Financing climate action: The GCF country programme as a priority investment framework for Togo

The Green Climate Fund (GCF) Readiness programme is a funding programme to enhance country ownership and access to the fund. It seeks to strengthen the institutional capacities of National Designated Authorities (NDAs) or focal points as well Direct Access Entities to engage with the fund by providing them with financial resources. The fund also supports countries to plan for adaptation and build strategic frameworks to engage with the GCF (GCF, 2018). Through its National Designated Authority (NDA) – the country focal point for the GCF – Togo obtained funding under this programme. Togo’s readiness programme covers two components: The capacity building of national stakeholders (component 1) and the development of a ‘country programme’ (component 2). The second component aims to identify the country‘s investment priorities for actions to build resilience and reduce GHG emissions. The country programme is designed to serve as a framework for interactions between the GCF and the country in the future.

The activities defined for the development of the country programme involved the review of existing policies and strategies as well as the organisation of round tables, two multi-stakeholder consultation workshops, and a high-level validation meeting to approve the final document. Throughout this process, the priority sectors as well as certain flagship projects in each sector have been identified. The assessment of financing needs for these projects resulted in an estimate of the investment volume expected by Togo from the GCF in the short and medium term. The country programme was subject to two validation phases: i) a pre-validation involving all the actors involved in the development process; and ii) a final high-level validation at the end of 2018.

The preparation of the country programme document was executed between March 2017 and November 2018. It was based on: i) an inclusive and holistic scientific approach based primarily on an analysis of the climate and vulnerability profiles of the country, as well as climate change scenarios; ii) a multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral consultative process aimed at involving multiple stakeholders from the government, the private sector, academia, civil society and other relevant groups or sectors; and iii) the prioritisation of projects and programmes to be submitted to the GCF.

Togo´s formulation of a country programme qualifies as a good practice as the process has been science-based and involved multiple stakeholders. Also, it tackles climate change in a holistic manner through the adoption of a cross-sectoral approach.