French President Emmanuel Macron will host a two-day summit in Paris starting on Thursday, aimed at mobilizing more financial resources for the most vulnerable countries facing the impacts of climate change. The summit, dubbed as the New Global Financial Pact, will bring together around 50 heads of state and government, as well as representatives from international organizations, civil society, and the private sector.
The summit’s main objective is to reform the global financial system to make it more responsive and supportive of the needs and aspirations of developing countries, especially those in Africa, small island states and least developed countries. The summit will also seek to increase the climate finance flows from the developed countries to the developing ones, in line with their commitment to provide $100 billion per year by 2020.
The summit is expected to produce several concrete outcomes, such a new mechanism to allocate special drawing rights (SDRs), a form of international reserve asset created by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), to support low-income countries in their recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic and their transition to a low-carbon and resilient economy.
A new initiative to cancel or restructure the debt of the most vulnerable countries, in exchange for their commitment to invest in green and social projects that contribute to their sustainable development.