By Axel Reiserer
The President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), Odile Renaud-Basso, will join finance ministers, central bank governors and heads of international organisations in Venice from Thursday to Sunday, to participate in the G20 Meeting and the G20 International Conference on Climate.
Organised by the Italian G20 presidency, this conference aims to promote global dialogue and advance common understanding to tackle climate change.
The EBRD President will share her thoughts following the Bank’s shareholders’ recent decision to align all its activities with the goals of the Paris Agreement from the end of 2022, aiming to accelerate decarbonisation across its regions, helping them to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.
Ms Renaud-Basso said: “As the lifting of public health measures is supporting a rebound of the global economy, it is all the more important that we learn the lessons from the recent Covid-19 pandemic and draw the right conclusions. Given the challenges we are facing, the recovery must be linked closely with sustainable growth and investing in energy transition, to accelerate the pace towards net zero across all regions in the world.”
Global cooperation of nations and multilateral development banks (MDBs) is a major contributor to this agenda. A new report, published last week, shows that MDB climate finance rose to a total of US$ 66 billion last year from US$ 61.6 billion in 2019. Of this, 58 per cent – or US$ 38 billion – was committed to low- and middle-income economies. Together, MDB climate finance and climate co-finance totalled more than US$ 151 billion.
Italy, a founding member of the EBRD as well as a major shareholder and business partner, is holding the G20 presidency this year and has defined people, planet and prosperity as its three priorities to find swift answers to the most pressing emergencies and look beyond the crisis.
The G20 was established as an international forum that brings together the world’s major economies. Today, its members account for more than 80 per cent of the world’s GDP, 75 per cent of global trade and 60 per cent of the population of the planet.
