 2020[5]).
The figures of total climate finance provided and mobilised by developed countries for climate action in developing countries are based on four distinct components (Figure 2.1):
Bilateral public climate finance: public climate finance commitments (excluding export credits) by developed countries for developing countries. Such commitments are made either directly or through intermediaries (NGOs and civil society, networks, partnerships, universities and research institutes, private for-profit institutions, and other bilateral channels) (flow A.1) or as earmarked (non-core) funding through multilateral channels (flow A.2).
Multilateral public climate finance attributable to developed countries: climate finance provided by multilateral development banks (MDBs) and multilateral climate funds (flow B.2) to developing countries, as well as climate-specific contributions by developed countries to multilateral bodies for which climate outflow data are unavailable (flow B.1).
Officially supported climate-related export credits: financial support extended by developed countries’ export credit agencies for climate-related projects in developing countries (flow C).
Private climate finance mobilised attributable to developed countries consists of that proportion of finance from private sources mobilised by bilateral and multilateral public finance interventions in support of climate activities in developing countries which can be attributed to developed countries, as per Table 2.2 (flow D).
The OECD DAC and OECD ECG databases, as well as climate finance data reported by countries to the UNFCCC, are dynamic, which implies that they can accommodate data modifications and updates if needed and requested by the providers. This report, however, does not consider such revisions whereby the figures for the years 2013-18 remain identical to those presented in (OECD, 2020[5]).
Figure 2.1. Simplified illustration of international development and climate finance architecture
Note: Outflows from the core budget of multilateral organisations and private finance mobilised by multilateral organisations are adjusted to only reflect the share attributable to developed countries (see Table 2.2).
2.2. Data sources
This section presents a summary (Table 2.1) and a brief overview of the climate finance data sources used. Previous OECD publications (most recently (OECD, 2020[5])) provide further details, including a range of methodological considerations and issues that have to be addressed for each of the data sources.
Table 2.1. Overview of the categories of finance considered and data sources
2.2.1. Bilateral public climate finance
Bilateral climate finance data are in principle sourced from Table 7(b) of the Common Tabular Format (CTF) tables that accompany Annex I Parties’ Biennial Reports (BRs) to the UNFCCC. However, 2019 climate finance data is only due to be reported by countries in 2022 as part of their fifth BR. Therefore, for 2019 only, bilateral public climate finance data were sourced as follows:
For individual Member States of the European Union, data were sourced from and analysed based on the publicly-disclosed information that they communicate annually to the European Commission under the EU Monitoring Mechanism Regulation.
For all other developed countries and the European Union itself, data were provided to the OECD in advance of official reporting to the UNFCCC.
The bilateral climate finance component excludes all forms of export credit financing to avoid any double-counting with the separate export credit component. It also excludes any coal-related financing. With the exception of the United States, bilateral climate finance data also exclude developmental guarantees, which are accounted separately for their mobilisation effect under the mobilised private finance component.
To ensure data quality, consistency, and comparability, information exchanges took place between the OECD and individual donor countries, e.g., to identify and exclude coal-related financing if relevant, as well as to identify and exclude delegated grants from the GCF to avoid double counting with the multilateral outflow component.
2.2.2. Multilateral public climate finance
The multilateral public climate component covers climate-related commitments by multilateral development banks (MDBs), multilateral climate funds, as well as other multilateral organisations, sourced from their core resources and subsequently attributed to developed countries (see Table 2.2). Outflows from trust funds and special-purpose programmes administered by multilateral organisations are not included in the multilateral public component. Inflows to such funds and programmes are considered as bilateral climate finance and are, in principle, reported in Table 7(b) of the CTF tables submitted to the UNFCCC. Where applicable, such inflows to special-purpose funds and programmes are accordingly presented under the “bilateral public” finance component.
Data on multilateral core budget outflows are sourced from the standardised activity-level data on development finance collected by the OECD DAC. Reporting to the OECD DAC on multilateral outflows is based on statistical data fields and underlying definitional standards. This results in a coherent dataset, notably in terms of point of measurement (all commitment based), currency conversion, and sectoral classifications. Concerning multilateral institutions and agencies for which no project-level outflow data are available, the analysis uses inflows included by developed countries in table 7(a) of the Biennial Reports to the UNFCCC.
2.2.3. Officially-supported export credits
The vast majority of the data are sourced from the OECD Export Credit Group’s (ECG) database on officially-supported export credits, which contains activity-level transaction data reported by developed countries’ official export credit agencies (ECAs). The ECG statistics include two main types of export credit transactions: loans extended directly by ECAs and loan guaranteed (or insurances) by ECAs. Both types are accounted for on their face value.
Importantly, the ECG database only covers export credits with a repayment term of two years or more that were provided in conformity with the Arrangement on Officially Supported Export Credits (OECD, 2020[8]). For the purpose of this report, only export credit data reported as explicitly targeting renewable energy, climate change mitigation and adaptation, and water projects were included. In practice, such data cover almost only renewable energy-related transactions.
Some countries provide export support outside of that reported under the aforementioned Arrangement, i.e. beyond the ECG database. These countries provide such data inputs directly to the OECD for the purpose of this report. A limited number of countries also include export credits in their biennial climate finance reporting to the UNFCCC. All export credit data were carefully reviewed, cross-checked, and netted out to avoid double counting across these different data sources. For example, export-credit activities reported by countries to the UNFCCC were excluded from the bilateral climate finance component and included in the export credit one if not already captured by the OECD export credit database.
2.2.4. Private finance mobilised by official climate finance interventions
In consultation with bilateral and multilateral providers, the OECD has developed an international standard for measuring the amounts mobilised from the private sector by official development finance interventions, including for climate. Work has been carried out over multiple years and successive rounds of research, surveys, workshops, methodological developments, and implementation (OECD, 2021[9]).
