In a report that the Ecofin Council will discuss on Thursday, 10 October, experts from the ‘Wieser’ group are recommending that the European financial architecture for global development be streamlined by establishing a ‘European Climate and Sustainable Development Bank’ (see EUROPE 12228/19).
This new financial architecture should make it possible to intervene more effectively in Africa and to better face the climate challenge through adaptation and mitigation.
To achieve this, the group suggests three options that each require “important institutional changes and [...] significant financial resources” and that should also be the subject of further technical analyses. The first option envisages transferring extra-EU activities from the European Investment Bank (EIB) to the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The second option involves creating a mixed-ownership bank with the EIB, the EBRD, Member States, and the European Commission as shareholders. The third option is to ask the EIB to establish a subsidiary for its extra-EU activities and to be a minority shareholder in it alongside the Member States, the European Commission, and national development banks.
“None of these options comes without important obstacles”, stress the experts, who believe that the EIB’s and EBRD’s mandates should not be changed until a decision has been made at the highest political level.
Concurrently with this reflection, the ‘Wieser’ group recommends a series of steps be taken urgently in the following areas: - developing a common narrative on development policy that is endorsed at the highest political level; - use the proposed Neighbourhood, Development, and International Cooperation Instrument (NDICI) as a catalyst for change (see EUROPE 12223/7).
See the report: http://bit.ly/30ZOHeC (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)