International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA) and Climate Policy Initiative sign MoU to cooperate on Sustainable Finance

The International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA) and Climate Policy Initiative – India (CPI) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for mutual assistance and cooperation to increase mobilisation of global sustainable capital flows into India.

The commencement of India’s G20 Presidency begins with the theme “One Earth, One Family, One Future”. Sustainable development is a key priority that runs across the priorities of G20 working groups. Mobilisation of sustainable finance is critical to achieve transition to green and resilient economies. IFSCA has taken significant steps in accelerating global sustainable capital flows by creating a conducive regulatory environment, based on international best practices, focused especially on the needs of India and developing countries. With deep expertise in finance and policy, CPI is an analysis and advisory organization that works to improve the most important energy and land use practices around the world. CPI’s mission is to help governments, businesses, and financial institutions drive economic growth while addressing climate change. It is against this backdrop that IFSCA and CPI are collaborating through a wide-ranging MoU, which includes research and joint convenings in the field of sustainable finance.

Shri Praveen Trivedi, Executive Director, IFSCA, said, “IFSCA intends to play a key role for India and other emerging economies to meet their net zero ambitions and achieve SDGs by developing IFSC as a global hub for sustainable finance. This is in-line with the vision of Hon’ble Prime Minister of India to make GIFT IFSC to be a gateway to global debt and equity capital for sustainable and climate projects. This MoU between IFSCA and CPI, focusing on broad areas of sustainable finance, is a step towards achieving a key objective to develop an ecosystem for mobilising global capital towards sustainable projects.”

Dr. Dhruba Purkayastha, India Director, Climate Policy Initiative, said, “As per the Landscape of Green Finance, report published by CPI in 2022, total tracked climate investments are of the order of $40 to $50 billion per year for FY2018 to FY2020, of which approximately 85% were through domestic sources. This is not sufficient to address the widening gap between required investment and financing to meet the India climate investment requirement.  Greater international capital flows are required for a successful low carbon transition in India. IFSCA can play a critical role in enabling climate investments in India from international sources through the capital markets route. The MoU between IFSCA and CPI, aims to support the mobilisation of sustainable finance in India.”

About IFSCA

The IFSCA is a statutory authority established under the International Financial Services Centres Authority Act, 2019 (“IFSCA Act”) with a mandate to develop and regulate the financial products, financial services, and financial institutions in the International Financial Services Centres (‘IFSC’). GIFT-IFSC is the maiden IFSC in India. The IFSCA aims to develop a strong global connect and focus on the needs of the Indian economy as well as to serve as an international financial platform for the entire region.

About Climate Policy Initiative

Climate Policy Initiative is an analysis and advisory organization with deep expertise in finance and policy. Our mission is to support governments, businesses, and financial institutions drive economic growth while addressing climate change. CPI has six offices around the world in Brazil, India, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, and the United States. CPI India Private Limited has been working to support India in fulfilling its global climate change commitments though: clean energy market catalysing initiatives, such as the US India Clean Energy Finance (USICEF), India Clean Energy Finance 2.0 (ICEF 2.0), Productive Use of Renewable Energy (PURE), India Distributed Solar Finance initiative (IDSF), the Global Innovation Lab for Climate Finance (India Chapter); capacity building initiatives, such as the Center for Sustainable Finance (CSF)]; and research and analysis into transitioning into a sustainable energy future, such as Futureproofing Strategy for PSUs, and Just Energy Transition.

Learn more at: www.climatepolicyinitiative.org