The global climate change alliance(+) : achievements fell short of ambitions. Special report 04, 2023.
Date: 2023-04-13
Institutions: European Court of Auditors
Subjects: EU initiative, adaptation to climate change, climate change, developing countries, development aid, performance audit, report

EN 

2023 

04 

Special report  The Global Climate Change 

Alliance(+) 
Achievements fell short of ambitions 

 
 
 
Contents 

Executive summary 

Introduction 

Climate change disproportionately affects developing countries 

The Global Climate Change Alliance aimed to help the poor 
developing countries most vulnerable to climate change 

The initiative supported a wide range of countries 

The initiative consisted of two components and covered several priority 
sectors 

Actions were mostly implemented through UN organisations and EU 
Member States’ aid agencies 

Audit scope and approach 

Audit scope 

Audit approach 

Observations 

While the initiative focused on building capacity, there was room 
for reducing costs and for demonstrating its impact 

The Commission did not sufficiently scale up adaptation  measures and 
address the needs of those most affected by the impacts of climate change 

The high variability of costs indicates that the efficiency of some actions 
could be improved 

Completed actions generally delivered outputs, but the improvements in the 
beneficiaries’ situation were not measured 

The initiative pursued the sustainability of actions  through synergies but 
paid insufficient attention to exit strategies 

The initiative did not demonstrate that it increased countries’ resilience to 
the effects of climate change 

2 

Paragraph 

I-X 

01-12 

01-02 

03-12 

03-05 

06-09 

10-12 

13-17 

13-16 

17 

18-67 

18-44 

20-26 

27-31 

32-37 

38-40 

41-44 

 
 
3 

45-67 

46-49 

50-53 

54-56 

57-62 

63-67 

68-74 

The Commission did not maximise the added value of the 
initiative 

The focus on the most vulnerable countries decreased in the second phase 

The initiative did not attract additional funding as expected 

The initiative reached many countries but awareness and visibility remained 
limited 

The complex set-up of the initiative and the lack of a clear definition of its 
perimeter limited its added value 

The initiative was proactive in identifying lessons learnt, but the 
Commission did not set out a clear exit strategy 

Conclusions and recommendations 

Annex 

Overview of sampled actions 

Abbreviations 

Glossary 

Replies of the Commission 

Timeline 

Audit team 

 
 
 
 
4 

Executive summary 

I The Least Developed Countries and the Small Island Developing States contribute 
the least to greenhouse gas emissions but are the most affected by the impacts of 
climate change. In 2007,  the EU launched the Global Climate Change Alliance initiative 
to help these countries increase their resilience to the effects of climate change. 
In 2014,  the initiative entered a second phase, the Global Climate Change Alliance Plus, 
covering the period 2014-2020.  The EU provided total funding of €729  million for the 
two phases. 

II In 2020,  the Commission decided not to continue the initiative for a further phase. 
During the 2021-2027  period, the Commission will fund actions tackling climate change 
in developing countries through thematic and geographical support under the 
Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument. Our audit 
aimed to draw lessons from the two phases of the Global Climate Change Alliance, 
both for future climate change actions and for future global development initiatives. 
The objective of our audit was to assess whether actions achieved their intended 
results efficiently and whether the Commission maximised the added value of the 
initiative. 

III Overall, we found that the initiative did not demonstrate its impact on countries’ 
resilience to climate change. In terms of efficiency, completed actions generally 
delivered their outputs, but sometimes at a high cost. 

IV The initiative did not measure the improvements in the beneficiaries’ situation, 
nor did it focus sufficiently on the needs of those most affected. The cost of using new 
technologies made it more difficult for the poorest households to benefit from the 
programme. In addition, few actions included activities specifically addressing the 
needs of women. 

V The initiative focused on building institutional capacity, but sustainability was 
limited due to high staff turnover. Therefore, the expected evolution from capacity 
building and pilot activities to more scaling-up of adaptation actions reaching more 
beneficiaries did not take place systematically. 

 
 
5 

VI Neither of the two phases of the Global Climate Change Alliance attracted the 
expected additional funding from Member States and the private sector. Despite this 
significant financing gap, the Commission did not revise its initial ambitious objectives 
over the 15-year duration of the initiative. Furthermore, in the second phase, the 
Commission’s funding allocation criteria led to proportionally less support being 
allocated to the most vulnerable countries. 

VII The Commission did not sufficiently analyse the reasonableness of the budgeted 
costs of most of the sampled actions. Our analysis showed that the management costs 
of actions varied widely, and were particularly high in the Pacific. We found that the 
Commission could have made savings with a more detailed analysis of the costs. 

VIII Although the initiative started in 2007  and supported more than 80  countries, 
awareness remained limited amongst developing countries as well as in the EU 
Member States. This was partly because the actions funded were not distinguishable 
from other EU actions addressing climate change in developing countries. Moreover, 
the efficiency of the initiative was impacted by the complexity of its organisation, in 
particular the duplication of support facilities and funding streams. 

IX There will be no additional phases of the Global Climate Change Alliance, but it 
has provided useful lessons for any other global development initiatives that the EU 
might implement in future. 

X On the basis of these conclusions, we recommend that the Commission: 

(a) 

focus on those most affected by climate change; 

(b) 

incorporate lessons learnt into future global development initiatives. 

 
 
 
 
6 

Introduction 

Climate change disproportionately affects developing countries 

01 Sustainable Development Goal 13 aims to combat climate change and its impacts 
through both adaptation and mitigation measures. There is a particularly urgent need 
for adaptation action in developing countries. The United Nations’ Intergovernmental 
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) acknowledges that the main mitigation efforts should 
take place in developed countries, where emissions per capita are higher1. 

02 The poorest and most vulnerable populations in the world are the ones hardest 
hit by the consequences of climate change because they live in areas more prone to 
flooding, landslides, drought and other disasters 2. Governments and societies are likely 
to expand adaptation and resilience measures to manage existing threats, but these 
measures are unlikely to be evenly distributed, leaving some populations behind 3. 

The Global Climate Change Alliance aimed to help the poor 
developing countries most vulnerable to climate change 

The initiative supported a wide range of countries 

03 The main thematic programme channelling EU development aid to support the 
response to climate change was the Global Climate Change Alliance initiative launched 
in 20074.  It aimed to help the poor developing countries most vulnerable to climate 
change increase their capacity to adapt to the effects of climate change. The initiative 
also aimed to help countries participate in the mitigation effort. It focused on the Least 

1  Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change, Working Group III Contribution to the 

IPCC Sixth Assessment Report. 

2  European Parliament, report on the impacts of climate change on vulnerable populations  in 

developing countries, 7.4.2021. 

3  Global Trends 2040, March 2021, National Intelligence Council. 

4  Communication from the Commission  on Building a Global Climate Change Alliance 

between the European Union and poor developing countries most vulnerable to climate 
change, COM(2007) 540. 

 
 
                                                             
7 

Developed Countries (LDCs) 5 and Small Island Developing States (SIDS) 6. In 2014,  the 
initiative entered a second phase, the Global Climate Change Alliance Plus, covering 
the period 2014-2020. 

04 In 2020,  the Commission decided that the initiative would not be continued for a 
third phase with the 2021-2027  Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF). Instead, in 
line with the 2021  Regulation on the Neighbourhood, Development and International 
Cooperation Instrument (NDICI – Global Europe), the Commission would fund actions 
tackling climate change in developing countries mainly through thematic and 
geographical support provided by the Multiannual Indicative Programmes (MIPs). 

05 The initiative supported climate change actions in a wide range of countries (see 
Figure 1). 

Figure 1 – Global Climate Change Alliance intervention countries 

Note: Figures based on data provided by DG INTPA on 15.4.2022. The map refers only to actions that 
can be attributed to specific countries or regions. 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

5  United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs Economic Analysis. 

6  Office of the High Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked 

Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States. 

 
 
 
                                                             
8 

The initiative consisted of two components and covered several priority 
sectors 

06 Each of the two phases of the initiative consisted of two components: 

(1)  The global component, covering all developing countries. This component was 
financed by the Development Cooperation Instrument (DCI) and mainly funded 
actions covering a single country. 

(2)  The intra-ACP component, covering African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) 

countries. This component was financed by the European Development Fund 
(EDF) and mainly funded actions covering an entire region. 

07 Two support facilities, outsourced to consortia led by environmental consultancy 
groups, helped the Directorate-General for International Partnerships (DG INTPA) and 
the EU Delegations assist partner countries in their efforts to implement climate 
actions funded by the initiative: 

(1)  The Global Support Facility supported the global strand of the initiative by 

promoting dialogue and exchange of experiences on climate change. It helped EU 
Delegations formulate climate change actions and also provided ad hoc technical 
assistance, i.e. support and advice for the design and implementation of climate 
actions in beneficiary countries. Additionally, it supported knowledge creation 
and dissemination and managed a collaborative platform, which contained 
documentation on the initiative’s programmes. 

