On invitation by the European Union’s DG Development and Cooperation – EuropeAid through its SWITCH-Asia Network Facility, ADFIAP Secretary General, Mr. Octavio B. Peralta, and ADFIAP Consulting Group Head, Ms. Corazon D. Conde, shared the experience of ADFIAP members as well as the Association’s work and advocacy at the “Climate and Green Growth Finance for SMEs” forum held on March 14, 2014 at the Sheraton Hotel in Hanoi, Vietnam. The event was part of the 3-day “Southeast Asia Climate Finance Workshop: Accessing Finance for Green Growth and Low Emission Development Strategies (LEDS)” – please see related story.
Mr. Peralta spoke at the session on “Green Finance Opportunities for SMEs from the Public Sector” and presented a paper on “Regional Climate and Green Growth Finance Programs”, highlighting ADFIAP members’ lending facilities on energy efficiency, renewable energy, climate finance, carbon finance, green technology, and micro-energy financing. Ms. Conde was on the session on “Looking at Project Sustainability” that featured selected SWITCH-Asia projects that have already completed implementation, covering ADFIAP’s access to finance experience with its EU grant-funded SMART Cebu project.
The event drew 50 participants from the SWITCH-Asia programme, the European Union, the Vietnam Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) and selected experts in the field of climate and green finance as well as SME finance.
The E.U. SWITCH Asia Programme http://www.switch-asia.eu/programme/ has made the issue of sustainable consumption and production (SCP) a priority in its latest regional cooperation strategy to help interested consumers, businesses and supporting associations switch to a more sustainable paradigm.
The SWITCH Asia Network Facility http://www.switch-asia.eu/network-facility/about/ (a) provides information on the SWITCH-Asia Programme, its grant projects, sustainable consumption and consumption (SCP) (b) distills knowledge of project practices to facilitate exchange of information and promote effective replication and up-scaling (c) organises networking events for the SWITCH-Asia grant projects to help them share their experiences and facilitate fruitful exchanges of lessons learned, success stories and best practices and (d) contributes to a wider dissemination of information material on SCP by publishing studies and reports, strengthening networks and synergies among SCP practitioners, policy-makers, researchers and experts.