UN climate damages fund earmarks $20 million to Nepal for August disaster

The Hindu – International

You are logged in

Loading…

You don’t have any Active Subscription.

Subscribed with another email? Logout and Login with that one.

Your active subscription(s)

Account subscription benefits alongside Premium Stories, Editorials,
Opinions and more. Unlock these with Subscription

Products you’ve access to

Additional Subscription Benefits

Account Settings

Need help with your subscription?

Weather News October 22, 2026 e-Paper

The View From India
Looking at World Affairs from the Indian perspective.

First Day First Show
News and reviews from the world of cinema and streaming.

Today's Cache
Your download of the top 5 technology stories of the day.

Science For All
The weekly newsletter from science writers takes the jargon out of science and puts the fun in!

Data Point
Decoding the headlines with facts, figures, and numbers

THEdge
At the cutting edge of education and careers

Health Matters
Ramya Kannan writes to you on getting to good health, and staying there

Gender Agenda
Stories from beyond the binary.

The Hindu On Books
Books of the week, reviews, excerpts, new titles and features.

Weather News October 22, 2026 e-Paper

Published – October 22, 2026 11:10 pm IST – NEW DELHI

On August 26, a climate-induced ice-and-rock avalanche in Nepal set off a debris flow and flooding along the Bhotekoshi-Trishuli-Narayani river system. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

The United Nations climate convention’s Loss and Damage Fund has set aside $21.6 million for Nepal towards addressing the damage from the Bhotekoshi floods that ravaged the country in August.

The decision, taken at an extraordinary meeting by the Fund’s Board on Thursday (October 22, 2026), is the first time that the Fund has earmarked money for a specific country to remedy damage from climate change. However, the funds still constitute a tiny fraction of the $5 billion in economic losses the country has self assessed.

It comes weeks before the 31st UN climate conference, COP31, opens in Turkey next month.

On August 26, a climate-induced ice-and-rock avalanche in Nepal set off a debris flow and flooding along the Bhotekoshi-Trishuli-Narayani river system. The Nepal government puts initial recovery and reconstruction needs at a minimum of $4.71 billion.

On August 31, Nepal’s Finance Minister Swarnim Wagle, and Agriculture, Forests and Environment Minister Gita Chaudhary wrote to the Board’s co-chairs. They asked it to “take a special decision to respond rapidly, directly and effectively.” The letter said that Nepal, a least developed country, contributes negligibly to global emissions yet bears escalating climate impacts, and that the full extent of losses was still to be determined.

Board members from Africa, Asia-Pacific and least developed countries then sought an extraordinary meeting. Members from Latin America, small island states, Eastern Europe and developed countries sent letters of support.

The Fund for responding to Loss and Damage, was established at COP27 in 2022, with its operational mechanism agreed at COP28 the following year. It is meant to help vulnerable developing countries respond to economic and non-economic losses from climate change.

The Fund has pledges by countries (mostly developed) of more than $820 million, of which $342 million has been promised for its start-up phase. On the other hand, it has 176 requests from 119 countries, worth about $2.8 billion. There was no official figure immediately available on how much money the Fund had on hand, and the disbursement, even in the Nepal case, will rest on donors making good on their pledges in time.

The allocation, as of Thursday, is provisional and includes $1.6 million in “oversight fees,” which are a charge the Fund pays to the organisations that implement its projects, to cover the cost of overseeing how the money is used. These can include multilateral banks, national institutions, and UN agencies.

“The Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) has taken a landmark operational step by allocating $20 million for the reconstruction in Nepal following the [glacial lake outburst flood] GLOF event. But the funding is less than 0.5% of Nepal’s estimated $5 billion reconstruction costs, and the cash would be released only after Nepal clears further bureaucratic project proposals, risking a delay to vital relief amid an ongoing structural crisis. I would suggest that the FLRD releases support immediately if the bulk of funding is coming from other sources,” Ajay Mathur, former Director General, International Solar Alliance, said in a statement.

Published – October 22, 2026 11:10 pm IST

Nepal

/

United Nations (climate change)

Terms & conditions | Institutional Subscriber

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.

Fonte: The Hindu – International