(2)  The Intra-ACP Support Facility supported the Organisation of African, Caribbean 
and Pacific States (OACPS) Secretariat in coordinating the Intra-ACP strand of the 
initiative. It also managed the Climate Support Facility (CSF), which provided 
technical assistance to ACP regional organisations 7, government bodies and non-
state actors. The technical assistance included activities such as feasibility studies, 
project identification and formulation missions, training and workshops. 

08 To achieve its objective of helping countries respond to climate change, the 
initiative based its approach on two pillars: 

(1)  Fostering dialogue and knowledge sharing, for example via national or 

international conferences and workshops. 

7  For example, the African Union, the Caribbean Forum and the Secretariat of the Pacific 

Environment Programme. 

 
 
                                                             
9 

(2)  Providing technical and financial support for adaptation, mitigation and disaster 
risk reduction measures. This support ranges from capacity building or technical 
assistance for national, regional or local authorities to concrete actions testing 
new approaches or scaling up successful pilots. 

09 The initiative provided technical and financial support through actions covering a 
wide range of sectors (see Figure 2). The two main sectors supported were 
“environment and natural resources” and “agriculture and food security (including 
fisheries)”. 

Figure 2 – Actions supported by the initiative 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

Actions were mostly implemented through UN organisations and EU 
Member States’ aid agencies 

10 The initiative did not have its own budget line in the Commission’s accounting 
system. The Commission gave the Global Climate Change Alliance label to a number of 
climate change actions funded by the DCI and the EDF. The total funding allocated to 
the initiative was €728.8  million, including contributions from EU Member States. The 
overall allocation was €308.8  million for the first phase (2007-2013)  and €420 million 
for the second phase (2014-2020)  (see Figure 3). 

 
 
 
Figure 3 – Funding allocated to the two phases of the Global Climate 
Change Alliance 

10 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

11 Figure 4 shows the funding channelled through the main global programme and 
the intra-ACP programme, as well as the funding for the two support facilities. 
Amounts contracted to April 2022  total €587  million. 

Figure 4 – Contracted amounts 

Global actions

Intra-ACP actions

Support Facilities

(million euros)

469.9

95.3

21.8

Note: Figures based on data provided by DG INTPA on 15.4.2022. Contracted amounts exclude the two 
large multi-country programmes for sustainable landscape management and sustainable agri-food 
systems. For these two programmes, it is not possible to distinguish between the initiative and other EU 
funding. 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

 
 
 
 
11 

12 Actions were delivered through different implementing modalities, the main one 
being financing agreements with UN organisations and Member States’ development 
aid agencies (see Figure 5). 

Figure 5 – Amounts contracted (by implementing modality) 

Financing 
Agreements

Services

Programme 
Estimates

(million euros)

325.4

123.8

70.2

33.2

32.3

2.0

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

Action 
Grants

Budget 
Support

Others

 
 
 
 
 
12 

Audit scope and approach 

Audit scope 

13 As the Global Climate Change Alliance will not be continued, our audit examined 
how the Commission managed its two phases, in order to learn lessons for both future 
climate change actions and future global development initiatives. The audit aimed to 
assess whether funds were used efficiently and effectively, and to make 
recommendations for improvements for future EU actions in the area of climate 
change. 

14 Our main audit question was whether the initiative was efficient and effective. 
We split this question into the following sub-questions: 

o  Did actions achieve their intended results efficiently? 

o  Did the Commission maximise the added value of the initiative? 

15 We examined 14 actions: five in the Pacific, two in Bangladesh, two in Ethiopia, 
two in Bhutan, one in Niger, one in Cuba, and a regional action covering the whole of 
Africa. The total value of these actions was €95.4  million, which represents 16 % of the 
funds contracted under the initiative from 2007  to April 2022. 

16 We selected these countries based on the amount of funding provided by the 
initiative, and the need to cover both global and intra-ACP components, different 
regions and different implementation methods. We included both closed and ongoing 
actions. We also assessed the contribution of the two support facilities. Table 1 and 
the Annex provide an overview of all 16  sampled actions. 

 
 
13 

Table 1 – Overview of sampled actions 

1 – PACIFIC 

2 – PACIFIC 

3 – PACIFIC 

4 – PACIFIC 

Scaling Up Pacific 
Adaptation: South Pacific 
Commission and Secretariat 
of the Pacific Regional 
Environment Programme 
component 

Scaling Up Pacific 
Adaptation: University of the 
South Pacific component 

Increasing Climate Resilience 
of Pacific Small Island States 
through the Global Climate 
Change Alliance (GCCA) 

Support to the Global 
Climate Change Alliance 
through Capacity Building, 
Community Engagement and 
Applied Research 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€12.8m 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€2.1m 

FIRST PHASE  BUDGET  €11.4m 

FIRST PHASE  BUDGET  €7.6m 

5 – PACIFIC 

6 – BANGLADESH 

7 – BANGLADESH 

8 – BHUTAN 

Pacific Adaptation to Climate 
Change and Resilience 
Building 

Local Government Initiative 
on Climate change (LoGIC): 
United Nations Development 
Programme component 

Local Government Initiative 
on Climate change (LoGIC): 
United Nations Capital 
Development Fund 
component 

Climate Change Adaptation 
in the Renewable Natural 
Resources sector 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€9.5m 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€7.4m 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€7.4m 

FIRST PHASE  BUDGET  €3.7m 

9 – BHUTAN 

10 – ETHIOPIA 

11 – ETHIOPIA 

12 – AFRICAN UNION 

Rural Development and 
Climate Change Response 
Programme 

Technical Assistance to 
Support 
GCCA+/Mainstreaming of 
Climate Smart Planning and 
Implementation Approaches 
into the Productive Safety 
Net Program IV in Ethiopia 

Pilot Testing Climate Change 
Activities within the 
Sustainable Land 
Management Programme 

ClimDev Africa 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET  €5m 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€8.1m 

FIRST PHASE  BUDGET  €6.2m 

FIRST PHASE  BUDGET  €7.7m 

13 – NIGER 

14 – CUBA 

15 – GLOBAL FACILITY 

16 – INTRA-ACP  FACILITY 

Appui au Développement de 
la résilience des ménages 
face au changement 
climatique dans la région de 
Zinder 

Construyendo resiliencia 
costera en Cuba a través de 
soluciones naturales para la 
adaptación al cambio 
climático 

GCCA+  SUPPORT FACILITY 

Technical Assistance to ACP 
Secretariat for the Intra-ACP 
GCCA+  Programme and 
Climate Support Facility 
Management 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€1.3m 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET  €5m 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€8.4m 

SECOND  PHASE BUDGET 
€5.5m 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
14 

Audit approach 

17 Due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, we could not carry out audit visits to Bhutan, 
Ethiopia and the Pacific as initially planned. We based our observations on the 
following sources of evidence: 

(a)  A review of documentation and web-based information on climate change in 

developing countries. 

(b)  A review of documentation (e.g. contracts, budgets, monitoring, final reports, 

evaluations) on the activities of the initiative provided by DG INTPA and the two 
support facilities. 

(c)  Videoconferences with EU Delegation staff, implementing partners and 

beneficiaries in Ethiopia, Bhutan and the Pacific. We also held videoconferences 
with DG  INTPA, the Directorate-General for Climate Action (DG CLIMA), the 
European External Action Service (EEAS) and the initiative’s support facilities. In 
addition, we had exchanges with representatives from six EU Member States and 
with the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) Partnership 8, which helps 
countries access resources to accelerate climate action. 

(d)  A survey we sent to the initiative’s focal points in 65 EU  Delegations. The 

response rate was 86  % (56 EU  Delegations). The survey included questions on 
the efficiency and effectiveness of actions and the strengths and weaknesses of 
the initiative. 

(e)  Questionnaires sent to DG INTPA and to the two support facilities regarding the 
design and implementation of actions and the management of the initiative. 

8  NDC Partnership. 

 
 
 
 
                                                             
15 

Observations 

While the initiative focused on building capacity, there was 
room for reducing costs and for demonstrating its impact 

18 One of the two pillars in both phases of the Global Climate Change Alliance was 
the provision of technical and financial support for adaptation and mitigation 
measures (see paragraph 08). We examined the efficiency and effectiveness of this 
support. In particular, we assessed whether: 

(a)  the Commission targeted the initiative to address the needs of those directly 
affected by the impacts of climate change, particularly women, and scaled up 
successful pilot actions to enable more people to benefit; 

(b)  management costs were reasonable to maximise the amount of support reaching 

recipients; 

(c)  actions achieved their expected results; 

(d)  actions achieved synergies, and the needs addressed continued to be met after 

the support had ended; 

(e)  the initiative increased countries’ resilience to the effects of climate change. 

