Nine proposals by Ghana on climate change mitigation and adaptation activities to the Green Climate Fund (GCF) for funding as part of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) have been approved.

Some nine others are pending approval by the Fund.

The GCF is the financial mechanism of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) designed to disburse new and additional resources to support developing countries to implement their climate change mitigation and adaptation activities.

Ghana submitted the proposals to GCF through the Ministry of Finance, the National Designated Authority (NDA) for GCF, Mrs Adwoa Faikue, Principal Economics Officer, Ministry of Finance, has said.

She was speaking at a just-ended climate financing forum held on the theme: "Empowering the Private Sector as a key Partner in achieving Ghana's NDCs in the Era of COVID-19 and beyond."

The two-day forum was attended by private sector actors, some international and development-oriented organisations, government agencies, civil societies and academia, who participated in person and virtually.

The Private Enterprises Federation (PEF), in collaboration with the Ministries of Finance and Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) under the Global Climate Finance Readiness Programme and the NDCs Support Programme, hosted the forum.

Through the forum, private sector players were provided the platform to explore opportunities and risks to climate change investment and to identify possible concrete actions that could be taken forward to overcome key barriers, particularly in the era of COVID-19.

Mrs Faikue mentioned some of the approved NDCs proposals as: Drought Early Warning and Forecasting System, Improving resilience of crops to drought through strengthened early warning within Ghana-approved in May 2017.

Approval was also given to "Strengthening national capacities to access climate finance through enhanced country strategies and stakeholder engagement" in Ghana in March 2019.

The "Enhancing-sector planning and capacity" activity was also approved in May 2019, while the "Ghana Industrial Energy Efficiency Readiness Support project" was given the nod in September 2020.

The Programme on "Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa (AFAWA): Financing Climate Resilience Agricultural Practices in Ghana" was approved in July 2019 for women in agriculture, while the "Acumen Agricultural Fund" was endorsed in March 2018 for agribusiness.

The "Arbaro Fund- Sustainable Forestry project" got the nod in March 2020 for afforestation with "Miro Limited; the Ghana Shea Landscape Emission Reduction" project receiving the green light in September 2020.

The "Inclusive Green Financing Initiative (IGREENFIN)" came on board February 2021.

Mrs Faikue said Institutions and Ministries, Departments and Agencies implementing the activities on behalf of Ghana were the Water Commission of Ghana, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Forestry Commission, Ministry of Energy, and the Apex Bank, among others.

She said the GCF had different modalities for partners to access funding and that one was the "Readiness and Preparatory Support," which provided up to one million dollars per country per a year.

Out of that amount, NDAs may request up to USD 300,000 per year to help establish or strengthen the NDA to deliver on the GCF's requirements.

She said Ghana's NDA had already received approval for a "Readiness and Preparatory Support" and that one of the key components of the NDA readiness was to support the private sector in climate finance related investment, hence the forum to mobilise the sector and show them the investment opportunities.