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ActionAid International Nepal (AAIN) has submitted a letter of concern regarding climate change to Nepali legislators on Sept 5 as part of their ‘Climate Justice Campaign’. Climate change stands as one of the most pressing global challenges confronting humanity today, impacting communities worldwide, particularly vulnerable communities and people but it has differential impacts. This issue transcends environmental boundaries, encompassing social, economic, political, and cultural dimensions.

AAIN initiated the ‘Climate Justice Campaign’ on June 5 during World Environment Day, featuring a week-long series of events in Kathmandu and its surrounding regions led by youth, women, and children. This campaign has fostered a deeper understanding of the interconnectedness between climate change, its consequences, and the injustice it perpetuates. It has rallied affected populations, including youth, farmers, women, children, and various stakeholders, to out loud their voices in the call for climate justice.

On Sept 4, ActionAid Federation, with a presence in over 50 countries, formally launched the ‘Climate Justice Campaign’ globally within its federations and beyond. AAIN is also coordinating various activities to coincide with the official campaign launch. The primary objective is to mobilize young people, women, and children to raise public awareness about the urgency of climate justice.

Nepal is among the countries most at risk from climate change due to its geographical location, which exposes it to severe impacts, adversely affecting people's livelihoods and adaptive capabilities. Climate change’s mounting effects manifest directly and indirectly across sectors, especially life and livelihood of people including  agriculture, water resources, forests, biodiversity, health, infrastructure, and tourism. Consequently, Nepal has witnessed a surge in climate-related disasters, including floods, landslides, and droughts, which are expected to escalate in the future.

Although Nepal’s greenhouse gas emissions account for a mere 0.025 percent of the global total, the nation grapples with rising atmospheric temperatures, particularly in the Himalayan region. Despite its small emissions share, Nepal has committed to the objectives of mitigating climate change, as outlined in the Paris Agreement.

Nepal has developed a long-term strategy to achieve sustainable emission reductions and attain net-zero emissions by 2045, aligning with its Paris Agreement commitments. Additionally, Nepal has engaged in agreements and collaborations with international bodies to mitigate climate change’s effects, implementing essential policy reforms, timely initiatives, and national plans and programs. And prepared the Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) and National Adaptation Plan (NAP) document with its implementation plan, though it is still heavily underfunded. The country has been a party to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change since 1994, actively participating in climate change initiatives.

Nepal has established various mechanisms, including the Climate Change Coordination Committee and the Climate Change Management Division, and employs climate budget coding to address climate change challenges. The government collaborates with the international community as a signatory to the Kyoto Convention, the Paris Agreement, the Sendai Framework, and the Sustainable Development Goals.

Despite these efforts, the issue of climate justice has not received sufficient priority in practice. Nepal’s annual budget allocates an inadequate portion to address climate change impacts, with only 5.96 percent directly relevant to climate, 29.9 percent indirectly relevant, and 64.14 percent climate-neutral. Furthermore, climate policy mandates that 80 percent of international climate finance should reach the local level, a goal that remains unmet.

“Elected parliamentarians should proactively play a crucial role in minimizing climate change’s adverse impact on through policy departure,” says Sujeeta Mathema, executive director of AAIN. “There is a pressing need to lead the climate justice campaign from the global to the national to the grassroots level. The government must execute climate change policies and plans, allocate budgets, monitor its effectiveness, and mobilize resources at the local, province, and federal levels. Government should actively contribute to the global climate negotiation process of climate change.” 

Lawmakers can initiate and lobby for budget allocation for climate actions, says Saroj Pokharel, Head of Program And Policy at AAIN. “During the preparation of the annual budget, lawmakers can draw the attention of the government for the allocation of more funds for the plans and programs related to climate change.” He further says that the implementation of the target by the government should be closely patrolled by the lawmakers.

What AAIN anticipates from lawmakers?