19 Figure 6 and the Annex summarise the findings from our assessment of the 
14 sampled actions at the time of our audit. We analysed sustainability only for the 
seven completed actions. The two support facilities are examined in paragraph 62. 

Figure 6 – Summary of findings from our sampled actions 

Source: ECA. 

 
 
 
16 

The Commission did not sufficiently scale up adaptation measures and 
address the needs of those most affected by the impacts of climate 
change 

20 Based on our examination of actions and programme evaluations, the replies to 
our survey and the discussions we held with Commission staff, EU Delegations and 
beneficiaries, we found that for the following reasons the initiative did not sufficiently 
address the needs of those directly affected by the impacts of climate change: 

(a)  there was no systematic shift from capacity building (e.g. training in integrating 
climate change into national and local plans, workshops for key staff to increase 
their understanding of climate change, etc.) and pilot activities towards more 
scaling-up of concrete adaptation actions directly supporting the population, as 
envisaged in the Global Climate Change Alliance Plus concept note 9; 

(b)  there was not enough focus on women, even though they were 

disproportionately affected by the impacts of climate change 10, for example 
because they remained in villages while men migrated to urban areas; 

(c)  some activities were unaffordable for the poorest households. 

The expected evolution from capacity building and pilot activities to more scaling-up 
of adaptation  actions was not systematic 

21 Among the EU Delegations that responded to our survey, 86 % expected support 
to evolve from capacity building for national, regional or local authorities to concrete 
adaptation measures directly benefiting the populations most affected by climate 
change. According to the Commission, national partners appreciated concrete 
adaptation activities as citizens could clearly see that action was being taken to adapt 
to climate change. 

22 However, throughout both phases of the initiative, capacity building remained a 
significant feature of support to the countries concerned because of trained staff 
leaving. Our survey highlighted this issue, as 52 % of respondents felt that turnover of 
trained staff was high. The Commission’s implementing partners explained that high 
staff turnover meant there was an ongoing need for capacity building. There was a risk, 
highlighted by the EU Delegation in the Pacific, that actions may have replaced, rather 

9  The Global Climate Change Alliance Plus concept note sets out the priorities of the second 
phase of the initiative for 2015-2020. (See: The plus of GCCA+. The Global Climate Change 
Alliance Plus. An EU flagship initiative supporting climate resilience, 18.12.2015). 

10  UN WomenWatch: Women, Gender Equality and Climate Change. 

 
 
                                                             
17 

than built, capacity. The continued focus on capacity building was in some cases 
preferred to supporting the scaling-up of successful concrete adaptation actions 
identified during the first phase, as a way to respond to the continuing need for these 
countries. This meant that there were fewer resources to support the scaling-up of 
successful concrete adaptation actions identified during the first phase. 

23 Only three of the 14 actions in our sample (action 5 in the Pacific and actions 6 
and 7 in Bangladesh) involved some scaling-up of pilot adaptation activities, namely by 
covering new locations and more beneficiaries. Furthermore, only 38 % of respondents 
to our survey thought that adaptation pilots were systematically scaled up. The 
expected evolution from capacity-building activities towards more concrete adaptation 
activities in the second phase of the initiative did not always occur in practice. Box 1 
presents two examples from actions in our sample where scaling-up was possible but 
did not materialise. 

Box 1 

The initiative missed an opportunity to scale up activities in Ethiopia 
and the Pacific 

In Ethiopia, action 11,  which was funded during the first phase of the initiative and 
related to the Sustainable Land Management Programme, was not scaled up 
during the second phase of the initiative. Instead, the pilot adaptation activities 
were discontinued and action 10, which aimed to mainstream climate-smart 
planning into the Productive Safety Net Programme during the second phase of 
the initiative consisted mainly of capacity building. 

In the Pacific, action 1 on Scaling up Pacific Adaptation, funded by the second 
phase of the initiative, aimed to scale up successful adaptation pilots from 
action 3, funded by the first phase. However, instead of scaling up the earlier 
pilots, action 1 carried out its own pilots. It did not provide the necessary support 
to scale up adaptation measures, such as household water storage, for countries 
with larger populations. The action only tested the framework for scaling-up and 
continued to provide a lump sum of €0.5  million to the same nine countries as the 
previous action 3, regardless of their population. Kiribati, for example, had a 
population of over 100  000,  while Niue had a population of less than 2 000. 
Action 1 added a tenth country, Fiji, with a population of 900  000,  which received 
the same amount. 

 
 
18 

There was insufficient focus on women, even though they were disproportionately 
affected by the impacts of climate change 

24 Commission planning documents for the actions in our sample explained that 
women were disproportionately affected by the impacts of climate change. However, 
actions did not systematically focus on women. There were only three actions 11 in our 
sample that included activities specifically addressing the needs of women. Among the 
respondents to our survey, 84 % thought that actions should put more emphasis on 
helping women. Box 2 contains examples of the lack of focus on women. 

Box 2 

Several actions did not sufficiently focus on helping women 

In Bhutan, action 8, concerning the renewable natural resources sector financed 
by the first phase, considered women and men to be affected equally by the 
impacts of climate change as members of rural communities. A 2020  study, 
however, concluded that women bore the brunt of climate change 12, as they tend 
to remain in the villages with children and the elderly when the younger male 
population migrates to urban areas to find employment. Action 9, funded by the 
second phase, introduced a target to increase the proportion of women trained in 
farming techniques from 43  % to 45  %. However, the target was not sufficiently 
ambitious and it was not achieved. The proportion of women trained increased to 
just 44 %, due to the impact of COVID-19 travel restrictions on the possibility to 
conduct training. 

Monitoring of action 5 in the Pacific in June 2021  found there was no plan to 
integrate gender aspects into activities and no gender indicators to assess the 
impact of the action in reducing inequities. In Haupu, Timor-Leste, no women 
attended the initial consultation meetings for the implementation of an 
ecosystem-based water security adaptation solution. 

Although action 12  covering Africa included a study on gender, monitoring reports 
found that it did not address gender issues directly. Women were usually under-
represented in activities. 

11  Actions 6, 7, 13. 

12  National Commission  for Women and Children, Royal Government of Bhutan, 2020: 

“Gender and Climate Change in Bhutan”. 

 
 
                                                             
19 

Some activities were unaffordable for the poorest households 

25 The initiative aimed to integrate climate change into poverty reduction efforts 
and pay special attention to measures that directly benefit those in extreme poverty 13. 
The actions were expected to help reduce poverty by building the resilience of 
vulnerable households. 

26 However, the 2021  impact and sustainability report 14 produced by the Global 
Support Facility found that some actions did not reach the poorest households. This 
was due to the higher subsistence risks they face when joining pilot actions or because 
replicating new technologies is unaffordable. Studies of actions in Cambodia, Nepal, 
the Pacific and Tanzania found that the cost of adaptation interventions meant that 
the most vulnerable households were largely excluded. For example, for action 3 in the 
Pacific, the cost of transporting rainwater storage tanks to remote outer islands in 
Palau was unaffordable for smaller and poorer households. 

The high variability of costs indicates that the efficiency of some actions 
could be improved 

27 The design and budget for actions were appraised by EU Delegations and the 
Quality Review Group within INTPA. For actions 6 and 7 (LoGIC) in Bangladesh, the EU 
Delegation assessed the reasonableness of costs in relation to the planned results. It 
aimed to limit management costs (i.e. salaries, travel and subsistence costs for 
managers, coordinators, and administrative, finance, communication and IT staff, 
together with the cost of office premises and equipment and the contribution to 
organisational overheads) to approximately 20 %. The EU Delegation compared this 
favourably with a similar intervention with slightly higher management costs. A study 
on LoGIC from March  2020  found that one of the strong points of the action was the 
large percentage of funding that directly benefited the local people. 

28 However, for nine actions in our sample, the Commission did not sufficiently 
assess the reasonableness of costs. In three cases there was no analysis of whether the 
staff and transport costs were necessary or reasonable (see Box 3). 

13  Commission  Communication COM(2007) 540. 

14  Global Climate Change Alliance Plus Impact and Sustainability Report, 2021. 

 
 
                                                             
20 

Box 3 

There was no systematic analysis of the reasonableness of costs 

The staffing costs for action 11 in Ethiopia more than doubled (from €0.6  million 
to €1.3 million) during implementation. This enabled the implementing partner to 
recruit more staff on higher salaries, but there was no analysis of the need for the 
increased costs or whether they were reasonable. 

The budget for action 14  in Cuba included management costs of 27  %. The budget 
also included €2 million (39 % of total costs) for the purchase and maintenance of 
equipment including agricultural vehicles, 11 trucks, a jeep, a minivan, three cars 
and 13  motorbikes. The minivan, cars and one motorbike were for the 
administration. There was no analysis of the budget to assess whether these costs 
were necessary or reasonable. 

