At its first session (Berlin, March/April 1995), the COP established the financial
procedures of the Convention as well as four trust funds, namely:
- The Special Trust Fund for the Core Administrative Budget of the UNFCCC (the
"core budget";
- The Special Trust Fund for Facilitating Participation of Parties in the UNFCCC
Process (the "participation fund");
- The Special Trust Fund for the Voluntary Supplementary Financing of the approved
activities under the UNFCCC (the "trust fund for supplementary activities");
- The Special Trust Fund for the Host Country Contribution to the UNFCCC (the
"Bonn Fund").
The core budget is funded by indicative contributions from all Parties, based
on the United Nations scale of assessment. The financial procedures also call
for Parties to make voluntary contributions to the core budget, the participation
fund, and the fund for supplementary activities. The SBI regularly reviews the
status of contributions to the funds.
Every two years, the Executive Secretary proposes a programme budget to the
SBI, setting out the proposed activities of the secretariat for the coming biennium
and the funds needed to cover these. The SBI considers the proposal, and forwards
a recommended programme budget to the COP for its approval. The financial procedures
require the Executive Secretary to provide interim and final reports on the allocation
of funds and on their use.
At SBI 12 (June 2000), Parties initiated a discussion on how to respond to
the late payment of contributions. This discussion continued at SBI 13 part I
(September 2000) and a draft decision was forwarded to SBI 13 part II (meeting
together with COP 6 in The Hague, November 2000) for further consideration. In
view of time constraints, however, Parties decided to postpone further discussion
until after COP 6.
The SBI also considers other financial and administrative matters under this
item, including the implementation of the headquarters agreement of the secretariat
and the institutional linkage between the UNFCCC and the United Nations.