Climate change finance mechanisms such as the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) were
previously designed in ways that would only benefit large developing countries like China and
India that have enhanced technological capacity and capabilities, providing attractive environments
for state and non-state actors seeking to leverage climate finance to support their
international investments. Africa in its entirety, including South Africa and North African countries,
has received only 3% of accumulated international investment under the CDM. The African Centre for Technology Studies (ACTS) and the University of Sussex invited all of the East African climate policymakers to a 2 day training and capacity building workshop on designing NDCs to leverage climate finance for building innovation systems within East African nations. The first day of the workshop involved exploring innovations systems and more specifically CRIBS (Climate Relevant Innovation-system Builders) as a pathway to enhancing implementation and delivery of NDCs) in ways that leverage funding to build new innovation systems around low-carbon energy technologies. The main aim of this first day event was to help participants understand the various perspectives of innovation systems within the context of CRIBs and link these to their policy contexts particularly implementation and delivery of NDCs. The second day of the workshop entailed group discussions involving all the attending stakeholders from across the region. These discussions built on the discussions conducted on the first day. The participants explored CRIBs as a mechanism in the context of utilizing NDCs to build innovation systems and leveraging climate finance in the region.