Action 12 covering Africa reported final travel costs of €2.4  million (31 % of 
expenditure). Travel costs were high because activities included workshops and 
conferences, which involved travel for meeting participants and staff. However, 
there was no initial travel budget with which to compare these costs. 

29 Because the Commission did not sufficiently analyse and compare costs, we 
carried out our own analysis of management costs based on the information available 
in budgets and reports. Our analysis of the actions sampled showed wide variation in 
management costs and the potential for identifying efficiency gains at design stage 
(see Figure 7). 

Figure 7 – Management costs varied widely 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

 
 
 
21 

30 Management costs were particularly high in the Pacific. For example, the 
management costs for actions 1, 2 and 5 represented 43 %, 59 % and 53 % of the total 
budget respectively. There were two main reasons why management costs were 
particularly high in the Pacific: 

(a)  having two separate actions running at the same time (e.g. 1 and 5), funded by 
the different components of the initiative, added to management costs; 

(b)  actions from the second phase (1, 2 and 5) were managed by several 

implementing partners, which brought in expertise from different regional 
organisations, but resulted in high management costs. 

31 The Commission pointed out that some costs fell into the grey area between 
management and activities. However, it was not able to specify the proportion spent 
on each. Box 4 presents two examples illustrating this issue. 

Box 4 

No systematic distinction between management and activity costs 

The management costs for action 13  in Niger represented 24 % of the total 
budget. Activities accounted for 28 % of costs. The remaining 48  % of costs were a 
mixture of management and activities (human resources, travel, supplies and 
equipment), but the Commission could not determine how much was used for 
each. The management costs included the standard 7 % for administrative costs. 
This is the ceiling for lump-sum contributions to organisational overheads 15. 
However, on top of this, they included 9 % for the administrative costs of the 
implementing partner. These additional costs were not eligible, but the 
Commission decided to pay them because they were clearly set out in the contract 
from the beginning. A more detailed analysis of costs at the design stage would 
have the additional benefit of detecting this type of error. In this case it would 
have resulted in savings to the Commission of €166  000. 

15  Article 181.6 of the Financial Regulation applicable to the general budget of the Union, 

July 2018. 

 
 
                                                             
22 

The management costs for action 1 in the Pacific included some capacity-building 
and training activities. Some of the management staff (the Research and 
Community Officers) for action 2 were also involved in operational activities. 
However, the Commission was not able to specify how much of their time was 
spent in this way. Conversely, the activity costs of the preceding action 3 included 
some management, but the Commission did not have detailed information on 
who was working on activities and who was managing them. 

Completed actions generally delivered outputs, but the improvements in 
the beneficiaries’ situation were not measured 

32 Results fall into two categories: 

(1)  outputs: produced or accomplished with the resources allocated to an action e.g. 

number of people trained, number of households applying new farming 
techniques, publications produced, adaptation activities implemented; 

(2)  outcomes: improvements in the beneficiaries’ situation resulting from the 

intervention, such as improved climate change policies, improved access to safe 
water, improved coastal protection, increase in protected land, increase in 
production and income, and improvements in their health. 

33 The 14 actions in our sample typically aimed to build capacity and to carry out 
concrete adaptation activities (coastal management, water security, healthcare and 
sustainable farming), mostly pilots. Eight actions 16 focused mainly on adaptation, four 
actions 17 consisted of both equally, whilst two actions consisted mainly of capacity 
building18. 

34 There were seven completed actions 19 in our sample, five 20 of which generally 
delivered their expected outputs such as developing national climate-change strategies 
or helping communities to implement innovative adaptation measures. Action 11 in 
Ethiopia and action 3 in the Pacific did not deliver activities as planned. Action 11 
cancelled the capacity-building activities, while for the remainder it was not possible to 

16  Actions 1, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, 13, 14. 

17  Actions 3, 4, 5, 12. 

18  Actions 2 and 10. 

19  Actions 3, 4, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13. 

20  Actions 4, 8, 9, 12, 13. 

 
 
                                                             
23 

link the reported outputs (physical achievements) to specific locations in the 
34 woredas (districts). Action 3 was not able to construct the planned national water 
storage tank in Nauru. 

35 The 15-year duration of the initiative provided an opportunity to measure 
outcomes (i.e. the improvement in the beneficiaries’ situation). Implementing partners 
told us that focusing on outcomes would encourage ownership and help to bring about 
the desired longer-term changes. It was also necessary to follow up outcomes to 
identify actions that achieved lasting benefits in order to influence future policy and 
select the most suitable actions for scaling-up. 

36 However, we found that the Commission did not set up the necessary system of 
indicators, baselines and targets to measure the outcomes of most activities (see 
Box 5). 

Box 5 

Weaknesses in the follow-up of longer-term outcomes 

Action 10, aiming to mainstream climate-smart planning into Ethiopia’s Productive 
Safety Net Programme, initially set neither baselines nor targets to assess longer-
term outcomes. 

Action 12 produced a number of knowledge products (briefing papers, policy 
briefs, technical papers and reports), which are available on the ClimDev-Africa 
website. However, the website did not track the extent to which these knowledge 
products were being viewed. 

In line with the recommendation of the Commission’s 2015 monitoring report, 
action 4 introduced indicators for longer-term outcomes. One target indicator in 
the Pacific was for two thirds of students to still be actively engaged in a discipline 
related to climate change in the 12  months following completion of their training. 
The Commission provided many examples of students who continued to work in 
climate-change ministries, meteorological services, national disaster management 
offices and climate-change negotiation. The action carried out a more 
comprehensive exercise tracking 72 % of students, and the final report provided 
information on their activity sector (e.g. further studies, government, regional 
organisations, international agencies, private sector). However, this tracking 
exercise did not show whether they were still engaged in a discipline related to 
climate change. 

 
 
24 

37 Implementing partners in the Pacific suggested that outcome indicators could be 
measured by using a follow-up action or retaining part of the action’s funds. However, 
we found that the initiative did not follow up outcome indicators from previous 
actions. 

The initiative pursued the sustainability of actions through synergies but 
paid insufficient attention to exit strategies 

38 The impact and sustainability study highlighted the importance of links with other 
actions to foster sustainability. Among the respondents to our survey, 80 % felt that 
the initiative’s actions achieved synergies with other climate change actions. Our 
examination of actions also found many synergies. However, in three cases 21 there was 
a lack of coordination and interaction with similar actions. The response of EU 
Delegations to a number of questions in our survey also indicated that in some cases 
the sustainability of the results of actions was challenging: 

(a)  28  % of respondents felt actions did not put sufficient emphasis on sustainability; 

(b)  34  % thought mainstreaming of climate change into sector policies did not lead to 

budgets, acts and regulations; 

(c)  52  % of respondents to our survey thought staff turnover was high (see 

paragraph 22). 

39 The 2021  impact and sustainability report found that actions generally did not 
pay much attention to creating exit strategies to ensure that activities continued after 
funding had ended (see Box 6). 

21  Actions 3, 8 and 12. 

 
 
                                                             
25 

Box 6 

Actions did not pay sufficient attention to exit strategies 

The 2021  impact and sustainability report found that actions did not sufficiently 
carry out the following tasks to continue activities after the action had ended: 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

o 

undertake a sustainability gap analysis, looking at technical, financial, 
institutional, environmental and social aspects; 

develop Memoranda of Understanding with stakeholders defining their roles 
and responsibilities after the end of the action; 

scale down direct support for activities during the latter stages of an action, 
allowing others to take over; 

link activities to larger programmes that can count on continued support 
from the government, private sector or other donors; 

identify the main gaps in key partners’ capacities and focus on addressing 
them; 

develop communication material to document lessons learnt with a view to 
promoting replication of best practices from the action. 

All nine countries supported by action 3 in the Pacific had difficulties maintaining 
the technical and financial resources necessary to sustain the results in the long 
term. There was little replication of rainwater-harvesting technologies in Palau 
due to the high installation costs (see paragraph 26). 

40 There were seven closed actions in our sample. Five of them 22 received additional 
EU funding either from the initiative or from other EU programmes in order to be 
sustainable. However, the other two closed actions 23 lacked the resources to continue 
activities once funding had ended. The sustainability prospects of action 11  in Ethiopia 
were particularly poor because of the lack of maintenance of tools and equipment (see 
Box 7). 

