Climate financing by MDBs hit USD 35.2bn in 2017

The world's six leading multilateral development banks (MDBs) have provided a record USD 35.2 billion (EUR 29.9bn) of climate finance in 2017, an increase of 28% compared to 2016.

This is the largest sum since the multilateral banks started jointly tracking the data in 2011.

The funds in 2017 were mainly directed to Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and East Asia and the Pacific. According to the banks' latest joint report, 79% of the total climate financing last year supported climate mitigation projects, while the remaining 21% was invested in climate adaptation projects.

These climate projects attracted an additional USD 51.7 billion of financing last year.

In terms of types of financial instruments, 81% of the 2017 total was committed through loans, while other instruments included policy-based lending, grants, guarantees, equity and lines of credit.

The six banks are the African Development Bank (AfDB), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the European Investment Bank (EIB), the Inter-American Development Bank Group (IDBG) and the World Bank Group (WBG).

EIB vice-president Jonathan Taylor said in a statement today that "the EU Bank is well on track to fulfil its commitment to increase climate finance in developing countries to 35% of total financing by 2020, to help turn the Paris agreement into reality."

(USD 1 = EUR 0.849)

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