The scope of this OECD DAC methodology for measuring the amounts mobilised from the private sector covers the main mechanisms used by bilateral and multilateral development finance providers: syndicated loans, guarantees, credit lines, direct investment in companies or special purpose vehicles (SPVs), shares in collective investment vehicles (CIVs) and simple co-financing arrangements. On that basis, the methodology is considered comprehensive and, since 2017, has been fully implemented in the OECD DAC’s regular data collection processes, as per the most recent of the Statistical Reporting Directives for the CRS (OECD, 2021[10]). The Working Party on Development Finance Statistics (WP-STAT) will continue to fine-tune the methodology where needed, e.g. to account for the role of technical assistance in mobilisation schemes, where plausible and feasible.
In order to avoid double-counting at the international level when multiple official financiers invest in the same project or vehicle together with the private sector, the OECD methodology attributes the amounts mobilised from the private sector following an instrument-specific approach that takes into account the role (e.g. arranger of syndications) and position (investment seniority) of each official actor, including both international and domestic public agencies (e.g. national development banks).
Consistently with data coverage that underpinned previous OECD figures of private climate finance mobilised in 2016, 2017, and 2018, almost all OECD DAC members and multilateral institutions that work with the private sector report mobilisation data to OECD DAC for the year 2019 as part of their annual data reporting. Complementary data were gathered on an ad hoc basis or accessed through dedicated processes from a limited number of providers where data could not be reported as part of the official OECD DAC CRS process, either due to capacity or confidentiality limitations.
2.3. Attribution of multilateral finance to developed countries
A key methodological point behind the multilateral climate finance volumes included in the present and previous similar OECD reports is to consider only the share of multilateral climate commitments attributable to developed countries (with the remainder being attributable to developing countries). A dedicated methodology is, therefore, needed to calculate such share for each multilateral institution. This takes into account the concessional and non-concessional nature of multilateral finance, most recent and cumulative replenishment participations by individual countries, as well as, where applicable, the organisations’ capacity to raise funds from the capital markets (TWG, 2015[11]). The resulting attribution shares (Table 2.2) are applied to both outflows from multilateral institutions as well as to the amounts mobilised from the private sector by these same institutions.
Table 2.2. Calculated share of multilateral climate finance attributable to developed countries
Notes: 2015 percentages apply to 2013, 2014, and 2015 climate finance data. 2018 percentages apply to 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019 data. The merger of the AsDB ordinary capital resources (OCR) balance sheet with the lending operations of the AsDF became effective at the start of 2017. Climate finance outflows for the GCF, the IDB Invest (previously Inter-American Investment Corporation; IIC) and the AIIB were first recorded in OECD DAC statistics in 2015, 2016 and 2017, respectively. Climate finance outflows from IFAD, CEB and CAF were first included in the present figures in 2018 and from CDB and IIB in 2019 (figures for previous years include developed countries’ inflows to IFAD and CDB and did not cover CAF, CEB and IIB altogether).
Source: OECD calculations based on annual reports and websites of each institution; see also (OECD, 2019[12]) and (TWG, 2015[11]).
2.4. Country groupings
2.4.1. Developed and developing countries
For the purpose of this report’s analysis and figures, the following classifications are used:
“Developing countries”, which refer to countries and territories included on the DAC List of ODA Recipients for 2018 development finance (OECD, 2020[13]) and/or on the non-Annex I list of Parties to the UNFCCC (UNFCCC, 2018[14]), as detailed in Table 2.3, Table 2.4, and Table 2.5.
“Developed countries”, which include Annex II Parties to the Convention, the Member States of the European Union, Lichtenstein, and Monaco (Table 2.6).
Countries and territories that do not fall in these categories (most notably the Russian Federation (Russia) are not covered by the analysis.
Table 2.3. Developing countries: Non-Annex I Parties on the DAC List of ODA Recipients
Table 2.4. Developing countries: Non-Annex I Parties beyond ODA Recipients
Table 2.5. Developing countries: ODA Recipients beyond the Non-Annex I Parties
Table 2.6. Developed countries
Note by Turkey: The information in this document with reference to “Cyprus” relates to the southern part of the Island. There is no single authority representing both Turkish and Greek Cypriot people on the Island. Turkey recognises the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC). Until a lasting and equitable solution is found within the context of the United Nations, Turkey shall preserve its position concerning the “Cyprus issue”.
Note by all the European Union Member States of the OECD and the European Union: The Republic of Cyprus is recognised by all members of the United Nations with the exception of Turkey. The information in this document relates to the area under the effective control of the Government of the Republic of Cyprus.
2.4.2. Regions and sub-regions
The classifications used in this report are inspired by the M49 standard of the United Nations (UNSD, 2020[15]) to the extent possible, as well as the DAC regional groupings (OECD, 2020[16]). Climate finance that is not allocable by region is grouped under “unspecified”.
The divergences from the UN M49 standard in this report are that:
Central Asia includes all post-soviet countries in Asia, except Russia, namely Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
Western Asia is replaced with the Middle East, whereas relevant post-soviet countries (Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia) are included in Central Asia (see above).
Sudan is included in Eastern Africa, rather than North Africa.
The main reason for these divergences is to ensure consistency with the DAC classification, which is used in the context of the underlying data on multilateral public and private finance mobilised. Moreover, “developed countries” as listed in Table 2.6 are excluded from the individual regions.
Table 2.7. List of developing countries and territories by region and sub-region
Source: (UNSD, 2020[15]) and (OECD, 2020[16]).