22  Actions 3, 4, 8, 9 and 12. 

23  Actions 11 and 13. 

 
 
                                                             
26 

Box 7 

Lack of maintenance was an obstacle to sustainability in Ethiopia 

The evaluation of action 11 in Ethiopia found that successful pilot activities were 
discontinued once the action had finished due to the lack of maintenance of tools 
and equipment: 

o  many of the hand-operated water pumps were damaged, so farmers could 

not use them; 

o  most of the wells provided collapsed; 

o 

o 

o 

a nursery failed due to lack of seeds; 

farmers could not practise stall-feeding successfully due to lack of fodder; 

the drip irrigation system failed because of the time and effort needed to 
carry water to the raised tanks. 

The subsequent action 10 in Ethiopia was mainly capacity building and did not 
follow up these activities. 

The initiative did not demonstrate that it increased countries’ resilience 
to the effects of climate change 

41 ‘Impacts’ are the longer-term socioeconomic consequences that can be observed 
a certain time after the completion of an initiative. The expected longer-term impact 
of the Global Climate Change Alliance was the increased resilience of countries to the 
effects of climate change. However, the robust monitoring and evaluation system 
necessary to measure the results and impacts of the initiative was not set up as 
proposed by the global evaluation 24 and the concept note in 2015  (see paragraphs 35, 
36, 37 and Box 5). There was no assessment framework with common indicators on 
which all actions could report. Therefore, the Commission could not aggregate results 
across all actions to monitor the overall performance of the initiative and be held 

24  Evaluation of the Global Climate Change Alliance (GCCA) Global programme World-Wide: 

Final Report, 2015. 

 
 
                                                             
27 

accountable for its achievements. Instead, the impact of support was expressed in 
terms that were not measurable. For example: 

(a)  The Warsaw Decision on Loss and Damage 25, taken at COP 19  in 2013,  established 
the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage, referring to the harm 
caused by climate change. The 2014  publication ‘Loss and Damage in Africa’, 
produced by action 12  (ClimDev), provided an assessment for consideration when 
setting up the procedures for implementing this mechanism. However, the extent 
of its contribution was not measurable. 

(b)  A 2019  article on the Global Climate Change Alliance described how it contributed 
to the formation of a progressive coalition between the EU and the beneficiary 
countries, which made the Paris Agreement possible 26. However, the contribution 
of the initiative to the Paris Agreement was not measurable. 

42 One attempt to measure impact was action 5 in the Pacific, which included the 
change in the University of Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative (ND-GAIN) country 
index 27 for participating countries as an indicator. This index shows the resilience of a 
country to the impacts of climate change. It uses 45 indicators to measure a country’s 
vulnerability to climate disruption and its readiness to invest in adaptive actions. We 
built on the Commission’s attempt to measure impact and analysed the change in 
ND-GAIN country indexes over the duration of the initiative from 2007  to the present. 
We found that there was an improvement in the ND-GAIN index for most countries 
that received funding from the initiative (see Figure 8). In most cases, this was less 
than four points on the ND-GAIN scale. 

25  UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)  loss and damage. 

26  Walter Kennes, 2019: The origins of the GCCA: remembering how the alliance was born. 

27  University of Notre Dame-Global Adaptation Index. 

 
 
                                                             
Figure 8 – Changes in ND-GAIN country indexes 2007-2019 

Funded by the initiative
Not funded by the initiative

28 

Nigeria
Bangladesh
Myanmar/Burma
Somalia
Yemen
Cuba
Madagascar
Central African Republic
Malawi
The Gambia
Equatorial Guinea
Vanuatu
Eritrea
Mali
Sudan
Uganda
Suriname
Mozambique
Belize
Chad
Cameroon
Comoros
Lesotho
Congo
Tanzania
Afghanistan
Liberia
Guinea-Bissau
Trinidad and Tobago
Papua New Guinea
Bolivia
Benin
Ethiopia
Djibouti
Haiti
Namibia
Zimbabwe
Zambia
Dominican Republic
Burundi
Maldives
Cambodia
Sri Lanka
Ghana
Jamaica
Guyana
Cabo Verde
Samoa
DRC
Kenya
Mauritania
Niger
Angola
Senegal
Sierra Leone
São Tomé and Príncipe
Togo
Guatemala
Burkina Faso
Iraq
Laos
Nepal
Seychelles
Mauritius
Solomon Islands
Guinea
Côte d'Ivoire
Bhutan
Timor-Leste
Rwanda

Source: ECA, based on ND-GAIN data. 

 
 
 
29 

43 Support from this initiative is just one of the factors that can influence the 
ND-GAIN index of countries’ vulnerability to climate change. The impact of the 
initiative cannot be isolated from that of national governments, other donors and 
outside events. Other EU  funding can also have an impact, especially as climate-related 
actions are now more prominent in the Multiannual Indicative Programmes. For 
example, the European Development Fund and the Development Cooperation 
Instrument contributed to actions 9, 10, 11  and 12, which were also funded by the 
GCCA initiative. 

44 A further indication that improvements in the ND-GAIN index cannot be 
attributed to the initiative is that there is a similar improvement for most of the 
vulnerable countries that did not receive funding. Similarly, the three countries that 
saw the largest deterioration in their ND-GAIN index (Nigeria, Bangladesh and 
Myanmar/Burma) all received funding from the initiative. 

The Commission did not maximise the added value of the 
initiative 

45 This section assesses whether the Commission: 

(a) 

focused both phases of the Global Climate Change Alliance on the poor 
developing countries most vulnerable to climate change, in particular LDCs and 
SIDS; 

(b)  attracted additional funding from EU Member States, the private sector and other 
innovative financing mechanisms, as intended, to maximise the impact of the 
initiative; 

(c)  promoted general awareness of the initiative; 

(d)  had reliable global oversight of the costs and activities of the initiative and 

achieved synergies between the global and intra-ACP components; 

(e)  set out an exit strategy to ensure that the lessons learnt from the initiative are 

taken forward in the new MFF and feed into the design of activities aiming to 
tackle climate change in developing countries. 

 
 
30 

The focus on the most vulnerable countries decreased in the second 
phase 

46 The initiative aimed to help the poor developing countries most vulnerable to 
climate change, in particular the LDCs and SIDS, increase their capacities to adapt to 
the effects of climate change 28. In the first phase, the Commission developed its own 
climate vulnerability index to select the countries that would most benefit from 
support. This phase provided support to the most vulnerable LDCs and SIDS, funding 
24 out of 29 (see Figure 9) 29. 

28  Commission  Communication COM(2007) 540. 

29  Walter Kennes, 2019. 

 
 
                                                             
Figure 9 – The first phase mainly focused on vulnerable LDCs and SIDS 

Funded in the first phase
Not funded in the first phase

Commission index

(higher index means 
more vulnerable)

31 

The first phase 
mainly focused on 
vulnerable LDCs 
and SIDS

Bangladesh
Mozambique
Nepal
Tanzania
Cambodia
Mali
Haiti
Madagascar
Rwanda
Senegal
Solomon Islands
Ethiopia
The Gambia
Guyana
Malawi
Uganda
Belize
Liberia
Sierra Leone
Afghanistan
Benin
Cuba
Bhutan
Burkina Faso
Guinea-Bissau
Maldives
Vanuatu
Congo, Dem Rep
Laos
Niger
Burundi
Jamaica
Papua New Guinea
São Tomé and Príncipe
Zambia
Myanmar/Burma
Somalia
Togo
Eritrea
Mauritania
Central African Rep
Comoros
Fiji
Mauritius
Seychelles
Guinea
Samoa
Tonga
Chad
Djibouti
Timor-Leste
Micronesia
Sudan
Yemen
Cabo Verde
Suriname
Grenada
Lesotho
Saint Lucia
Trinidad and Tobago
Angola
Antigua and Barbuda
Dominica
Dominican Republic
Bahamas
Barbados
Bahrain
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Equatorial Guinea

L
L
L
L
L
L
LS
L
L
L
LS
L
L
S
L
L
S
L
L
L
L
S
L
L
LS
S
LS
L
L
L
L
S
S
LS
L
L
L
L
L
L
L
LS
S
S
S
L
LS
S
L
L
LS
S
L
L
S
S
S
L
S
S
L
S
S
S
S
S
S
S
L

Note: L = LDC; S = SIDS. 

Source: ECA, based on Commission 2010 index. 

 
 
 
32 

47 The Commission’s index was based on three factors: Gross National Income (GNI) 
per capita, climate-related vulnerability and commitment to climate change policy 
dialogue. However, it did not take into account other funding provided to help 
countries tackle climate change. As a result, the Commission did not know whether it 
was supporting countries that had already received significant funding, through the 
MIPs (see paragraph 04)  or from other donors, to help them adapt to the impacts of 
climate change. 

48 In the second phase, the Commission’s headquarters stopped updating its 
vulnerability index and no longer used it to select countries for funding. Instead, the 
Commission referred to the ND-GAIN index to assess countries’ vulnerability to climate 
change, but did not use it as a selection tool. 