• AAIN believes that Nepal and other climate impacted nations have the right to receive grants, not loans, to address problems stemming from both underdeveloped and industrialized countries. Therefore, there's a call to actively discuss and promote the idea of securing grants rather than loans. The rationale behind this is to prevent the mounting burden of debt, which could adversely affect the country's economy and lead to a debt trap. To combat the impacts of climate change, there is a need to exert pressure on the government to seek financial assistance in the form of grants from donors and other means of financing.
• AAIN urges the government to establish a dedicated mechanism for climate diplomacy within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Such a mechanism would facilitate more effective collaboration with the international community in addressing climate change issues.
• Despite Nepal being highly vulnerable to climate change, there is a lack of effective utilization and tracking of foreign aid to tackle this problem. Nepal currently lacks precise data on the funds received under the banner of climate finance. This information gap poses a risk of missing out on potential opportunities for international climate financing. To address this concern, AAIN suggests the formation of a parliamentary working group or committee that can consult with both governmental and non-governmental agencies, as well as experts active in the field, to gather accurate data and improve transparency.
• Recognizing that climate-related disasters disproportionately affect impoverished, marginalized individuals, women, and small-holders farmers, AAIN emphasizes the importance of parliamentary advocacy for climate justice. This involves understanding the challenges faced by these vulnerable groups and taking measures to enhance their capacity to cope with climate change. Additionally, AAIN recommends the creation of a dedicated fund to manage compensation for loss and damage resulting from climate induced disasters.
• AAIN expresses concerns that climate change might not receive sufficient attention in the 16th five-year plan developed by the National Planning Commission. To rectify this, there's a call to initiate the development of a national plan specifically focused on climate change. This plan should prioritize areas directly impacted by climate change, including green energy, environmental preservation, agriculture, urbanization management, and the oversight of emissions from waste disposal.

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ActionAid’s climate justice campaign is spearheaded by those who suffer the most from climate change, namely poor and vulnerable women and young people. The campaign seeks to advance climate justice by adopting effective organizing, mobilizing, and communication strategies to demand social and political transformation. ActionAid acknowledges the importance of youth and women in addressing climate change and simultaneously launched the campaign nationwide with some initiatives at the same time from  11 districts of Nepal, including Tehrathum, Siraha, Mahottari, Parsa, Chitwan, Makwanpur, Palpa, Kapilvastu, Bardiya, Dhading and Doti. Collaborating with local organizations and national solidarity, ActionAid aims to maximize the campaign's impact and create a collective response to climate change by pursuing various activities and mobilization efforts to compel communities, families, students, and activists to agitate for climate justice.

What AAIN do:

• Mobilize vulnerable and poor women and young people to advocate for climate justice and demand social and political change.
• Increase awareness on climate change and its impact, particularly on marginalized communities.
• Empower local organizations and communities to participate actively and make their voices heard in the campaign.
• Develop a collective response to the climate crisis and foster solidarity across different groups and communities.
• Put pressure on policymakers and decision-makers to act on climate change and prioritize the needs of vulnerable and marginalized communities.

Nepal and the Republic of Cameroon have established diplomatic relations. With this, the number of countries with which Nepal has diplomatic ties has reached 180. Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Nepal to the United Nations Amrit Bahadur Rai and Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Republic of Cameroon to the United Nations Michel Tommo Monthe signed a Joint Communiqué to this effect in a brief ceremony held at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on Thursday. Both the ambassadors had signed a joint letter informing the UN Secretary-General Antonio Gutteres on the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, the Permanent Mission of Nepal to the United Nations said. On the occasion, the ambassadors exchanged views on various topics of common interest to strengthen the bilateral cooperation for the mutual benefit of both countries on national and international forums, especially in the UN forums. Cameroon lies in West Africa and it has more than 240 ethnic communities speaking 230 languages. It shares borders with Chad, the Central African Republic, the Republic of Congo, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and Nigeria. Cameroon borders the Atlantic Ocean to its south-west. With a population of over 27 million, Cameroon's total area is 475 thousand 440 sq Km. It gained independence on 1 January 1960 and became a UN member on 20 September the same year. Both Nepal and Cameroon are members of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM).

