What is happening at the Green Climate Fund Board meeting?
To ensure that everyone on the planet will be protected against the impacts of climate change, a lot of money will have to be made available. By now, most scholars do agree on this. All this money (ultimately about $ 100 billion per year) will be put into one large fund: the Green Climate Fund. But what's going to happen with all that money and who will benefit from it?
Transparency
For a number of days now, the members of the Board of the Green Climate Fund have discussed these and related matters during their Board Meeting in Berlin. Before the Fund actually becomes operational (which is expected to still take a few years), they must agree on the design of the Fund. All kinds of issues are reviewed: how public and transparent should these meetings really be? The use of the logo, the involvement of the private sector, the salaries of the staff and the extent to which civil society should be involved, these and many more agenda points come by.
Separate room
Civil society is more or less represented at the meeting: representatives of various organizations who want a say in the design of the framework of the Green Climate Fund are present. We from Both ENDS are here too, to push forward our own agenda. Unfortunately we are in a separate room and we can only see the discussions on a large screen. But we do have a so-called "active observer" in the meeting, who firmly defends the views of CSOs from North and South. Occasionally we all clap our hands when she talks, which of course she cannot hear.
Fair Green Climate Fund
In the past few days we wrote a number of blogs which create a clear picture of how things are moving here. Furthermore, we have written a document that we have handed to different board members: our research-based recommendations for the design of a Fair and Inclusive Green Climate Fund.
Of course we hope that our presence and efforts here in Berlin will help to make sure that the Green Climate Fund will especially benefit those who suffer most from climate change: local populations in vulnerable areas, particularly in southern, poorer countries
Here you can find all our information
Read more about this subject
-
Dossier /Trade agreements
International trade agreements often have far-reaching consequences not only for the economy of a country, but also for people and the environment. It is primarily the most vulnerable groups who suffer most from these agreements.
-
Dossier /International trade and investment with respect for people and planet
The network of international trade and investment treaties is large and complex. The Netherlands alone has signed more than 70 bilateral investment treaties (BITs) and is party to the trade and investment agreements concluded by the EU, like the EU-Mercosur and EU-Indonesia trade deals.
-
Dossier /Rights for People, Rules for Corporations – Stop ISDS!
Indigenous communities in Paraguay saw their attempts to regain their ancestral lands thwarted by German investors. In Indonesia, US-based mining companies succeeded to roll back new laws that were meant to boost the country’s economic development and protect its forests. This is the level of impact that investment treaties can have on social, environmental and economic development and rights. Why? Because of the ‘Investor-to-State Dispute Settlement’ clauses that are included in many such treaties.
-
News / 15 October 2026ISDS infringement complaint filed with the European Commission
The Netherlands and Portugal join four other EU countries facing such a complaint.
-
Press release / 15 October 2026Dutch and Portuguese organisations file EU complaint over investment treaties that let companies and sanctioned Russian oligarchs sue EU countries for compensation
The Netherlands and Portugal join four other EU countries facing such a complaint, as the Global Days of Action against Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) begin.
-
Dossier /Dare to Trust: the power of unconditional funding
At Both ENDS we cherish our long-term relationships with partners in our global network. These relationships are based on equality and built on trust. The trust we have in each other has developed from years of strategic cooperation, including joint advocacy around common agendas, knowledge sharing, networking, and mobilising and sharing resources to advance environmental justice.
-
Dossier /Global Alliance for Green and Gender Action (GAGGA)
GAGGA rallies the collective power of the women's rights and environmental justice movements to realize a world where women can and do access their rights to water, food security, and a clean, healthy and safe environment.
-
News / 5 October 2026Rural Women's Assembly wins Right Livelihood Award
We are thrilled to share that our partner the Rural Women's Assembly (RWA) is one of this year's Right Livelihood Laureates! The award, often called the "Alternative Nobel Prize", honours RWA for bringing together more than 178,000 women farmers in eleven Southern African countries. Together, these women stand up for their land, their seeds and their right to make decisions about their own lives and bodies.
