NADI, Fiji—The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has committed to extend $5 billion to finance projects on the blue economy, ecosystem management, pollution control and sustainable infrastructure.
In a briefing on Thursday, ADB Sustainable Development and Climate Change Department Safeguards Division Director Bruce Dunn said the funds will be provided using various financing modalities such as lending, grants and bond floats.
Dunn said the funding, which will be extended starting this year until 2024, is part of the Action Plan for Healthy Oceans and Sustainable Blue Economies for the Asia and Pacific region launched at the 52nd Annual Meeting of ADB’s Board of Governors here.
“Climate change, unsustainable fishing, increasing uncontrolled coastal development and pollution are threatening not only our ocean but also threatening our prosperity and sustainability in our region,” ADB Vice President for Knowledge Management and Sustainable Development Bambang Susantono said in the briefing.
“ADB’s Action Plan for Healthy Oceans and Sustainable Blue Economies for the Asia and Pacific region will scale up our investment and technical assistance in ocean health to $5 billion by 2024,” he added.
ADB said the new Oceans Financing Initiative would leverage public sector funds to create investment opportunities able to attract financing from a range of sources, including the private sector.
Technical assistance and funds from ADB and donors, along with innovative financing instruments such as revenue guarantees and credit-enhanced blue bonds, will be used to reduce project risks and make them “bankable.”
The initiative will be piloted in Southeast Asia in collaboration with the Asean Infrastructure Fund and the Republic of Korea. The World Wide Fund for Nature, a longtime partner of ADB, will support the design and implementation of the financing initiative.
ADB said this initiative is crucial since Asia and the Pacific is at the epicenter of a major crisis in marine plastic pollution, threatening the productivity of the region’s marine economies crucial to poverty reduction.
An article in a journal titled, “Export of Plastic Debris by Rivers into the Sea,” it was written that of the 10 rivers transporting 88 percent to 95 percent of plastics into the sea worldwide, eight are in the region. These rivers are the Yangtze, Indus, Yellow, Hai, Nile, Meghna/Brahmaputra/Ganges, Pearl, Amur, Niger and Mekong.
“Unless immediate action is taken, about 90 percent of Asia and the Pacific’s coral reefs will be dead by 2050, and all commercially exploitable fish stocks will disappear by then. This will significantly threaten food security, the global economy, and livelihoods, especially among millions of poor and vulnerable communities in the region,” ADB said.