The 2008 ecbi Regional Workshop for South and South East Asia in Male was attended by participants from Bangladesh, Indonesia, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.
European Capacity Building Initiative
ecbi Publications
ecbi's Publications and Policy Analysis Unit (PPAU) generates information and advice for developing country negotiators that is relevant to the climate negotiations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Developing countries often lack the economic and institutional capacity for policy analysis. If negotiators are unable to engage proactively by submitting proposals, responding to proposals from other States, and assessing the impact of global climate policy decisions on their individual States, progress in the negotiations can be hampered by the lack of alternatives and uncertainity. The differences in analytic capacity between developing countries and the industrialised world are often profound – developing countries lack support from organisations like the OECD, for instance, which has an immense apparatus producing thorough and focused reports, including direct advice on future policy responses to each of member country.
ecbi publications aim to be relevant to ongoing negotiations under the UNFCCC, timely, and trustworthy. PPAU works with negotiators from developing countries, sometimes through Editorial Committees, to identify UNFCCC issues where further analysis and policy advice is needed. Global experts are then teamed up with negotiators from devleoping countries to produce Policy Briefs and Discussion Notes. This partnership between experts and negotiators helps to ensure that the process of producing a Brief addresses the specific concerns of developing country negotiators; builds the capacity of developing country co-authors in policy analysis; and also builds ownership of the analysis.
For new negotiators, and for use in ecbi Regional and Pre-COP Training Workshops, PPAU produces Background Papers and a series of Pocket Guides. These generally provide a more basic analysis of issues for newcomers to the process, along with the background and history of the issue in the negotiations.
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The 2017 Fellowship took place from 28 August to 1 September, hosting 24 ecbi Fellows – senior climate change negotiators from developing countries. On 30 August, the Fellows were joined by 24 European colleagues for the Oxford Seminar. This year, the Seminar was attended by, among others: representatives of the current (Morocco), the preceding (France), the incoming (Fiji) and the next (Poland) Presidencies of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change; the Chairs of the LDC Group, the G77, as well as the Western European and Others Group; the Chair of the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice; the Co-Chair of the Standing Committee on Finance; members of the Green Climate Fund Board; representatives of the current trio of EU Presidencies (Estonia, Bulgaria and Austria), as well as representatives from the European Commission.
Discussions during both events focused on key concerns relating to the ongoing global negotiations on the rules for implementing the Paris Agreement. In particular, participants focused on issues related to: gender; equity; common timeframes and the ambition cycles; the 2018 Facilitative Dialogue; global stocktakes; adaptation communications; transparency; finance; and the Article 6 Mechanisms.
H.E. Ambassador Deo Saran, Fiji’s Climate Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the European Union, in a keynote address, expressed his appreciation for the level of engagement in the Seminar. “I must say that the spirit of the seminar truly reflects the Talonoa spirit that we would like to bring at COP23,” he said. “It has been very enriching and will bring immense value to our preparation for the COP.”
• Seminar Group Photograph (5mb)
• Speech by Deo Saran
• Address by Tosi Mpanu-Mpanu
Publication Date:
September, 2017
On Thursday 31 August 2017, Oxford Climate Policy, on behalf of the European Capacity Building Initiative (ecbi) and the Oxford University Natural History Museum, hosted a special event for the participants of the ecbi Oxford Seminar.
The Natural History Museum was the venue of a historic evolution debate on 30 June 1860, seven months after the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, involving Samuel Wilberforce, the then Bishop of Oxford, and Thomas Henry Huxley, a biologist who defended Darwin's theory of evolution and had earned the epithet of “Darwin’s bulldog”.
The event, named "We Meet Again!" in reference to the historic debate, brought together the current Bishop of Oxford, the Rt. Revd. Dr Steven Croft, and Professor Sir Brian Hoskins, Director of the Grantham Institute for Climate Change at Imperial College, London, and Professor of Meteorology at Reading University, to discuss the question: "What can we do to support the fight against global warming in the current climate?"
The transcript of the proceedings is now available for downloading.
• Oxford University Science Blog
• Transcript of proceedings
• The Oxford University Science Blog (pdf)
Publication Date:
August, 2017
News coverage of ecbi event during the 2017 Oxford Fellowship and Seminar.
Publication Date:
November, 2017
Are we doing enough to address climate change? Are countries living up to their promises? Are some doing better than they pledged? Transparency is key for answering these questions. This ecbi Pocket Guide, updated in January 2018, traces the evolution of transparency arrangements under the UNFCCC right up to the transparency framework under the Paris Agreement. It addresses both transparency of action and of support, and suggests ways to strengthen both these important elements of the global climate regime.
Publication Date:
January, 2018
The Adaptation Communications can play a central role in identifying national needs and enabling international follow-up, while informing future action, driving ambition, and contributing information for the global stocktake. However, Parties to the Paris Agreement face a difficult balancing act while developing further guidance for the Communications, as they strive to make them useful and effective on one hand, and avoid placing an additional burden on countries (particularly those with limited capacity) on the other. This policy brief considers the challenges in light of the discussions that have taken place so far, most recently in Bonn in November 2017.
Publication Date:
January, 2018
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August, 2017
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August, 2017
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August, 2017
