28 January 2009: The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) recently approved three projects to support energy efficiency in the Caribbean. The Bahamas will receive US$1.45 million to strengthen the capacity of the Ministry of the Environment and support ongoing efforts to reform the country's regulatory, financial and fiscal frameworks, in order to achieve a sustainable energy matrix and to encourage energy efficiency in public, commercial and residential buildings.
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6 February 2009: The UNFCCC Secretariat has posted reports by a number of parties on fulfillment of the Bali Action Plan and the components of the agreed outcome to be adopted by the Conference of Parties at its 15th session: Sri Lanka (6 February); Cuba (5 February); Lebanon (4 February) and Saudi Arabia (2 February).
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5 February 2009: The UNFCCC Secretariat has notified parties and observer States to the UNFCCC and its Kyoto Protocol, UN specialized agencies, intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) of the forthcoming seventh session of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Further Commitments for Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG-KP 7) and fifth session of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA 5), which will take place in Bonn, Germany, from 29 March-8 April 2009.
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5 February 2009: During the 2009 Delhi Sustainable Development Summit, which is organized around the theme “Towards Copenhagen: an equitable and ethical approach” and is taking place from 5-7 February 2009, in New Delhi, India, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warned that ignoring or underestimating the threat of climate change would lead to increased poverty and hardship. Ban, who received the Sustainable Development Leadership Award at the Summit, underlined that tackling this challenge requires “all our leadership, all our commitment, all our ingenuity,” but that it also provides an “opportunity to make progress on a wide range of sustainable development issues.”
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February 2009: The UNFCCC Secretariat has reported that, following consultations with the Chair of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Further Commitments for Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG-KP), Harald Dovland (Norway), and the Chair of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA), Michael Zammit Cutajar (Malta), and taking into account guidance provided by the Subsidiary Body for Implementation, the ninth session of the AWG-KP and the seventh session of the AWG-LCA will take place at the UN Conference Centre of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific in Bangkok, Thailand, from 28 September-9 October 2009.
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30 January 2009: The Trust Fund Committees for the World Bank's Climate Investment Funds met on 27-30 January 2009, and identified which countries will be offered funding under the PPCR within the US$6 billion Climate Investment Funds. Bangladesh, Bolivia, Cambodia, Mozambique, Nepal, Niger, Tajikistan and Zambia have been invited to submit projects to the World Bank's Pilot Program for Climate Resilience (PPCR), which will provide about US$500 million for scaled up action and transformational change in integrating climate resilience in national development planning.
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2 February 2009: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) approved a US$31.1 million loan for an energy-efficiency project in the Philippines that will provide 13 million energy-saving compact fluorescent lamps (CFL) to homeowners and businesses as part of a government push to save about US$100 million every year in fuel costs, and a deferral of an investment of US$450 million in power generation and associated network capacity.
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2 February 2009: The World Bank has reported the success of a Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) wind-power project in Bangui Bay, where the Bank's carbon finance programme is funding a wind farm with a 33 MW capacity and the possibility to provide half the province's power needs.
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30 January 2009: UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner participated in a panel on “Rising to the Challenge of Copenhagen,” at the World Economic Forum on 29 January 2009, in Davos, Switzerland. The panel was moderated by Thomas L. Friedman, Foreign Affairs Columnist, The New York Times, and included Jacques Aigrain, Swiss Re CEO, Al Gore, former US Vice-President and Nobel Laureate, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Prime Minister of Denmark, and Jeroen van der Veer, Royal Dutch Shell CEO.
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January 2009: The World Bank has launched its annual international essay competition. This year's edition focuses on how young people up to 25 years old are affected by climate change, and how to tackle it with youth-led solutions.
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