by Benito Müller. Managing Director, Oxford Climate Policy, Director ecbi, Convener International Climate Policy Research, Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford

The ecbi was founded in 2005 by the late Saleemul Huq (IIED) as Head of the then “Workshop Programme”, and Benito Müller (OCP) as ecbi Director and Head of the “Fellowship Programme” (for more on the ecbi click here). During the 20^th Anniversary Oxford Seminar dinner on 27 August 2025 in the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford, the ecbi Director looked back over the two decades of ecbi activities and highlighted some key accomplishments. This post is based on this summary.

2006-7: Adaptation Fund

The first discernible impact of the ecbi Fellowship Programme was on the operationalisation of the Kyoto Protocol Adaptation Fund in 2007 which took up a number of suggestions of two publications by ecbi Fellows:

• “Operationalising the Kyoto Protocol’s adaptation fund: A new proposal“(2006, lead: Mohammad Reazuddin, LDC Chair), and
• “On the Road to Bali: operationalising the Kyoto Protocol Adaptation Fund“(2007, lead: Enele Sopoaga, AOSIS Chair).

2010-12 Establishing the Standing Committee on Finance

The August 2010 Fellowship proposed “A General Blueprint for reforming the UNFCCC Financial Mechanism” including the proposal to establish “a standing committee (‘Finance Committee’)” under the COP. Farrukh Khan, one of the 2010 Fellows, presented the proposal in September 2010 to a meeting of high-ranking representatives from 46 countries in Geneva. COP 16 (November/December 2010, Cancun) decided to establish a Standing Committee on Finance (SCF) to assist the COP in exercising its functions with respect to the Financial Mechanism of the Convention. But it left open how exactly this should be done.

The August 2011 ecbi Policy Brief “What Functions? What Form? Operationalizing the  Standing Committee” by Farrukh Khan and Benito Müller was looking looking at the COP functions which the Standing Committee was meant to assist considering, in particular, how such assistance could enhance the implementation of the Financial Mechanism. Based on this analysis, the brief put forward detailed recommendations concerning the functions and the form of the Standing Committee. The SCF was operationalised in the following 12 months, holding its inaugural meeting in September 2012 (Bangkok), where the members were presented with a Note on Reforming the Financial Mechanism reflecting thoughts put together by the 2010 ecbi Fellowship.

The ecbi continued to work with the SCF. For example, in May 2013, at the first SCF Forum Konrad von Ritter and Diann Black-Layne presented their ecbi Policy Brief ‘Crowdfunding for Climate Change: a new source of finance for climate action at the local level?‘. And in June 2015 the ecbi organised a meeting in Bonn in conjunction with the 10th SCF meeting to discuss The Adaptation Fund in the new climate finance regime Its role in relationship with the GCF, having previously made a submission to the SCF on Institutional linkages and relations between the Adaptation Fund and other institutions under the Convention.

2009-2014 Developing and Operationalising “Enhanced Direct Access” 

The evolution of the ideas behind the concept of “Enhanced Direct Access” (EDA) and the role of ecbi have been documented in the ecbi Brief History of EDA (Dec 2015) which traces the idea back to a number of historic precursors, such as the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) under the Marshall Plan, the World Bank Kecamatan Development Program in Indonesia, and the Brazilian Amazon Fund. It then follows how the idea evolved under the Bali Action Plan, the Transitional Committee for the design of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) and finally, the GCF Board, culminating in the establishment of a GCF Enhancing Direct Access pilot at the 8th GCF Board meeting in Barbados (18 October 2014) with the support of GCFB members Dipak Dasgupta (India) and Amb. Jan Cedergren (Sweden) both long-time ecbi supporters.

The updated second edition of the Brief History (July 2021)includes a summary account of EDA programmes that have been implemented under the UNFCCC/Paris Agreement Green Climate Fund and Adaptation Fund, as well as the French SUNREF (Sustainable Use of Natural Resources and Energy Finance) programme, and ends with a forward looking section on ‘performance-based’ EDA.

In December 2024, the ecbi Director attended a Workshop on Enhanced Direct Access (EDA) for Locally Led Adaptation (LLA) organised by Anju Sharma of the Global Center on Adaptation together with the Green Climate Fund and the Adaptation Fund in Nairobi Kenya, which has given rise to work on an ecbi Concept Note on Local Enhanced Direct Access (forthcoming)

2014 – 2021 Common Time Frames

Following discussions at the Oxford Seminar (August 2014), the Co-chairs of the Paris Agreement negotiation (ADP) Artur Runge-Metzger and Kishan Kumarsingh (both of whom having attended the 2014 Oxford Seminar) stressed in their Scenario Note (8 Oct. 2014) that “it will be important in the October session, to further clarify and flesh out the operational aspects of the agreement. Key challenges that will need focussed attention in our work include: deepening the understanding on the longer-term cycle of contributions/ commitments, including its periodicity (length) and the functions of the steps proposed, such as any periodical consideration or assessment and review”. A number of 2014 Fellows then published an ecbi Concept Note on “A Dynamic Contribution Cycle: Sequencing contributions in the 2015 PARIS Agreement”(October 2014)

On 6 November 2014, Brazil officially submitted its Views on the Elements of the New Agreement under the Convention applicable to all Parties to the UN climate change negotiations regarding the new agreement which is meant to be agreed on in Paris at the end of 2015. The submission contained a “Dynamic Contribution Cycle” (for more, click here).

The Paris Agreement, adopted in 2015 left the issue of time-frames open to be negotiated with the Paris Agreement Rulebook. The ecbi continued to provide input in its Seminars and through its publications:

• February 2018 Common Time Frames: What & Why?
• October 2018 Common Time Frames Creating Space for Ambition in the Paris Agreement Rulebook
• June 2019 New Delhi Seminar on Common Time Frames.
• August 2019 The Dynamic Contribution Cycle: Enhancing Ambition on the Basis of Equity
• September 2020: Senior climate negotiators agree: Agreement on common time frames should be a priority for COP26.
• July 2021 Common Time Frames: Reducing the Options for a Decision in Glasgow.
• September 2021 Rolling Time Frames … the Article 4.10 landing zone in Glasgow

It was only at COP26 in Glasgow (Nov. 2021) that the Common Timeframe finally landed in the Paris Rulebook

2022 Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage

Following a presentation at the September 2022 Oxford Seminar on “Funding Arrangements for Loss and Damage” by Michai Robertson AOSIS Finance Lead Negotiator, the ecbi Director and two of the 2022 Fellows (Amb. Diann Black-Layne, HOD Antigua and Barbuda), Kishan Kumarsingh (HOD Trinidad and Tobago, now Head of the ecbi Fellowship and Trust-building Programme) wrote Elements of a Pilot Loss and Damage Response Fund. This was followed by three OCP/ecbi posts on the topic of L&D response in the same year before the COP:

Time to Respond! 4 November 2022

Elements for a Pilot Loss and Damage Response Fund 17 October 2022

The time is ripe … for serious discussions on finance to address and indeed respond to L&D through a dedicated pilot fund 17 October 2022

On 20 November 2022 in Sharm el Sheikh, the COP/CMA decided to establish a “Loss and Damage Response Fund” (for more click here), followed by another post on:

Some Thoughts on Access Modalities for the new Loss and Damage Response Fund 16 November 2023