E3G’s new report, Banking on Reform: Aligning the development banks with the Paris Climate Agreement, shows that the Inter-American Development Bank is a leader amongst the MDB’s in aligning with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. However, none of the MDBs has been shown to be transformational across the different areas covered, demonstrating MDBs still need to work to integrate climate across their operations.
Together, the major Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) have committed to align their financial flows with the Paris Agreement on climate change. MDBs have an important role in providing advice to countries on economic pathways and leveraging private capital. In this report, we analyse the progress of the main six MDBs against their commitment.
Key findings
- The Inter-American Development Bank is a leader among the group of MDBs, especially in technical assistance for supporting client countries in implementing the Paris Agreement. The European Investment Bank and World Bank Group also perform reasonably well.
- According to the MDBs own estimates, they committed more than US$27 billion in climate finance in 2016. However, some of the banks are still investing in fossil fuels. Revision of sectoral strategies over the next few years offers a key opportunity to align with the Paris Agreement.
- MDBs should do more to share learning with one another on best practices and pool data to inform collective progress.
- For all the MDB’s limited data was available on the green/brown energy finance ratio. To improve transparency on climate-related disclosures it is recommended the MDBs begin tracking and self-reporting on their alignment with the Paris Agreement.
- Among the 16 factors considered, the scores on energy finance are particularly diverse:
Ratio of Energy-related Climate Finance to Fossil Finance Directed to Developing Countries (2015-16 Average), from High to Low:
Overall scorecard against the 16 criteria in the analysis:
Note: Blank cells indicate N/A (not applicable) or not ranked. Please see report chapters for further details.
Download the full report
Banking on Reform: Aligning the development banks with the Paris Climate Agreement (5.5MB)
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Download the report’s methodology
Methodologies and indicators report: alignment with the Paris Climate Agreement (532 KB)
