Nepal raises nearly $90 million for flood recovery — Climate Home News
Nepal has raised nearly $90 million through a government fundraising campaign to address the consequences of the devastating Himalayan flood. Donations to the Prime Minister’s Relief Fund came from individuals and companies in Nepal and other countries, Climate Home News reports.
Manjeet Dhakal, an adviser to the least developed countries at UN climate talks, said contributions ranged from $5 to several million dollars. The fundraising is taking place while Nepal awaits a decision by the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage on its emergency request for $20 million.
Request to the UN fund
On August 31, Nepal’s finance and environment ministers appealed to the fund’s board to urgently allocate money to protect people and restore essential services after the disaster. According to the publication, the flood claimed about 1,450 lives, while more than 5,000 people are still considered missing.
Representatives of developing countries also called on the board’s co-chairs to convene an extraordinary meeting where a funding decision could be made. At the same time, despite informal online discussions, no board meeting with the authority to distribute money has yet been held. The next scheduled meeting is due to begin on December 15.
More current news is available on the UA.News Telegram channel Telegram.
Lack of recovery funding
According to Dhakal, Nepal’s request received a positive response, but the response mechanism is still under discussion. He questioned the fund’s ability to respond swiftly to disasters whose intensity and scale are increasing.
Wealthy countries have pledged $820 million to the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage, but not all of this money has yet been received. At the initial stage, the fund allocated $350 million for spending. Due to its limited budget and applications totaling nearly $3 billion, the fund said it would currently allocate no more than $20 million per project and has not yet approved funding for any of them.
The Nepalese government estimates recovery and reconstruction costs at $4.8 billion. Housing, roads, bridges, hospitals and hydropower plants in the affected area require repair and rebuilding. UN Secretary-General António Guterres called the level of funding available to the fund from wealthy states extremely low at the UN General Assembly and urged developed countries to ensure it operates at an appropriate scale.
Scientists from World Weather Attribution concluded that climate change contributed to a rock-ice avalanche that caused a massive flash flood in a river valley on the border between Nepal and Tibet.
