Australia finally pledges to GCF, fund managers barely notice

You might have heard the big news this afternoon: Australia finally pledged to the Green Climate Fund, as they should have done weeks ago. It was $165.8 million and they didn’t even say if it was apart from their aid program, while most sources stating it will actually come from there.

However, apparently there is a bit of a miscommunication between the Australian Department of Treasury and those good folks managing the Fund, because they said they received nothing. Don’t rush your calls to South Korea, folks, there might be a reasonable explanation for all of this.

As you might have noticed, Australian pledge was as shameful as the prices for coffee at every COP venue ever. While Panama, with only a fraction of Australia’s GDP, pledged $1 million to the Fund, here comes the Aussies to give $165.8 millions, like that’s reason to throw a party at them.

I think the Green Climate Fund board was expecting something bigger from a big fish like Australia. If you hop into them, tell them to check their spam box, maybe the pledge is there.

Now, Tony Abbott is not exactly your climate-lover, tree-hugger kind of politician, and yes, he can be sort of a problem to pretty-much-everyone-who-loves coral reefs, the atmosphere and pretty much this whole planet, but their GCF pledge is going beyond the line.

Speaking to a Mexican delegate last week, he was telling me how every country is sovereign and should decide on its own whether to pledge or not, but nevertheless they decided to give $10 million to the fund, just to show they care.

And Panama, dear one, don’t get me started again. I’ve already praised them for their $1 million voluntary pledge to the fund (as was Mexico’s, Mongolia’s and several more) but this just makes me think again: wow, Australia. You didn’t even try.

Nor did New Zealand, by the way, which pledged $2.3 million, even less than Mexico and barely more than Panama.

I’m not saying this to bash Latin American countries as if they were this poor nations (I’m a Latin American myself), but as a reference point. Let me give you the facts.

Let’s check what GDP per capita looks like for Australia, New Zealand, Mexico and Panama.

Do you see that flat gray lines at the bottom of the graph: there’s Panama and Mexico. Yet Mexico’s is almost four times New Zealand’s pledge. WTH New Zealand? There are still Tolkien movies around!

And we are still to understand if this Australian pledge will be apart from their usual aid budget (which, from what they have said so far during COP and before, won’t be), so there goes the Australian idea of something nice and pretty.

As my collague David Tong wrote, Australian media reported that:

Australia has defended its lack of support for the Green Climate Fund, saying that it will instead support climate change measures through its overseas aid budget, much of which goes to neighbouring Asian and Pacific countries.

Furthermore, ABC Australia reported that

The money, which will be paid over four years from Australia’s aid program, will go to the UN’s Green Climate Fund, which aims to fund projects in poorer countries.

And BTW, that fund was just cut $8 billion dollars shorter this year.

So, in case you know any member of the GCF, tell them: don’t despair. Maybe they confused Australia’s pledge with interest earnings or some silly contribution. As far as we know, with that lousy amount, maybe someone tripped over in a Monaco casino and spilled that in change.