Mexico, Germany, duelling to host Green Climate Fund

Dec 7, 2011, 18:24 GMT

Durban, South Africa - Mexico has joined the bidding to host the fledgling Green Climate Fund, Mexico's Minister of the Environment Juan Rafael Elvira told dpa Wednesday.

'Mexico is asking as well to be the venue,' Elvira said in an interview. 'There are several countries who are interested.'

Earlier, Germany's Minister of the Environment, Norbert Roettgen, made a similar announcement before a plenary session of the UN climate talks in Durban. 'Germany would like to host the Green Climate Fund,' he said.

The bidding war began even before negotiators have ironed out some of the wrinkles in the fund, such as whether it will have an independent board or be administered under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Creation of the structure of the Green fund is seen as a key measure of success for the gridlocked talks, which are taking place under the cloud of an expiring Kyoto Protocol in December 2012.

Elvira noted that Mexican President Felipe Calderon had created the idea of the Green Fund, presented it at the 2009 Copenhagen climate talks and sealed it into the Cancun accord when it hosted the talks last year.

'Then we as a developing country would like to be the venue, to really show the results of the process and work with the Latin American 'Countries. In the future, it will be several regional venues,' Elvira said.

He said it was important that the Green Fund venues be near to the poor countries that are to receive financial aid in adapting to warming temperatures and deploying clean technologies under the fund.

The creation of the venue is expected to create hundreds of jobs in the host country.

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