Russian experts shared their experience working on climate finance
The workshop Leveraging and Managing Climate Finance for Sustainable Development in MICs took place in Almaty, Kazakhstan on 14 November 2019 in the framework of the Russia-UNDP Trust Fund for Development’s regional project to enhance access to climate finance and knowledge exchange across the EECCA countries on leveraging and managing climate finance.
Three leading Russian experts in climate finance took part in the event. Michael Yulkin, General Director of the Centre for Environmental Investment provided an idea about domestic climate finance landscapes and explained the core of the climate finance in Russia. Georgy Safonov, Director of the Center for Environmental and Natural Resource Economics, The National Research University - Higher School of Economics, pointed out several case studies in Russian forestry sector displaying leveraging private investment to climate action. Elena Shonya, Affiliated Researcher at the Energy Politics Research Centre, European University at Saint- Petersburg spoke about promoting Green SME Financing by banks and shared experience on lessons learned.
The workshop provided an opportunity to government representatives, practitioners and development partners from the EECCA countries to exchange practical experiences and ideas on setting up new financing frameworks for climate investment based on combining and sequencing international, domestic, public and private finance. The participants discussed specific case studies on climate finance blending with IFIs, vertical funds and private sector for a greater SDG impact.