Low Emission Development Strategies - Colombia, jamaica, philippines, Vietnam

Around the world, countries are working to accelerate sustainable economic growth and investments while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and building climate resilience. These Low-Emission Development Strategies, or LEDS, enable nations to address various climate change challenges while continuing to grow their economies. The U.S. Agency for International Development, through its Analysis and Investment for Low-Emission Growth Project—or (AY-LEG)—is building capacity in these countries to carry out this work. As LEDS take shape around the world, AILEG was invited by countries and USAID Missions to fill data gaps and apply analytical methodologies while training key players how to do both. Since 2011, AILEG has worked in Colombia, Guatemala, Jamaica, Kazakhstan, Mexico, the Philippines, and Vietnam. Here's a closer look at AILEG's work in four of these countries. COLOMBIA Colombia must balance economic growth and energy demand with the sustainability of its fragile ecosystems. AILEG worked with its local and national government on three pressing issues. Colombia relies on hydropower for 70% of its energy, but climate change and land use threaten the main source, the Upper Magdalena Watershed. Further north, gold mining could boost the nation's economy, but at what cost? How would revenue gained compare to the current value of the unique ecosystem, the Paramo de Santurban? Lastly, Colombia is assessing cost and benefits of several policy decisions and climate change actions. Yet it lacked information on the impact of energy efficiency on the commercial building sector. In Colombia, AILEG activities included: Hydrological Modeling of the Upper Magdalena Watershed Economic Valuation of the Paramo Ecosystem Marginal Abatement Cost Curve (MACC) Analysis of the Commercial Building Sector James Lee: Colombia has a lot of capacity, but one of the big challenges in Colombia is taking these vast amounts of data from the climate change database and making it usable for people on the ground to make decisions. An example regarding low-emissions development in AILEG involves the Santurban Paramo. AILEG helps us understand the value of the water coming out of the Paramo and that enables policy makers to decide if they want to develop mining in the same Paramo. AILEG's data contributions to Colombia has helped us start a process that will continue with bringing people to the process, to have watershed planning, climate change adaptation, and low emissions development. AILEG's impact in Colombia is something that could be shared in other parts of the world, because we have a common frame of reference. If we're using economic data that values ecosystem services that ascribes value to low emission development, then we have a common frame of reference. JAMAICA Frequent storms and power outages threaten Jamaica's vulnerable grid and access to energy for its population, 80% of whom live in coastal areas. Meanwhile, sky-high electricity costs discourage investment opportunities. It all adds up to serious economic limitations, particularly for the crucial pillars of tourism and agriculture. USAID supports the plan of Jamaica's government to reduce energy costs and increase reliability through efficiency and diversification of power sources. Michael Hanowsky: Here in Jamaica, they were doing four key activities. One was working on an assessment of climate finance flows, to set the groundwork for thinking about how finance should be considered as a part of a low emission development strategy. The second area that they were working on in Jamaica was looking at economic modeling; the data and models currently used in doing assessment to figure out what a baseline for thinking about modeling is. Third activity was to support in the development of an energy action plan as part of the government's strategic planning process. And the fourth area was to work with two communities on the community level of energy efficiency and renewable energy action plans. Rachel Allen: I think AILEG has assisted in building capacity or even before building capacity, creating awareness that this is necessary. So often we do plans without really putting our role in reducing emissions into the equation. And yes, we can grow our economy, but we have to be cognizant of our emissions. Fitzroy Vidal: The plan is what you're hear to talk about, right? You want to know what is the next plan? the things we try to do from energy policy is to allow for wide-scale participation. We believe the government must be involved, we believe the private sector must be involved, academic institutions must be involved, we believe non-government organizations, we believe communities must be involved. We believe individual households should be involved. It's a work in progress, and so this is just the start. So I'm really excited to see where this takes us. And if it takes us to where we hope to get, then I think Jamaica will be on a path toward low emission growth. THE PHILIPPINES The Philippines is a newly industrialized nation and is growing rapidly, but high energy costs and shortages are handicapping its economic opportunities and investment possibilities. The nation relies heavily on fossil fuels, which contributes to local and worldwide pollution. Yet many rural areas lack access to energy. Meanwhile, its forests are being damaged to feed the country's agricultural and energy demands. USAID supports the goals of the Government of the Philippines to integrate renewable energy sources into economic planning, promote efficient energy use, develop rural energy sources, and attract international funding to preserve forests. Joseph Foltz: The Philippines has led the way in legislation. We're going to sign a memorandum that is really a signal of intent to continue to work together. So some of this is going to be hosting integrated databases within academia, doing joint research and development, and doing more job trainings, seminars, workshops, and conferences. We found reason economically to be engaged in this issue. Marietta Quejada: We have received four projects from USAID and this has been provided through AILEG. The first one is capacity building for LEAP. Secondly, we have the energy database assessment. We also have the MACC analysis, Marginal Abatement Cost Curves. And also the renewable energy investment analysis has been helpful to us. Especially we have this renewable energy act so we could implement the RE act as we want it to be in the energy sector. Jess Tamang: We are happy in particular to have partnership established with the different sectors of economy, particularly now the academia. Academia can really be doing a lot of studying and even analysis for us to be able to better understand how the government's policies and programs can really be affecting the future and even the other sectors of economy. VIETNAM Vietnam is highly vulnerable to the effects of climate change, particularly flooding. The Government of Vietnam wants to reduce greenhouse gas emissions—including those from rice cultivation and livestock management—as part of its Green Growth Strategy to improve environmental quality and stimulate economic growth. USAID supports this effort, which means Vietnam must have accurate data to estimate emissions and analyze the costs of reduction strategies. In Vietnam, AILEG activities included: Pilot Survey of Rice and Livestock Management Marginal Abatement Cost Curve (MACC) Analysis of Rice Management Practices Pilot Rice Emissions Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) tool Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs) Workshop on Clean Energy Mai Van Trinh: The big challenge is data collection and processing and also the cooperation between partners and institutions in the country and also international institutions. Le Hoang Anh: I think that AILEG was working on data collecting, analysis and now they are starting to do the pilot with the MRV system for rice production in Vietnam. We already have the targets for gas emission reduction for agriculture sector. And now we have to do something to monitor it and evaluate it, and it's important. With AILEG work, we also have to do, but with AILEG work, it's much more reasonable.