Monitoring of an ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) project in Flores demonstrated that diverse knowledge systems can be crucial for overcoming these challenges.

When adaptation interventions recognize the value of both traditional ecological knowledge and western science, they can become more locally relevant and effective.

Ecosystem-based adaptation projects that do not recognize and tackle cultural, economic, and infrastructural barriers will lead to limited uptake of adaptive practices and become cost-ineffective, or even lead to maladaptive outcomes that could, for instance, deepen pre-existing inequalities.

Monitoring, evaluation, and learning thus play important roles in ensuring that insights from the ground are captured and reflected in future implementation.

Calls for “decolonizing” climate finance are gaining traction in order to embed the Global South, Indigenous Peoples and marginalized communities in decision-making around climate finance, including: who contributes towards climate finance; the instruments used to distribute climate finance; who receives the funds; how it is accessed; and the projects and initiatives it goes towards.

The Bridgetown Initiative proposes a set of reforms targeting the international financial architecture – particularly the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and multilateral development banks –to make them more fit-for-purpose through reducing the debt crisis in Global South countries and enabling them to better respond to the climate crisis.

Despite being led by Global South priorities, the Bridgetown Initiative has been criticized for not including sufficient measures for debt cancellation or scaling up grants-based finance, placing too much emphasis on the private sector for providing climate finance and ignoring both the role of public climate funds and the need for climate finance to adhere to principles of historical responsibility.

In addition to existing proposed reforms, measures such as debt cancellation, scaling up grants-based public finance, implementing tax and trade reforms, and channelling increased finance to the local level are needed to tackle the coloniality of the international financial architecture.

Un tema clave es la discrepancia entre las ambiciones y prioridades de la transición justa de los actores que operan principalmente a nivel nacional y aquellos que operan principalmente a nivel subnacional.

La limitada capacidad institucional a nivel subnacional y la insuficiencia de los mecanismos de financiamiento convencionales son dos de los principales desafíos para implementar la transición justa.

La toma de decisiones transparente es crucial para seleccionar a los beneficiarios y asignar recursos en los proyectos de transición justa, y fortalecería su legitimidad pública.