-
News / 29 September 2026Summary - Both ENDS complaint under the EU-New Zealand trade agreement
On 29 September 2026, Both ENDS lodged the first complaint on climate grounds with the European Commission's Single Entry Point. It asks the Commission to examine whether Aotearoa New Zealand has broken two promises both sides made in the EU-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement: not to weaken or set aside environmental laws in order to encourage trade or investment, and to effectively implement the Paris Agreement.
-
Publication / 29 September 2026
-
Publication / 29 September 2026
-
News / 29 September 2026Q&A: New Zealand's climate rollback and the EU trade agreement
On 29 September 2026 / 30 September in Aotearoa New Zealand, Both ENDS lodged a complaint with the European Commission under the EU-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement. These are the questions we are asked most often, and our answers. The complaint summary, the case explainer and the key public sources are linked at the end of this page.
-
News / 29 September 2026What happens now? A timeline of the SEP Case
What happens now? On 29 September 2026 / 30 September in Aotearoa New Zealand, Both ENDS lodged a formal complaint with the European Commission. It is the first complaint to the EU's Single Entry Point on environmental and climate grounds. It asks the Commission to hold New Zealand to two promises it made in its trade agreement with the EU: not to weaken environmental protection to encourage trade or investment, and not to undermine the Paris Agreement on climate change.
-
Press release / 29 September 2026New Zealand faces its first climate complaint under EU trade rules
UTRECHT / WELLINGTON, 29 September 2026 /30 September in Aotearoa New Zealand
Both ENDS, a Dutch environmental justice organisation, has lodged a formal complaint with the European Commission arguing that New Zealand has broken the climate promises it made in its free trade agreement with the European Union. It is the first complaint on environmental and climate grounds under the Commission's Single Entry Point, the mechanism that lets civil society ask the EU to enforce the sustainability commitments in its trade agreements.
-
News / 10 September 2026Rutu Foundation receives UNESCO Literacy Prize for multilingual education
Both ENDS’ partner the Rutu Foundation for Intercultural Multilingual Education has been awarded the 2026 UNESCO King Sejong Literacy Prize for its language friendly school programme. This prestigious prize recognises the importance of multilingual education and the right of children to learn in an environment where their home languages are valued.
-
News / 7 September 2026Unprecedented criminal conviction in the Mariana disaster case breaks mining industry's cycle of impunity
A Brazilian federal court has, for the first time, criminally convicted a mining company and three of its managers for their role in the 2015 collapse of the Fundão dam, one of the worst environmental disasters in Brazil's history. Our partner Instituto Cordilheira, which represented victims as assistant prosecutors in the case, calls it a historic breakthrough after years of impunity.
-
Dossier /Communities Regreen the Sahel
In various countries in the Sahel, vast tracts of land have been restored by the local population by nurturing what spontaneously springs from the soil and protecting the sprouts from cattle and hazards.
-
News / 3 September 2026Restoring Land, Restoring Hope: Both ENDS at UNCCD COP17 in Mongolia
From 17 to 28 August, governments gathered in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, for COP17 of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). At stake was more than how the world responds to land degradation and drought. It was also a question of who gets to shape land restoration, whose knowledge counts, and where the money goes.
-
Letter / 14 July 2026
Statement on CAO Cambodia Microfinance Case
The independent complaints mechanism of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the World Bank Group found that the IFC violated its own Environmental and Social Sustainability Framework by investing in six banks providing microfinance in Cambodia.
-
News / 6 July 2026Strengthening Women's Land Rights Across the Rio Conventions
From 29 June – 2 July 2026, Tamara Mohr, GAGGA coordinator at Both ENDS participated in the 4th convening of the Women's Land Rights Initiative (WLRI) in Nairobi, Kenya.Hosted by the Robert Bosch Stiftung, TMG Research and the Huairou Commission, the event brought together grassroots organisations, (inter)national NGOs, government institutions and donors from around the world.
