Capacity-building is one of the key means of implementation of the Convention and Paris Agreement. The capacity-building framework for developing countries and the Paris Agreement highlight that capacity-building should be country-driven, based on countries’ needs and priorities, and foster country ownership. Have capacity-building efforts, in practice, lived up to this promise? Does capacity-building ‘supply’ match ‘demand’?
Efforts to enable country-driven capacity-building and foster country ownership can be related to addressing technical and organizational bottle necks as well as systemic transformations. Identification and discussion of challenges and actionable solutions is timely and relevant to global efforts to build capacities to address climate change.
The interactive event was the second in a new public event series hosted by the UNFCCC secretariat. The Capacity-building Talks aim to facilitate discussion and provision of information among actors and stakeholders involved in climate capacity-building. These talks offer a space to exchange knowledge and share best practices, including with a view to strengthening the focus of and work on capacity-building within the UNFCCC process.
Description/Objective
The 2nd capacity-building talk shed a light on country-driven capacity-building and ownership and provided insights and solutions for providers and recipients of capacity-building to foster ownership and thereby facilitate more effective and sustainable capacity-building.
The virtual session brought together actors involved in capacity-building projects and programmes, and facilitated the sharing of key insights and best practices to effectively address the actual needs and priorities of developing countries through enhancing ownership. It will directly contribute to the ongoing work on capacity-building in the UNFCCC process through promoting discussions and solutions on a topic of key importance to Parties and observers.
The findings from the discussion are expected to feed into the work of the Paris Committee on Capacity-building, which, under its current workplan, is collating, reviewing and sharing experience, good practices and lessons learned related to enhancing the ownership of developing countries of building and maintaining capacities.
Besides providing space for general reflections and perspectives on country-driven capacity-building and ownership, the session covered the following aspects:
Organizational, logistical and technical bottle necks to enhanced ownership of capacity-building, including at the national, subnational and local levels.
Systemic challenges to fostering country ownership, including discussions on the role of providers and recipients.
Solutions and good practices to an effective deployment of country-driven capacity-building actions attuned to the needs and priorities of countries.
The discussion will focus on organizational bottlenecks and systemic challenges related to fostering ownership of capacity-building, as well as experiences, best practices and lessons learned.
Shehnaaz Moosa, Director, CDKN, SouthSouthNorth
Rocío Cóndor-Golec, Forestry Officer, FAO
Orlando Rey Santos, Climate Change Advisor, Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment of the Republic of Cuba
14:50 – 14:55
Break
14:55– 15:25
Open Plenary Discussion
This moderated open discussion session invites participants to join the discussion, either by requesting the floor or through the chat.
Towards the end of the timeslot participants will be asked to share their key takeaways via Menti.
15:25 – 15:30
What is Next?
Alejandro Kilpatrick, UNFCCC secretariat
Panelists
Shehnaaz Moosa
Shehnaaz Moosa is the Director of the Climate and Development Knowledge Network programme and is a Director at SouthSouthNorth. Shehnaaz has overseen SSN’s Southern Africa Climate Finance Partnership Programme since 2016, focused on improving climate finance access in southern Africa. Previously, Shehnaaz was the African Regional Coordinator for CDKN (2013-2017) and the Climate Resilience Lead for the Climate Resilient Infrastructure Development Facility (CRIDF), which delivers small-scale water infrastructure in Southern Africa. She previously consulted on a range of projects to the public sector including managing the National Strategy for Sustainable Development in South Africa. Shehnaaz holds a BSc, an MSc and a PhD in Engineering.
Rocío Cóndor-Golec
Rocío Cóndor-Golec is a Forestry Officer in the Forestry Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. She has 20 years of experience working at the national and the international level in the field of Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use sector on measurement, reporting, and verification under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the enhanced transparency framework under the Paris Agreement. Before joining the FAO in 2012, she worked for the governments of Peru and Italy. At the FAO, she started coordinating the capacity development and south-south cooperation initiatives for the Mitigation of Climate Change in Agriculture. Currently, she is coordinating the "Building global capacity to increase transparency in the forest sector (CBIT-Forest)” global project financed by the Capacity-building Initiative for Transparency trust fund of the Global Environment Facility. Rocio holds a Masters Degree in Environmental Science and a Ph.D. in Forest Ecology.
Orlando Rey Santos
Orlando Rey Santos is Climate Advisor in the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment of the Republic of Cuba since 2014. From 1999 to 2013 he was Director of the Environmental Directorate. Orlando has been attending the UN Climate negotiations since COP 13 in Bali (2007) and is an expert on the UN review process (Biannual Reports and Biannual Update Reports). Currently, Orlando is involved in the design and implementation of the national agenda for adaptation and mitigation, and he serves as a Member of the Kyoto Protocol Compliance Committee.