49 The Commission allocated funds in the second phase in response to requests 
from EU Delegations, endorsed by host country governments. However, this demand-
driven approach did not successfully target vulnerable countries that had not 
benefited from funding in the first phase. In particular: 

(a)  Some less vulnerable countries received additional funding in the second phase 

even if they had already received funding in the first phase (see Figure 10). These 
countries were mainly SIDS, e.g. Mauritius (the funding recipient with the highest 
ND-GAIN index and considerably less vulnerable than the other recipients), the 
Maldives, the Seychelles and Timor-Leste, but also included Bhutan, a less 
vulnerable country that is phasing out from the group of LDCs in 2023. 

(b)  Some countries that were neither LDCs nor SIDS also received funding in the 
second phase. These were Côte d’Ivoire, Namibia, Nigeria and Sri Lanka. 
Moreover, two large multi-country programmes also provided funding in the 
second phase for some countries that were neither LDCs nor SIDS (e.g. Brazil, an 
upper middle income economy). 

(c)  Several LDCs that were highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change but had 

not received support in the first phase still did not receive country funding in the 
second phase. These included Afghanistan, Angola, Burundi, Central African 
Republic, Eritrea, Guinea and Yemen (see Figure 10). Despite the unstable 
political situation in some of these countries, they nevertheless benefited from 
other bilateral EU support through the MIPs (see paragraph 04). 

(d)  The Commission’s own index and the ND-GAIN index both ranked the SIDS as 

generally less vulnerable to the impacts of climate change than LDCs. This may 
seem counterintuitive, given the existential threat posed by rising sea levels. 

 
 
33 

However, sea level rise accounted for 10 % of a country’s final score on the 
Commission’s own index, and 4 % on the ND-GAIN index. There were many other 
factors that the indexes took into account to assess countries’ vulnerability to 
climate change, such as floods, droughts, storms and reliance on agriculture, to 
which LDCs were particularly exposed. In both the first and second phase, one 
third of the countries funded were SIDS, even though the indexes ranked them as 
considerably less vulnerable than LDCs. Moreover, the SIDS of the Pacific received 
16 times more funding per person than the LDCs of Africa. The Commission 
considered that the relatively strong emphasis on the SIDS and their high funding 
per capita was appropriate because of their small size and isolation. 

 
 
34 

Figure 10 – In the second phase, several highly vulnerable LDCs still 
received no funding 

ND-GAIN 2014 country index
(lower index means 
more vulnerable)

Budget in million euros
First phase (2007-2013)
Second phase (2014-2020)

Several highly vulnerable
LDCs still received 
no funding

Chad
Central African Rep
Congo Dem. Rep.
Niger
Guinea Bissau
Eritrea
Sudan
Zimbabwe
Afghanistan
Myanmar/Burma
Mali
Uganda
Liberia
Bangladesh
Haiti
Congo
Nigeria
Angola
Benin
Madagascar
Burkina Faso
Malawi
Ethiopia
Kenya
Yemen
Sierra Leone
Burundi
Côte d'Ivoire
Guinea
Papua New Guinea
Mauritania
Cambodia
Pakistan
Mozambique
Tanzania
The Gambia
Comoros
Togo
Cameroon
Laos
Senegal
India
Eswatini
Syria
Equatorial Guinea
Solomon Islands
Zambia
Honduras
Bolivia
Rwanda
Nepal
Djibouti
Vanuatu
Somalia
Venezuela
Iraq
São Tomé and Príncipe
Turkmenistan
Guyana
Nicaragua
Korea, DPR
Guatemala
Ecuador
Lesotho
Libya
Philippines
Gabon
Ghana
Timor-Leste
Tajikistan
Viet Nam
Egypt
Cuba
Bhutan
Namibia
Indonesia
Sri Lanka
Maldives
Uzbekistan
Belize
Lebanon
El Salvador
Paraguay
Dominican Republic
Suriname
Samoa
Jamaica
Peru
Botswana
Brazil
South Africa
Colombia
Mexico
Seychelles
Antigua and Barbuda
Trinidad & Tobago
Cabo Verde
Mauritius

L
L
L
L
LS
L
L
-
L
L
L
L
L
L
LS
-
-
L
L
L
L
L
L
-
L
L
L
-
L
S
L
L
-
L
L
L
LS
L
-
L
L
-
-
-
-
LS
L
-
-
L
L
L
S
L
-
-
LS
-
S
-
-
-
-
L
-
-
-
-
LS
-
-
-
S
L
-
-
-
S
-
S
-
-
-
S
S
S
S
-
-
-
-
-
-
S
S
S
S
S

Note: L = LDC; S = SIDS. Countries are listed in order of their vulnerability according to the ND-GAIN 
country index. 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

 
 
 
35 

The initiative did not attract additional funding as expected 

50 The Commission, the European Parliament and the Council all recognised that the 
success of the initiative depended on the mobilisation of significant resources (see 
Box 8). 

Box 8 

Mobilisation of significant resources identified as a key factor for 
success 

In its Communication from 2007,  the Commission called for a strong commitment 
from the EU to the Global Climate Change Alliance. The European Parliament 
estimated the needs of the initiative to be at least €2 billion annually by 2010  and 
€5-10 billion annually by 202030. 

While the Council supported the set-up of the initiative and identified the 
mobilisation of significant resources as a key factor for success, it expected the 
Commission to find innovative means of financing. However, the Commission 
relied on the Member States to provide more support. The ECA’s special 
report 17/2013  found that the Member States did not sufficiently support the 
initiative and that this created a gap between its initial ambitions and its 
achievements. The global evaluation of the initiative from 2015  confirmed that 
increasing Member States’ contributions was challenging. 

51 Despite several attempts to encourage greater participation, the Commission did 
not succeed in widening the base of EU support for this initiative. In the end, it 
mobilised €728.8 million over the whole 14-year period from 2007  to 2020,  even 
though the second phase was an EU flagship initiative. Total financing thus remained 
well below the Commission’s expectations. While in the first phase, some EU  Member 
States (Estonia, Ireland, Cyprus and Sweden) made limited additional contributions of 
€28.8  million 31 to the initiative, no bilateral contributions were made during the 
second phase. 

30  Anders Wijkman, EP Rapporteur: “Global Climate Change Alliance between the European 
Union and poor developing countries most vulnerable to climate change”, 23.9.2008. 

31  Estonia (€0.8 million), Ireland (€23 million), Cyprus (€0.6 million) and Sweden (€4.4 million). 

 
 
                                                             
36 

52 In addition to increasing EU Member States’ contributions, the initiative aimed to 
promote innovative funding modalities and attract a much wider range of 
stakeholders, non-state actors and the private sector in partner countries. The 
Parliament also called for the establishment of green taxes, public-private partnerships 
and other innovative financing mechanisms. The Commission envisaged the creation of 
trust or basket funds 32 in order to pool funding from different sources (government, 
donors, private sector, etc.). However, this did not materialise. The evaluation of the 
initiative from 2015  found that private sector involvement remained relatively weak. 

53 Overall, the level of funding available to the initiative prevented the Commission 
from realising its initial ambition to create a world alliance and limited what it could 
achieve in tackling climate change in developing countries. A 2019  article on the Global 
Climate Change Alliance described how “after the launch of the GCCA in 
September 2007  it became clear rather quickly that the extra resources that could be 
mobilised by the European Commission would not be enough to have a big effect on 
the positions of the 70-odd LDC/SIDS in the climate negotiations”33. 

The initiative reached many countries but awareness and visibility 
remained limited 

54 EU Delegations were globally aware of the initiative and received regular 
information material and newsletters from the Global Support Facility. However, our 
survey found that many EU Delegations (46 %) felt that the initiative was not very well 
known in developing countries. Furthermore, 77 % of respondents considered that the 
lack of awareness of available funding was one of the reasons preventing some 
vulnerable countries from requesting financial support. 

55 EU Member States’ permanent representations showed little awareness of the 
initiative. A contributing factor was that the Commission did not produce annual 
reports to the Council summarising the main achievements of the initiative as initially 
planned in the Implementation Framework 34. 

32  Commission  Staff Working Document on the Implementation Framework of the Global 

Climate Change Alliance, SEC(2008) 2319. 

33  Walter Kennes, 2019. 

34  Commission  Staff Working Document SEC(2008) 2319. 

 
 
                                                             
37 

56 Other reasons why awareness of the initiative remained low, despite funding 
actions in more than 80  countries, were that: 

(a)  communication activities in some countries (actions 11  in Ethiopia and 13  in 

Niger) provided visibility for the EU,  but not for the initiative; 

(b)  there were many different information sources, including several websites35, 
which meant that the information on the initiative was dispersed through 
multiple communication channels; 

(c) 

the parallel implementation through the “global” (DCI-funded) and the “Intra-
ACP” (EDF-funded) component blurred the image and the visibility of the initiative 
and was a source of potential confusion, particularly for external stakeholders. 

