President Park Geun-hye plans to attend a global climate summit in New York next Tuesday, a day before delivering a keynote speech at the U.N. General Assembly. During the conference that will bring together leaders from about 140 nations, Park will reaffirm Seoul’s pledge to take an active role in fighting climate change.
The country’s hosting of a U.N. climate fund may give some weight to her commitment. In 2012, Korea was selected to be home to the Green Climate Fund, which was established in 2011 with the aim of channeling aid from industrialized countries into projects designed to help developing states cope with climate change and pursue low-carbon growth. The secretariat of the 190-member GCF began work last December in Songdo, a newly developed international town in Incheon.
During the summit to be hosted by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Park is expected to pledge Seoul’s substantial contribution to the climate fund. The GCF is seeking to raise an initial $10 billion by the end of the year and plans to increase the yearly collection to $100 billion by 2020. Developing nations want to receive $15 billion in pledges from rich countries this year to finance projects like solar power and geothermal energy.
The process of securing the fund’s first capitalization, however, has not been going smoothly. The GCF had received $55 million, mainly for its own administration and work to help countries plan how to use the climate finance it would distribute, until German Chancellor Angela Merkel promised $1 billion to it in July. Fund officials have called on other rich members to follow Germany’s example and make appropriate contributions. Their request is expected to have a more urgent tone in the run-up to a first pledge meeting of potential donors in November, which will be followed by the U.N. climate talks in Peru in December.
According to officials here, Seoul has so far paid $12 million in its initial contribution to the climate fund. The $1 billion pledge by Germany, one of the countries that competed with Korea to host the GCF headquarters, seems to be putting pressure on Seoul to additionally promise a substantial amount to the fund this year. Park’s attendance at the upcoming climate summit will be a proper ― maybe inevitable ― occasion to do so.
In the face of growing fiscal strains, however, Korean financial officials appear to differ in their views on the appropriate additional amount the country should pledge. Some argue that, as the host of the GCF secretariat, Korea should contribute as much as Germany. Others note the sum needs to be set at a more moderate level, considering the country’s unfavorable economic conditions.
It is true that Korea is still classified as a developing country under the U.N. convention on climate change, carrying less financial responsibility than other major advanced nations. But the country needs to go beyond the conventional framework and be more active in contributing to the capitalization of the GCF, particularly as it seeks a bridging role between developed and developing states in the battle against global warming. It seems a reasonable argument that Korea’s pledge ought to be equivalent to Germany’s in relative terms of their economic sizes.
