Green Cities - scaling-up climate finance to combat water scarcity

Water touches every aspect of development, making it a bedrock of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This panel discussion brings together city leaders, experts and financiers to discuss best practices and solutions for climate adaptation of urban water systems.

The panel will showcase projects addressing water challenges in urban settings, with a specific focus on urban adaptation measures. It will share how EBRD is leveraging its expertise and financial resources to support innovative solutions and catalyse sustainable urban development, and how Global Center on Adaptation is driving innovation to develop specific approaches that can be mainstreamed by their partners in developing countries. Global Center on Adaptation will also shed light on its water and urban work within its City Adaptation Accelerator. The panel will include unique perspectives from cities on their integration of water adaptation into urban planning and the role of community engagement in building resilient urban water systems.

As cities and their economies grow, many become climate vulnerability hotspots. Cities feel climate change especially through their water systems, for example through sea-level rise, droughts, or flooding. Their increasing exposure to climate-related hazards challenges cities’ commitment to provide water and sanitation for all by 2030 (SDG 6). This urgently calls for additional dedication to building sustainable cities and communities (SDG 11) and stepping up climate action (SDG 13).

EBRD’s countries of operation across North Africa and the Middle East are characterised by acute scarcity of conventional water resources and insufficient water infrastructure. Compounded by population growth, the climatic conditions drive cities to non-conventional water resources such as wastewater reuse or desalination. In Africa, 60 % of the urban population lives in urban informal settlements. Many of the settlements are already affected by the impacts of climate change and particularly women and adolescent girls are in vulnerable positions. Building climate resilience for these settlements requires a concrete and focused effort from all stakeholders.

Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) are well positioned as solutions broker to accelerate, innovate and scale adaptation action for a climate-resilient world. Working with partners, GCA provide a unique adaptation perspective across i.a. strategy and design of programmes, finance mobilisation, project implementation advisory or design of governance structures. Through its City Adaptation Accelerator, GCA is providing technical assistance to increase climate resilience of urban investments with a total investment value of $ across 10 investment projects of World Bank and ADB in Africa. GCA specifically focuses on promoting equitable resilience building in fragile countries such as Central African Republic, DRC, Chad, Liberia, and so on.

As an International Financial Institution, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is heavily involved in financing urban water solutions. In 2023, EBRD’s Sustainable Infrastructure Group signed projects benefitting 1.53 million people from improved water supply and wastewater services (SDG 6), as well 33 projects that build climate adaptation (SDG 13).

EBRD Green Cities works directly with regions and cities to ensure that impactful and sustainable infrastructure can be delivered in a localised manner.