The complex set-up of the initiative and the lack of a clear definition of 
its perimeter limited its added value 

57 The initiative was not related to a particular aid modality, nor did it support a 
specific sector/measure that was not already supported by other funds (EU and 
non EU). 

58 In its Communication from 2007  and the related Staff Working Document from 
2008,  the Commission set out its vision of the initiative. It considered it 
complementary to the many already existing climate change funds and initiatives, in 
particular the Least Developed Countries Fund, the Special Climate Change Fund, the 
Adaptation Fund and the Global Environmental Facility. The Commission’s intention 
was to provide the majority of the initiative’s funding directly to governments through 
general or sector budget support and not to rely on a project-based approach working 
through UN implementing agencies, as was the case for the other funds. 

59 However, the initiative was mostly project-based, as in the case of the existing 
funds, and a lot of aid was also channelled through UN organisations or EU Member 
States’ development agencies (see Figure 5 and paragraph 12). Consequently, there 
was no clear distinction between this initiative and the numerous thematic funds 
already tackling climate change in developing countries. 

35  www.gcca.eu, www.intraacpgccaplus.org, www.europa.eu/capacity4dev/gcca-community. 

 
 
                                                             
38 

60 The Commission did not have a reliable overview of the costs and activities of the 
initiative, which would have facilitated the strategic planning of resources. The actions 
funded were indistinguishable from other EU actions tackling climate change in 
developing countries. In some cases, funds were used to top up actions already funded 
by other EU programmes. This raises questions about the added value of having a 
separate initiative with its own management structure to fund the same actions. Given 
the fact that all the actions were supported by the same funds (the DCI and the EDF), it 
was not clear why the decision was made to add the Global Climate Change Alliance 
label in some cases and not in others. 

61 Beside the lack of a clear definition of the initiative’s perimeter, splitting the 
initiative into two components and two support facilities was unnecessarily complex 
(see paragraphs 06 and 07 and Table 2). Not only was there a lack of synergies, but 
having separate actions (for example, action 3 and 4 in the Pacific) made little sense in 
terms of efficiency. Merging the actions would have led to economies of scale (the 
same applies to actions 1 and 5 in the Pacific), which would have helped reduce the 
high management costs (see paragraph 30). The complexity of the set-up was an 
obstacle to the initiative being a cohesive whole. 

 
 
39 

Table 2 – The set-up of the initiative 

Global component 

Intra-ACP component 

+85  countries 

+80  actions 

Regional organisations 

+20  actions 

Development Cooperation Instrument 

European Development Fund 

Technical Assistance, Support Facility 

(Ad-hoc support to institutions working in 
eligible countries, training and capacity 
building, etc.) 

Technical 
assistance to the 
OACPS Secretariat 

Technical 
Assistance, Climate 
Support Facility 

Websites: 

Global facility 

Global Climate Change Alliance 
community 

Global Climate Change Alliance 
Community YouTube channel 

Newsletters: Fridays for Climate, 
Flashnews 

Knowledge-sharing platform for 
institutional stakeholders and 
beneficiaries 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

Website: 

Intra-ACP facility 

Intra-ACP Twitter 

Intra-ACP GCCA+ Official Newsletter 

Knowledge Management platform 

62 The regional meetings organised by the two support facilities helped share 
lessons and experiences between actions. The support facilities contributed to the 
design of actions and developed their own web-based knowledge-sharing tools. 
However, we did not find any reasoned justification for the duplication of structures 
(with their respective websites, etc.), which created risks of overlaps and of potential 
inefficiencies. For example, a regional workshop held in May 2021  only involved the 
Global Support Facility. This was a missed opportunity, as the workshop could have 
benefited from the experience of the Intra-ACP Support Facility with regional 
organisations. 

 
 
40 

The initiative was proactive in identifying lessons learnt, but the 
Commission did not set out a clear exit strategy 

63 Many lessons were learnt from the actions funded by the initiative, such as the 
need to: 

(a)  assess demand from policymakers for the climate information delivered by the 

actions; 

(b)  ensure the sustainability of community tools for planning climate change actions 

by integrating them into the curricula of schools and universities; 

(c) 

include activities specifically designed for women, young people and senior 
citizens; 

(d)  strengthen collaboration between relevant ministries and the ministry 

responsible for finance; and 

(e)  pay more attention to taking forward the achievements of successful actions. 

64 Among the respondents to our survey, 76  % felt the initiative identified useful 
lessons that could improve support in the countries’ Multiannual Indicative 
Programmes for 2021-2027.  In 2021,  the Commission mobilised the Global Support 
Facility to share lessons with EU  Delegations through regional workshops and to 
integrate lessons learnt into the content of the 2021-2027  MIPs. The Commission will 
also draw lessons from the impact and sustainability study as well as from a study on 
the initiative’s experience in the field of monitoring and evaluating adaptation. Action-
specific lessons are shared on the initiative’s websites, the collaborative platforms and 
the Cap4Dev community platform. The Global Support Facility shares knowledge and 
lessons learnt on its website, which has increased its user numbers from 8 000  to 
30 000  within three years (see Figure 11). 

 
 
Figure 11 – Key statistics on the use of the Global Support Facility 
website 

(thousand users)

41 

Sep 18 -
Feb 19

Mar 19 -
Aug 19

Sep 19 -
Feb 20

Mar 20 -
Aug 20

Sep 20 -
Feb 21

Mar 21 -
Aug 21

Source: GCCA+ interim report, March to August 2021. 

65 We found that the Commission had not set out a clear exit strategy for the 
initiative. The 2021  Regulation on the Neighbourhood, Development and International 
Cooperation Instrument (NDICI – Global Europe) for the 2021-2027  period sets out 
how thematic budget lines will fund global initiatives. It also states that specific 
country-based or regional actions will be funded through bilateral cooperation 
envelopes. In this context, the Commission decided to discontinue the initiative. 

66 Currently, the information available on the initiative is spread across different 
documents. The Commission did not set out a clear exit strategy bringing together the 
future steps for the initiative. There is also uncertainty over what will be done with the 
different websites as well as with all the technical papers, background documents, and 
training and workshop materials prepared by the Global and Intra-ACP Support 
facilities. 

67 The Commission has not explained how it intends to make knowledge products 
available after the initiative has ended and how it plans to pass on lessons learnt to the 
EU Global Support Facility for Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC), which began 
operations in October 2021.  Nor is it clear how this new facility will support ongoing 
activities, which are planned to continue until 2025. 

 
 
 
 
 
42 

Conclusions and recommendations 

68 We conclude that, overall, the initiative did not demonstrate its impact on
countries’ resilience to climate change. In terms of efficiency, completed actions 
generally delivered their outputs, but sometimes at a high cost. 

69 The initiative did not measure the improvements in the beneficiaries’ situation,
nor did it focus sufficiently on the needs of those most affected. The cost of using new 
technologies made it more difficult for the poorest households to benefit from the 
programme. In addition, few actions included activities specifically addressing the 
needs of women. 

70 The initiative focused on building institutional capacity, but sustainability was
limited due to high staff turnover. Therefore, the expected evolution from capacity 
building and pilot activities to more scaling-up of adaptation actions reaching more 
beneficiaries did not take place systematically (paragraphs 20-26  and 32-44). 

Recommendation 1 – Focus on those most affected by climate 
change 

When funding climate change actions in developing countries, the Commission should: 

(a)

select indicators, baselines and targets to measure the outcomes of activities;

(b)

(c)

set ambitious targets, taking account of the context in each country, for the
proportion of women directly benefiting from actions and increase the focus on
the poorest households;

in the case of successive actions, improve the balance between capacity building
and other activities with a view to scale up concrete adaptation actions reaching
more people directly affected by the impacts of climate change.

Target implementation date: Actions funded from January  2024 

43 

71 Neither of the two phases of the Global Climate Change Alliance attracted the 
expected additional funding from Member States and the private sector. Despite this 
significant financing gap, the Commission did not revise its initial ambitious objectives 
over the 15-year duration of the initiative. Furthermore, in the second phase, the 
Commission’s funding allocation criteria led to proportionally less support being 
allocated to the most vulnerable countries. 

72 The Commission did not sufficiently analyse the reasonableness of the budgeted 
costs of most of the sampled actions. Our analysis showed that the management costs 
of actions varied widely and were particularly high in the Pacific. We found that the 
Commission could have made savings with a more detailed analysis of the costs. 

73 Although the initiative started in 2007  and supported more than 80  countries, 
awareness remained limited in both developing countries and EU  Member States. This 
was partly because the actions funded were not distinguishable from other EU actions 
addressing climate change in developing countries. Moreover, the efficiency of the 
initiative was impacted by the complexity of its organisation, in particular the 
duplication of support facilities and funding streams. 

