The World Bank says it will allocate $200 billion to support countries taking action against climate change between 2021 and 2025, the organization announced on Monday. The funding represents double the amount allocated in the original five-year investment plan that was put in place after the 2015 Paris agreement.
The new plan will help boost funding for “adaptation and resilience,” as the organization aims to further recognize the impacts of climate change on peoples lives, particularly in countries with high poverty, the organization said.
Climate change has become a pressing issue following the release of a damning report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) earlier this year. The report explained the importance of limiting the rise in global temperatures to just 1.5 degrees Celsius, and also outlined steps that governments can take to ensure that the planet does not heat to 2 degrees.
“Climate change is an existential threat to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable. These new targets demonstrate how seriously we are taking this issue, investing and mobilizing $200 billion over five years to combat climate change,” World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim said. “We are pushing ourselves to do more and to go faster on climate and we call on the global community to do the same.”
The $200 billion in funding will include $100 billion in direct financing from the World Bank Group and an additional $100 billion in combined funding from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA).
World governments are meeting at the COP24 UN climate conference in Katowice, Poland this week and next week to determine a plan to implement the Paris accord, The Guardian reported. During the conference’s opening ceremony on Monday, renown environmental activist David Attenborough warned that climate change is “our greatest threat in thousands of years.”
“The world’s people have spoken,” he said. “Their message is clear. Time is running out. They want you—the decision makers to act now.”