Watch the webinar: International Climate Finance Perspectives from Canada and the Caribbean

It has become clear over the past few decades that the poorest developing countries are suffering the worst devastation from the climate crisis, in the form of droughts, flooding, and rising seas, despite being the least responsible for global warming. While the need for financial support for developing countries, particularly for climate change adaptation, has been acknowledged, financing from donor countries has chronically fallen short of UN targets. This webinar reviewed recent trends in climate financing for the poorest countries and recommended possible ways to resolve the financing shortfall.

Our panelists and moderator:

Dr. Spencer Thomas, Lead negotiator for climate change and biodiversity for Grenada, is currently the Vice Chair of the Clean Development Mechanism of the UNFCCC and the technology coordinator of the Alliance of Small Island States. He is a former Financial Secretary and Economic Policy Adviser in the Ministry of Finance of Grenada. Dr. Thomas holds a doctorate in Energy Economics from Howard University, master’s and bachelor’s degrees in Economics from Iowa State University and Howard University respectively, and a post-doctoral master’s degree in Telecommunications Regulation and Policy from the University of the West Indies. 

Brian Tomlinson is the Executive Director of AidWatch Canada, which focuses on issues related to Canadian and global aid priorities as well as global trends in the development effectiveness of civil society organizations (CSOs). Brian is an adjunct professor in the Department of International Development Studies at Dalhousie University. He facilitates several civil society Working Groups with the OECD Development Assistance Committee’s CSO Reference Group focusing on issues relating to donor policies and practices for Official Development Assistance (ODA). He retired in June 2011 as Senior Policy Analyst (Aid Policy) at the Canadian Council for International Co-operation (CCIC), the platform for Canadian CSOs in development cooperation, where he worked for 16 years.

Jennifer Bansard (Moderator) is a political scientist with expertise in climate, biodiversity, and urban governance, as well as the role of science in environmental governance. She works at the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU), which provides science-based advice on sustainability issues. Jennifer has an international academic education and holds Masters Degrees in Environment & Resource Management (VU Amsterdam, Netherlands), International Relations (Sciences Po Aix, France) and Applied Political Sciences (University of Freiburg, Germany). She is currently pursuing a PhD at the University of Potsdam. In her dissertation, she examines the emergence of “blue carbon,” a concept that refers to the carbon sequestration potential of coastal ecosystems, such as mangroves, seagrasses, and salt marshes.