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Climate investment opportunities in emerging markets: an IFC analysis

A study released today by IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, shows that the historic global agreement on climate change adopted in Paris last year helped open up nearly $23 trillion in opportunities for climate-smart investments in emerging markets between now and 2030. Since the Paris Agreement was adopted in December 2015, a total of 189 countries have submitted national plans that target aggressive growth in climate solutions—including renewable energy, low-carbon cities, energy efficiency, sustainable forest management, and climate-smart agriculture. These plans offer a clear roadmap for investments that will target climate-resilient infrastructure and offset higher upfront costs through efficiency gains and fuel savings. IFC’s study, based on the national climate-change commitments and underlying policies of 21 emerging-market economies, identifies sectors in each region where the potential for investment is greatest. This includes green buildings in East Asia and the Pacific—where China, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam show a climate-smart investment potential of $16 trillion. Latin America and the Caribbean offer the next largest opportunity—particularly in sustainable transportation, where the potential for investment in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico is about $2.6 trillion. Opportunities in South Asia are mostly in climate-resilient infrastructure, where $2.5 trillion of opportunities exist in India and Bangladesh.

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