Kick-off meeting of JICA-NRES Joint Technical Cooperation Project to Tackle Climate Change

Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), in collaboration with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environmental Sustainability (NRES) of Malaysia, will hold the first Joint Coordinating Committee (JCC) meeting for the "Project for strengthening capacity pertaining to national reporting obligation to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) under the Enhanced Transparency Framework" on 26^th February 2025 at the Royale Chulan Kuala Lumpur Hotel. At this JCC meeting, the project's future activity plan will be discussed..

・Project background/objectives
Climate change is a major global challenge that requires urgent actions from each country. To tackle climate change, the Paris Agreement was adopted in 2015, through which the enhanced transparency framework (ETF) was established. Under the ETF, all parties, including developing countries, are required to submit the biennial transparency report (BTR) every two years. The BTR includes information on national inventory reports (NIR), progress towards Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), policies and measures, capacity-building needs, etc.

It is challenging specifically for developing countries including Malaysia to transition from the previous framework to the ETF under the Paris Agreement as they face more stringent reporting obligations than before. To overcome the difficulties, Malaysia established the National GHG Center under the NRES and successfully submitted its first BTR on 31^st December 2024. Nevertheless, continuous improvement is essential for Malaysia to make its future BTR submission more effective and of higher quality.

This JICA-NRES joint project, which started from October 2024, aims to strengthen Malaysian technical and institutional capacity to prepare BTRs, enhance national capacity for the regular development of greenhouse gas (GHG) inventories, and strengthen its capacity to estimate Fluorinated gas (F-gas) emissions. The project will continue until October 2027.

・Workshops prior to the first JCC meeting
Before the first JCC meeting, JICA experts held several workshops in December 2024. The workshops addressed the topic of development of GHG inventory, NDC tracking and how to calculate F-gas emissions, etc. Members from NRES and other relevant stakeholders actively participated in the workshops and had opportunities to learn from Japan's experiences. More workshops plan to be held during the project after the official agreement in the JCC meeting.

For details/inquiry, kindly contact:
JICA long-term expert
Mr. KASUYA Yasuhiro
yasuhiro.kasuya.jica1▲gmail.com
※Please convert ▲ to ＠.