World Water Week: “Blended finance for water and climate. When theory meets practice”
Water Environment & Blue Economy
27 August 2021. The online session “Blended finance for water and climate: when theory meets practice” will take place on Friday, 27th of August from 14:30 to 15:55 CET in the framework of World Water Week 2021. The event is co-organised by Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), Agence Française de Développement (AFD) , Organisation for Economic Co-operation , Development (OECD) , French Water Partnership (FWP). , 1001 Fontaines, Development Bank of Latin America, Convergence Blended Finance, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), Safi Sana, The Nature Conservancy (TNC), and Waterpreneurs.
Vast additional public and private funds will be required to deliver the Paris Agreement and achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015. Blended finance is an important financing solution to accelerate action, but it has not reached scale for water-related investments. This session will be an extraordinary opportunity to discuss lessons learned and how to overcome barriers to scale blended finance. In addition, attendees will learn more about water-related investments as an essential means to enhance climate resilience and achieve the SDGs, as well as to understand the role that blended finance can play in helping to bridge the financing gap in water-related investments through case studies and roundtables.
Converging with the ongoing climate crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic is further exacerbating this financing shortfall and underlining the critical importance of Water Supply, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH). In this context, blended finance, -the strategic use of development finance to mobilize additional finance toward sustainable development in developing countries-, is emerging as an important financing solution to accelerate action for water-related investments, but it has failed so far to reach scale.