74 There will be no additional phases of the Global Climate Change Alliance, but it 
has provided useful lessons for any other global development initiatives that the EU 
might implement in the future (paragraphs 27-31  and 45-67). 

 
 
44 

Recommendation 2 – Incorporate lessons learnt into future 
global development initiatives 

When setting up future global development initiatives, the Commission should 
incorporate the lessons learnt from the Global Climate Change Alliance, particularly 
the following: 

(a)  revise the objectives when it is apparent during implementation that sufficient 

funding is not available; 

(b)  allocate funding strategically by applying objective criteria that also take account 
of financial support for the same sector received by partner countries from other 
sources; 

(c)  systematically analyse and document the reasonableness of the budgeted costs of 

actions; 

(d)  promote general awareness of the initiative through communication activities 

targeting beneficiary countries and potential donors. 

Target implementation date: April 2024 

This Report was adopted by Chamber III, headed by Mrs  Bettina Jakobsen, Member of 
the Court of Auditors, in Luxembourg at its meeting of 10 January 2023. 

For the Court of Auditors 

Tony Murphy 
President 

 
 
 
 
 
 
45 

Annex 

Overview of sampled actions 

No

Country/
Region

1

Pacific

2

3

Pacific

Pacific

4

Pacific

Contract title

Funding 
component

Contracted 
amount EUR

Paid amount 
EUR 
(at 04/2022)

Implementing 
modality

Status

Website

Needs 
assessment

Cost analysis

Results

Sustainability

Scaling Up Pacific Adaptation : South Pacific Commission and 
Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme 
component

Scaling Up Pacific Adaptation: University of the South Pacific 
component

Increasing Climate Resilience of Pacific Small Island States 
through the Global Climate Change Alliance (GCCA)

Support to the Global Climate Change Alliance (GCCA) through 
Capacity Building, Community Engagement and Applied Research

Global

      12 790 000          6 794 115  Financing Agreement

ongoing https://gccasupa.org/

Some weaknesses

Unsatisfactory

Some weaknesses

Not applicable

Global

        2 100 000 

        1 548 306  Action Grants

ongoing https://gccasupa.org/ 

Some weaknesses

Unsatisfactory

Some weaknesses

Not applicable

Global

      11 356 556        11 356 556  Financing Agreement

closed

https://ccprojects.gsd.spc.int/eu-
gcca-psis/ 

Some weaknesses Some weaknesses Some weaknesses Some weaknesses

Intra-ACP

        7 602 439 

        7 602 439  Action Grants

closed

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

5

6

7

8

9

Pacific

Pacific Adaptation to Climate Change and Resilience Building 

Intra-ACP

        9 500 000 

        6 314 867  Financing Agreement

ongoing

Some weaknesses

Unsatisfactory

Satisfactory

Not applicable

Bangladesh

Local Government Initiative on Climate change (LoGIC): United 
Nations Development Programme component

Bangladesh

Local Government Initiative on Climate change (LoGIC): United 
Nations Capital Development Fund component

Bhutan

Climate Change Adaptation in the Renewable Natural Resources 
sector

Global

        7 443 312 

        5 385 252  Financing Agreement

ongoing https://mptf.undp.org/fund/jbd40 

Satisfactory

Good

Satisfactory

Not applicable

Global

        7 434 392 

        5 373 032  Financing Agreement

ongoing https://mptf.undp.org/fund/jbd40 

Satisfactory

Good

Satisfactory

Not applicable

Global

        3 746 972 

        3 746 972  Budget Support

closed

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

Bhutan

Rural Development and Climate Change Response Programme

Global

        5 000 000 

        5 000 000  Budget Support

closed

Satisfactory

Good

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

10 Ethiopia

Technical Assistance to Support GCCA+/Mainstreaming of Climate 
Smart Planning and Implementation Approaches into the 
Productive Safety Net Program IV in Ethiopia

11 Ethiopia

Pilot Testing Climate Change Activities within the Sustainable 
Land Management Programme 

Global

        8 136 790 

        5 632 128  Services

ongoing

Some weaknesses Some weaknesses Some weaknesses

Not applicable

Global

        6 247 634 

        6 247 634  Financing Agreement

closed

Satisfactory

Some weaknesses Some weaknesses

Unsatisfactory

12 Africa

ClimDev Africa

Intra-ACP

        7 740 166 

        7 740 166  Financing Agreement

closed

https://www.climdev-africa.org/ 

Satisfactory

Some weaknesses

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

13 Niger

14 Cuba

Appui au Développement de la résilience des ménages face au 
changement climatique dans la région de Zinder

Construyendo resiliencia costera en Cuba a través de soluciones 
naturales para la adaptación al cambio climático

Global

        1 318 160 

        1 307 189  Action Grants

closed

Good

Unsatisfactory

Satisfactory

Satisfactory

Global

        5 000 000 

        4 577 110  Financing Agreement

ongoing

Satisfactory

Unsatisfactory

Some weaknesses

Not applicable

15

16

Global 
Facility

GCCA+ SUPPORT FACILITY

Global

        8 415 622 

        6 852 729  Services

ongoing

https://www.gcca.eu/gcca-support-
facility 

IntraACP 
Facility

Technical Assistance to ACP Secretariat for the Intra ACP GCCA+ 
Programme and Climate Support Facility Management

Intra-ACP

        5 499 320 

        4 181 663  Services

ongoing https://intraacpgccaplus.org/ 

Source: ECA, based on Commission data. 

 
 
 
46 

Abbreviations 

ACP: African, Caribbean and Pacific 

DCI: Development Cooperation Instrument 

DG INTPA: Directorate-General for International Partnerships 

EDF: European Development Fund 

GCCA(+): Global Climate Change Alliance (Plus) 

IPCC: United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 

LDCs: Least Developed Countries 

LOGIC: Local Government Initiative on Climate change 

MFF: Multiannual Financial Framework 

MIPs: Multi-annual indicative programmes 

NDC: Nationally Determined Contributions 

ND-GAIN: Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative 

NDICI: Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument 

OACPS: Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States 

SIDS: Small Island Developing States 

 
 
 
 
47 

Glossary 

Budget support: The direct transfer of EU aid to the national treasury of a partner 
country, subject to certain conditions. 

Climate change adaptation:  Reducing the vulnerability of countries and communities 
to climate change by increasing their ability to absorb its impacts. 

Climate change mitigation: Reducing or limiting the emission of greenhouse gases due 
to their effect on the climate. 

Programme  estimate: A document, drawn up by a partner country and endorsed by 
the European Commission, setting out the cooperation or development work to be 
implemented, and the financial, human and material resources required. 

 
 
 
 
48 

Replies of the Commission 

https://www.eca.europa.eu/en/Pages/DocItem.aspx?did=63424 

Timeline 

https://www.eca.europa.eu/en/Pages/DocItem.aspx?did=63424 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
49 

Audit team 

The ECA’s special reports set out the results of its audits of EU policies and 
programmes, or of management-related topics from specific budgetary areas. The ECA 
selects and designs these audit tasks to be of maximum impact by considering the risks 
to performance or compliance, the level of income or spending involved, forthcoming 
developments and political and public interest. 

This performance audit was carried out by Audit Chamber III External action, security 
and justice, headed by ECA Member Bettina Jakobsen. The audit was led by ECA 
Member Hannu Takkula, supported by Turo Hentila, Head of Private Office, and 
Nita Tennilä, Private Office Attaché; Alejandro Ballester Gallardo, Principal Manager; 
Loulla Puisais – Jauvin, Head of Task; Mark  Marshall and Flavia Di Marco, Auditors. 
Zoe Dennis provided linguistic support. Alexandra Mazilu provided graphic support. 
Britta Gauckler and Roussalia Nikolova provided survey support. Katja Dudzińska and 
Gitana Letukytė provided administrative support. 

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ISBN 978-92-847-9489-8 

ISSN 1977-5679 

doi:10.2865/87261 

QJ-AB-23-005-EN-N 

ISBN 978-92-847-9481-2 

ISSN 1977-5679 

doi:10.2865/540460 

QJ-AB-23-005-EN-Q 

In 2007, the EU launched the Global Climate Change Alliance 
initiative to help the poor developing countries most vulnerable 
to climate change increase their capacity to adapt to the effects of 
climate change. Our audit assessed whether actions achieved 
their intended results efficiently and whether the Commission 
maximised the added value of the initiative. We found that 
completed actions generally delivered their outputs, but that 
there was room for reducing costs and for demonstrating the 
initiative’s impact. We recommend that the Commission focus on 
those most affected by climate change and incorporate lessons 
learnt into future global development initiatives. 

ECA special report pursuant to Article 287(4), second 
subparagraph, TFEU.