on Sustainable Finance and Policy Costing and the Training on Public Finance for Sustainable Development and Climate Action
Phnom Penh 18November 2024: PCAsia and UNDP through the Climate Finance Network (CFN) co-organized Fiscal Analysis Capacity Training/FACT onsite training on Sustainable Finance and Policy Costing and the Training on Public Finance for Sustainable Development and Climate Action presided by Mr Shakeel Ahmad, Deputy Resident Representative of UNDP Cambodia, and Mr YI Chanprasnar, Executive Director of PCAsia.
This training aims to build knowledge and skills of parliamentary staff in the Southeast Asia region on sustainable and climate finance and climate budget analysis and policy costing to help ensure effective budget scrutiny for transparency and accountability of public expenditure for climate action and achieving SDGs.
Mr Shakeel Ahmad delivered his speech by emphasizing the critical roles of parliaments in climate budget oversight for achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals and for supporting countries’ transition to green growth. He also stressed the important roles of UNDP in providing technical assistance and knowledge sharing on climate change through different tools and instruments to the Parliaments in the Asia Pacific region.
Mr YI Chanprasnar began by thanking the important financial and technical contributions of UNDP which helped to make the training programme – a reality. This support helps fill the technical gap and respond to the needs of parliaments for a robust budget scrutiny from a climate change perspective in Southeast Asia. He also welcomed the 16 Parliamentary staff from Cambodia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand for being selected to participate in this important programme.
Mr Yi also emphasized that today’s event also marked the opening of joint project between PCAsia and UNDP on “Strengthening the Roles of ASEAN Parliaments for Enhancing Transparency and Accountability for Climate Finance” that aims to promote regional measures and dialogues across Parliaments in the ASEAN region and beyond on climate budget scrutiny in the framework of south-south and north-south cooperation.
The training on “Sustainable Finance and Policy Costing” will last for two weeks from 18-29 November 2024. The first week with the technical support from UNDP’s expert, Ms. Bushra Ferdous Khan, will feature a specialized module on “Public Finance for Sustainable Development and Climate Action” that is tailored to equip parliamentary staff with knowledge on sustainable and climate finance and practical skills for preparing thematic budget brief on climate budget analysis. The second week will cover a focused training module on policy costing. Delivered by professionals with extensive experiences in PBO works, the instructor team consist of: (1) Prof. Stephen Bartos of the University of Canberra, Ms. Katie (Katharine) Hill, formerly Chief of staff of the NSW PBO and Ms. Swavika Prasad, Acting Director, Financial Planning and Analysis, Department of Community and Justice, NSW.
Mr Yi Chanprasnar Executive Director of PCAsia (Left) and Mr Shakeel Ahmad, Deputy Resident Representative of UNDP Cambodia (Right)
Group photo in front of the Red Building of Cambodia Senate
Mr Vivek Misra, Regional Public Finance Specialist, UNDP Bangkok Regional Hub presenting Mainstreaming Climate Change into Planning and Budgeting
Ms Bandeth Ros, PC Asia Manager of Environment and Climate Change presenting the joint project on “Strengthening the Roles of ASEAN Parliaments for Enhancing Transparency and Accountability of Climate Finance”
Dr. Ari Mulianta GINTING, Parliamentary staff from House of Representative, Indonesia introducing himself and expectations from joining the training