The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), as the development arm of the United Nations, works in some 170 countries and territories, helping to empower lives and build resilient nations.
In Sri Lanka, UNDP has been working as a key development partner of choice since 1967, to achieve sustainable human development in economic, social and environmental fronts. Working closely with the Government at national, regional and local levels, and civil society and the private sector, UNDP aims at eradicating extreme poverty, and reducing inequalities and exclusion to protect both people and the planet.
Climate change is the single greatest challenge humanity has ever faced, threatening water and food security, health, livelihoods, and the safety of billions of people. The global response to this challenge must be just, inclusive, and leave no one behind, while seeking the most efficient climate solutions that advance multiple Sustainable Development Goals at once.
UNDP, Sri Lanka is assisting the Government to work towards a sustainable Sri Lanka building up institutional, legal and individual capacities to respond to the effects of climate change and natural and man-made disasters, by exploring the potential of renewable energy and energy and resource efficiency in responsible consumption and production, while supporting reform and modernization of the environmental management systems, protection of our biodiversity. Climate change is one of the priority areas for UNDP Sri Lanka. Support with signature solutions is provided to the government in a mix of policy advice, technical assistance, finance, reporting and further extension of benefits to affected by implementing pilot projects and programmes.
Sri Lanka was one of the first few countries to ratify the Paris Agreement in 2016 which is the most trailed climate initiative of the decade. Under the Paris Agreement, countries have committed to reducing Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions to limit the earth’s temperature rise and implement solutions to adapt to the effects of climate change impacts. These commitments are declared as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), and countries are required to revise their NDCs every five years to reduce GHG emissions. The updating of NDCs and their implementation presents countries with significant opportunities to align their climate and development agendas to promote sustainable growth, but also presents challenges in reinventing policies and operations and mobilizing enough investment. The ‘Climate Promise’ initiative of UNDP assists countries to undertake an inclusive and transparent process to revise and submit enhanced NDCs by the end of 2020.
Building on UNDP’s extensive climate and sustainable development portfolio and partnerships with other UN and development agencies, public and private sector entities, academia and civil society groups, UNDP Sri Lanka is to assist the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) to revise country’s NDC targets. Partnered with the Climate Change Secretariat (CCS) under the purview of the Ministry of Environment (MoE) in this important country’s first NDC revision, will strengthen the readiness of GoSL and its people for climate change ownership. This important NDC revision will be led by working groups relevant to the sectorial and/or respective ministries under the guidance of CCS. The revision will be carried out for climate change mitigation, adaptation including loss and damage.
The costing of NDSs has now become increasingly important for a few main purposes. Mainly the government and key policy makers wish to understand the costs of proposed climate actions and this is needed to compare with the local investment capacities to assess what the country can achieve in the given local context. This analysis can then be improved as an investment and financing strategy for bridging the gaps to achieve NDDs and for the purpose of communicating for external support requirements. This will also facilitate strategic rearrangement of available resources for climate actions which often have multiple co-benefits and interlinkages for sustainable development aspects.
Given its importance, UNDP Sri Lanka in collaboration with the CCS seeks to recruit a cost & investment analyst/expert with a climate change background to support the GoSL to technically guide and lead the costing and analysing investment requirements to achieve its climate ambitions.
SCOPE AND OBJECTIVES
Although the climate actions have direct and indirect cost-benefits and co-benefits, identification of the exact investment required to achieve committed actions and the investment gaps is crucial for the GoSL to communicate for various opportunities including donor support, climate finance and other market mechanisms. Under the Climate Promise Workplan for Sri Lanka, UNDP-Sri Lanka is planning to hire an NDC costing expert (home-based/Colombo) to help the Government of Sri Lanka to assess the costing and investment needs to achieve NDC mitigation, adaptation and L&D actions identified under the NDC revision process. This will help Sri Lanka strengthen political buy-in and societal ownership over the current NDC enhancement process. The NDC costing expert (The Consultant) will work remotely (and physically wherever possible) and conduct consultations with relevant agencies including Ministry of Environment, Ministry of Finance, the Department of National Planning, External Resource Department various sub-working groups and committees appointed for revising NDCs &all other-line ministries and agencies responsible for the implementation of the identified NDC actions, and.
The Consultant will play a key role by bringing in overall expertise and knowledge on climate finance and technical expertise to guide the working groups to adapt to a more rational, scientific and systematic approach to access and quantify the costs of proposed NDCs and NDC actions wherever possible. Further responsibilities under this consultancy assignment are detailed in ‘Section C. Responsibilities’