A first in climate finance: the UN Loss and Damage fund allocates $21.6 million to Nepal

The idea was argued over for decades: a global fund that pays for the damage climate change inflicts on countries that did least to cause it. It has now moved from communiqué to money. The UN's Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage has provisionally allocated $21.6 million to Nepal — its first-ever national disbursement — to support recovery after August's catastrophic floods and landslides, triggered by an ice and rock avalanche. The Nepalese government estimates losses of $2.7 billion and reconstruction needs above $4.7 billion, so the allocation is a beginning, not a settlement — Nepal will submit a formal proposal for board approval in December. But firsts matter in finance: a mechanism that exists on paper now has a first country, a first amount and a first process to copy.

SDG 13 · Climate action — Mechanism: funding & finance