Project News

Regional Dialogue on Domestic Preparation for NDC Development and Implementation

-Stocktaking of current national efforts to transform mitigation aspirations into actions and the role of international support-

Date: 14th November 2016, 10:00-12:00

Venue: COP22 Marrakech / Japan Pavilion

This Regional Dialogue had two-folded objectives:

• To foster sharing of country experiences and mutual learning of existing efforts/practices for domestic preparation towards NDC update and implementation among 3 middle income countries in Southeast Asia (Thailand, Indonesia, and Vietnam).
• To invite sharing of lessons by relevant global partnerships and technical assistance mitigation projects of international development partners in the region, and to collectively think through how to best support domestic NDC development and implementation.

Part I Country Experiences on Preparation of NDC Implementation

Co-Facilitators
Edwin Manansang	Advisor, CMEA(Indonesia)
Masato Kawanishi	Senior Advisor for Climate Change, JICA
Panelists
Medrilzam Medrilzam	Director, BAPPENAS (Indonesia)
Pham Van Tan	Deputy Director General, DMHCC/MONRE (Vietnam)
Rongphet Bunchuaidee	Manager, Technical Support Section, TGO (Thailand)

Part 1 of the Dialogue focused on country experiences to update country status and shared lessons surrounding domestic NDC preparation and implementation among the invited SEA countries.

Presentations by Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia tapped on various essential conditions and requirements to effectively move forward towards NDC implementation, including, inter alia, establishing robust monitoring/tracking system of measures taken, high-level political buy-in, striking mitigation-economy-poverty reduction nexus and integration of NDC into national development plan. In the meantime, practical challenges were shared by the participating countries, including limited private sector engagement, price competitiveness/high cost of low carbon technologies, institutionalization of MRV, cross-cutting coordination for domestic NDC mainstreaming process.

In the dialogue, countries exchanged views over how regional cooperation could accelerate in-country efforts. Remarks included possible replication of mitigation measures associated with common regional geographical endowments/features as part of south-south cooperation, while application of lessons from the achievement process of the Kyoto Protocol could be part of North-South cooperation. In view of domestic internal capacity within the participating country, support by the region to operationalization of domestic mechanisms (e.g. in-country climate change trust fund) was also suggested as another mode of regional cooperation to nurture and country ownership.

The interaction with the floor tapped on "the role of the market in NDC" and "domestic finance strategy" – for the former, while three countries were open to the concept of the market-based approaches, divergent responses were made including putting more priority on achievement of energy and transport policy serving as the basis for NDC, need for identifying appropriate means (e.g. carbon tax vs emission trading), while the need to interpret current provisions of the Paris Agreement and to align with the progress of the international negotiation was called for. As for the latter, responses included preference of using public finance including domestic resources to adaptation while inviting private finance to address mitigation, and mainstreaming of NDC into development plan as the pre-requisite for acquisition of domestic finance.

Take-Home Messages

• Engagement of high level, line ministries and relevant stakeholders serves an integral part of the concrete steps/processes taken towards NDC implementation.
• Securing financial sources (investment, funding), private sector engagement, low carbon technology deployment, cross-cutting coordination, public awareness/sensitization, potential developmental trade-offs of mitigation measures remain as part of common challenges.
• Nurturing stronger sense of ownership for NDC, capacity building, and progressive approach building on experiences of existing mitigation endeavors (e.g. CDMs, NAMAs) could be considered as early actions for replication.
• Provided shared geographical endowments/features, south-south cooperation is often deemed more effective as a regional cooperation than north-south.
• Mainstreaming NDC/climate change into development plan and its implementation contributes to strike nexus between pre-2020 mitigation actions and NDC nexus.

Part 2 Role of International Support in Best Leveraging Country Efforts

Co-Facilitators
Pham Van Tan	Deputy Director General, DMHCC/MONRE (Vietnam)
Ichiro Sato	Deputy Director, Office for Climate Change, JICA
Panelists
Satoshi Iemoto	former JICA Chief Technical Advisor (Thailand)
Jun Ichihara	JICA Chief Advisor (Indonesia)
Koji Fukuda	JICA Chief Technical Advisor (Vietnam)
Sven Egbers	GIZ Advisor / Mitigation Partnership
Pankaj Bhatia	WRI Deputy Director, Climate Change Program / NDC Partnership
Makoto Kato	Principal Researcher, OECC Japan

Part 2 of the Dialogue focused on exchange over the role of international support and its mode of cooperation/coordination to best support NDC implementation among country advisors of JICA climate change technical assistance projects in the region, relevant global Partnerships and a global think-tank.

Participants shared practical challenges including, inter alia, access to financial resources, synchronization between political-technical processes, ensuring genuine engagement beyond climate change focal point agency and department. It was also emphasized the need to adopt build-in flexibility among support modality of international partners by applying tiered approach for different country status for NDC preparation, as well as possible change of project design to better align with the dynamic circumstances surrounding mitigation especially after the adoption of the Paris Agreement. Also, anticipation for the newly established NDC partnership to assume coordination of existing on-going relevant partnerships and initiatives was stated.

During the Dialogue session, co-organization of relevant events, co-financing of activities with mutual interests were suggested as potential means of coordination/synergies towards NDC implementation, as well as highlighting the global partnership to streamline knowledge management.

Take-Home Messages

• There are already a number of on-going programs, initiatives and partnerships to support NDCs, and striking synergies, coordination and cooperation are crucial. The newly launched NDC Partnership is expected to assume such coordination functions.
• Multi-stakeholder engagement is indispensable for effective NDC implementation. Such engagement goes beyond conventional cooperation among climate change focal-point ministries across countries, but should encompass line ministries, non-state actors including municipalities, private sectors and academia. In particular, high-level political coordination among line ministries is crucial for mainstreaming NDCs into development planning.
• In light of the observed diversity of preparatory steps and country circumstances surrounding NDCs across participating countries, adoption of tiered approach to support NDCs implementation may be effective way foward.