Global climate finance remains slow to translate into effective local action, especially for vulnerable countries like Pakistan. Despite facing frequent floods, droughts, glacial melt, and erratic monsoon rains that strain its people, economy, and ecosystems, Pakistan continues to struggle with accessing and utilizing climate funds at the local level. In order to assist countries like Pakistan, global climate finance plays a vital role. However, despite international pledges and policy frameworks the access to global climate is cumbersome for states that are in dire needs for funds. Thus, localized action in Pakistan stays insufficient which makes mitigation and adaptation hard to achieve.

Funding provided by developed countries in order to finance mitigation and adaptation measures in developing countries is referred to as global climate finance. It is mentioned under the Paris Agreement’s article 9 to mandate developed countries to support least developed and vulnerable states by providing financial resources. This is an obligation which exists in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) a treaty adopted in 1992 have set target to provide 100 billion dollars annually by 2025 under the Paris Agreement.

Pakistan being a developing country has a low capita emission. However, despite this low rate of emissions the country is highly vulnerable to climate change. This climate vulnerability magnifies when access to climate finance becomes limited. Whereas funding given to Pakistan by Green Climate Fund (GCF), World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and other bilateral donors are mostly based on policy or mega infrastructure. Projects recently executed in Pakistan that have been approved by GCF are related to glacial lake outburst floods, solar energy, water management and climate smart agriculture. These projects have been impactful at certain level but their impacts at local communities have been limited. The main reason behind these are red tape, poor governance and weak implementation.

Multiple challenges that hamper climate finance to transfer into local action such as centralized control, complex reporting mechanism, poor community involvement and inefficient management. Firstly, climate finance transfers through federal and provincial governments. Whereas local governments don’t have capacity to execute climate related schemes in their areas despite being directly impacted by climate change induced disasters. Secondly, complex reporting mechanism is a hurdle at local level as expertise needed for using such systems are not available in remote regions of the country. Moreover, data availability for rural area remains a problem which hinders reporting risk assessment too.

Lack of community participation in climate related projects in Pakistan is also an issue. Without engagement and participation from local communities ‘projects fail to deliver their desired outcomes. For example, in Sindh need for climate resilient housing and clean water is needed before financing a project related to solar street lights. Lastly, funds that are allocated for climate projects face inefficient management and corruption due to bureaucratic hurdles.

In order to make global climate finance impactful, steps must be taken to strengthen localized solutions that answer Pakistan’s environmental challenges from north to south. Some of these could be like in Swat, where floods and dynamic weather patterns are a constant danger to agriculture, climate finance should work towards improving farming practices in the region through building flood resilient infrastructure, early warning radar systems, and advance the usage of climate friendly crop varieties.

In Sindh, where high temperatures and drought are displacing its rural population, funds should be allocated to water harvesting systems projects, drought resilient crops, and for protection of livelihood advancing local skills must be implemented. Whereas for urban areas like Karachi and Lahore, localized actions should include heatwave shelters, urban forest projects, and efficient water and waste management. Moreover, there are multiple reforms that would be needed to improve climate finance and its overall performance which could push it towards a meaningful local action in Pakistan. These are enhancing access to funds at local level, building resilience within communities, improving transparency of funds, increasing engagements of communities in climate projects and focusing upon adaptation related solutions.

Global climate finance remains a key to significantly enhance climate resilience within Pakistan but its impact will remain marginal unless it is effectively transferred at a local level. The major chunk of Pakistani population residing in rural, remote, and climatic vulnerable regions, need timely and focused support to deal with the threat of climate change. Through reforming national systems, making access easy, and giving importance to community led initiatives, Pakistan can ensure that climate finance becomes a major tool for climate justice and community empowerment not just a promise on paper.