Performance Framework: Needs
- Capital investment needed for critical priorities such as clean energy, biodiversity, climate change, food security, water and sanitation.
- Capital needed to be shifted away from unsustainable activities, such as the most resource intensive, and polluting activities, and extensive and inefficient physical infrastructure that locks in resource-intensive consumption.
- Capital which needs to be reserved against conditions that could challenge sustainability, including insurance against the consequences of the realization of environmental risks.
Inquiry Publications
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The Financial System We Need: Aligning the Financial System with Sustainable Development
Date: 08-Oct-2015Download the full report: [AR] [CH] [EN] [ES] [FR] [PT] [RU] Download the policy summary: [AR] [CH] [EN] [ES] [FR] [PT] [RU] This first edition of “The Financial System We Need” argues that there is now a historic opportunity to shape a financial system that can more effectively finance the development of an inclusive, green economy. This opportunity is based on a growing trend
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Making Waves
Date: 17-Apr-2018The Inquiry into the Design of a Sustainable Financial System was initiated by the United Nations Environment Programme to advance options to align the financial system with sustainable development. ‘Making Waves: Aligning the Financial System with Sustainable Development’ is its final, global report. This report reviews the Inquiry’s core analysis, summarizes progress made in aligning
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The Financial System We Need: From Momentum to Transformation
Date: 29-Sep-2016Download the policy summary: [AR] [CH] [EN] [ES] [FR] [PT] [RU] Download the individual chapters: Chapter 1: Mapping the momentum | Chapter 2: Harnessing financial technology for sustainable development | Chapter 3: Measuring performance | Chapter 4: Steps towards transformation Our follow-up annual report reveals a doubling in policy actions over the past five years to align the global financial system with sustainable
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Fintech and Sustainable Development – Assessing the Implications
Date: 14-Dec-2016The report, a companion to the second edition of “The Financial System We Need”, assesses how the financial system’s core functions are likely to be disrupted by financial technology (“fintech”) innovations and how they could help – or hinder – efforts to align financing with sustainable development. It considers ways to: Unlock greater financial inclusion by
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Green Finance for Developing Countries
Date: 15-Jul-2016This report outlines key concerns and needs of developing countries in relation to green finance, particularly focusing on developing countries that are not members of the G20. It also highlights emerging innovations, drawing in particular from engagement with practitioners and regulators from Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, Honduras, Jordan, Kenya, Mauritius, Mongolia, Morocco, Nigeria, the Philippines, Thailand
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Roadmap for a Sustainable Financial System
Date: 13-Nov-2017The objective of this Roadmap is to propose an integrated approach that can be used by all financial sector stakeholders—both public and private—to accelerate the transformation toward a sustainable financial system. This approach can bring policy cohesiveness across ministries, central banks, financial regulators, and private financial sector participants to focus efforts. The ultimate vision that
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Green Finance Opportunities in ASEAN
Date: 15-Nov-2017This report lays out ways in which the ASEAN region can unlock this investment and protect its people, environment and economies. It provides an analysis of green investment opportunities in the region from 2016 to 2030, assesses the characteristics of those opportunities, and estimates current green finance flows. Based on a literature review and expert
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Financing the Future
Date: 06-Feb-2017Italy’s Ministry of Environment, Land and Sea, in partnership with UN Environment, launched the National Dialogue on Sustainable Finance in February 2016 to identify practical market and policy options to mobilize Italy’s financial system for sustainable development and climate action. The conclusions of the paper are: Italy faces a strategic opportunity to harness its financial
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China Report
Date: 06-Oct-2015The Inquiry collaborated in an 18-month project, Greening China’s Financial System, carried out by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) and the Finance Research Institute (FRI), Development Research Center (DRC) of the State Council. The aim was to develop specific proposals for greening China’s financial system, based on an analysis of current practice in China
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4th Update Report: The Coming Financial Climate
Date: 07-May-2015This is the 4th Update Report of the UNEP Inquiry, it is focused on the challenge of financing the low-carbon transition. Many approaches and instruments will be needed to deliver the financing needed. Public finance, funded by tax revenues and international transfers, will provide part of the solution. However such finance will be inadequate. Private
Further Reading
- Financing For Sustainable Development: Review Of Global Investment Requirement Estimates
UNTT Working Group on Sustainable Development Financing (2014). Chapter 1.
- World Investment Report 2014 – Investing in SDGs
UNCTAD (2014). Geneva: UNCTAD
- Report of the Intergovernmental Committee of Experts on Sustainable Development Financing
Intergovernmental Committee of Experts on Sustainable Development Financing (2015). UNDESA.
- New Climate Economy Report: Better Growth, Better Climate
Global Commission on the Economy and Climate (2014).
- Investing In The Clean Trillion : Closing The Clean Energy Investment Gap
Fulton, M. and Capalino, R. (2014). Boston: CERES.
- Fossil Fuel Divestment: A $5 Trillion Challenge
Bullard, N. (2014). Bloomberg New Energy Finance White Paper.
- Energy Darwinism II: Why a Low Carbon Future Doesn’t have to Cost the Earth
Channell, J. H. Jansen, E. Curmi, E. Rahbari, P. Nguyen, E. Morse, E. Prior, S. Kleinman, A. Syme and T. Kruger (2015) New York: Citigroup.