While the banks are known for their relatively better corporate governance in Nepal, a new report by Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) says banks and financial institutions (BFIs) have failed to fully comply with the regulatory directives issued by the central bank in matters ranging from loan disbursement to internal audit. The central bank’s annual report titled ‘Bank Supervision Report’ has pointed out several issues where BFIs have not worked in accordance with the provisions in the laws and regulations as well as directives of the NRB. The report has questioned the role of the BFIs' board of directors and senior management of the institutions. Stating that most of the board agendas are related to credit appraisal or approval, the report says the board has spent less time on discussion of issues of compliance of NRB directives and prevalent laws, implementation of directions of previous NRB inspection, status and implementation of comments from the internal and external reports. “Discussions are insufficient on issues related to the identification, measurement, monitoring, and controlling of inherent risks that the bank faces as guided by the NRB Internal Capital Adequacy Assessment Process (ICAAP) guideline,” states the report. Board minutes, according to the report, reveal that excessive waivers have been provided to borrowers. The implementation status of decisions made and directions given to the management are rarely reviewed by the banks’ board. Some of the banks have not even appraised the performance of their CEOs as per the job contracts. The central bank has raised serious questions over the audit function of the BFIs. The audit committee of the banks has not performed its functions/duties as directed by the Banks and Financial Institutions Act (BAFIA) 2073, Company Act, and unified directives of NRB. Some of the banks lack adequate skilled staff in the audit function. In some banks, the performance appraisal of the head of Internal Audit was found to be done by DGM/CEO involved in credit administration. “This is in violation of NRB Directive 2078 which requires performance appraisal of the internal audit head to be done by the audit committee,” says the report.  The report says banks have also not followed the process of appointing an audit firm. While BAFIA requires the audit committee to recommend three auditors to the annual general meeting (AGM) for appointment of the statutory auditor, audit committees of some banks have selected one auditor and then recommended that particular audit firm to the AGM for approval. The other major issue highlighted by the report is carelessness in the loan disbursement by the banks. Loans disbursed were not found to be used for the intended purpose but were classified as pass category which is non-compliance of the unified directives of NRB.  According to the report, new loans were disbursed to settle existing demand loans/term loans/forced loans, settlement of interest at quarter-end, transferred to the account of sister concern without business transaction, and used to settle loan of sister concern in another bank. Ad-hoc loans are regularly used to settle the existing dues/interest of the loan. “Banks have weak post-disbursement monitoring mechanisms resulting in poor monitoring of utilization of loan after disbursement and so loan has been used for a purpose other than intended,” says the report. Banks have renewed revolving loans without obtaining basic documents required for credit appraisals such as audited financials, tax clearance certificates, firm renewal documents, and business inspection reports.  In many cases, banks have been found to not properly assess the borrowers’ requirements, and instances of over-financing have been observed. Some of the banks have even provided personal loans above Rs 5m without any specific purpose, which is non-compliance with the NRB’s unified directives. Many banks have changed the interest premium to the loan clients against the provision of NRB’s unified directives. In the report, NRB says assets liability committees (ALCOs) of banks are found more in status reporting activities and lack proactive orientation regarding assets liability management. Off-balance sheet items are not generally considered while assessing liquidity position. Most of the ALCO meetings are focused on the revision of interest rates on deposits and loans, publication of interest rates, comparative analysis of market interest rates, and approval of deviation of commission and fees of individual clients rather than on strategic aspects like a review of the investment portfolio, and divestment strategy. The report has also said banks have shown little seriousness over the operational risk.  Trainee interns have been found to be assigned to work in sensitive areas with user access in the core banking system (CBS), which is against the provision of NRB unified directives. According to NRB’s Supervision Department Chief Dev Kumar Dhakal, the central bank supervision has highlighted some of the anomalies in the banking system. “The report will help to control the irregularities,” he said. Nar Bahadur Thapa, former Executive Director of NRB said that there are issues in the lending of the banks. “Rather than properly utilizing the depositors’ money, the banks have been randomly issuing loans,” he said, “And, those who’re getting loans have also not used it properly.” The report says  

• Most of the board agendas are related to credit appraisal or approval
• The board has spent less time on discussion of issues of compliance of NRB directives and prevalent laws.
• Board minutes reveal that excessive waivers have been provided to borrowers. 
• Some of the banks have not even appraised the performance of their CEOs as per the job contracts.
• Some of the banks lack adequate skilled staff in the audit function.
• Banks have also not followed the process of appointing an audit firm. 
• Loans disbursed were not found to be used for the intended purpose but were classified as pass category.
• New loans were disbursed to settle existing demand loans/term loans/forced loans, as well as for the settlement of interest at quarter-end
• Ad-hoc loans are regularly used to settle the existing dues/interest of the loan.
• Banks have renewed revolving loans without obtaining basic documents. 
• Some of the banks have even provided personal loans above Rs 5m without any specific purpose.
• Trainee interns have been found to be assigned to work in sensitive areas with user access in the core banking system (CBS)

Imagine you’re working on a presentation that you have the next day for an important client. You’re doing the best you can to gather and construct ideas. You might think of some of the best techniques you can use in the presentation to get your message across. You might work on a story to hook your clients to your key messages or appeal. The next day you’re waiting in the meeting room at your client’s office. You’re having all kinds of thoughts. When the decision-makers arrive, you have a brief conversation with them before beginning the presentation. You are nervous and yet all pumped up at the same time. You start the presentation, and everything’s going perfectly well. You are almost about to wrap up when your client stops you and asks, “Great presentation! Your service is interesting too – but what’s in it for us? How can we grow with the help of your proposed plan?” You realize how you never gave that aspect a proper thought to begin with. From here on, you know what you say to answer that question will only be tweaked ideas of what you want your client to do for you. Will this guarantee the deal? Well, nobody knows. What do you think is happening here? What went wrong? The individual was operating with a self-focused mindset, and the example I shared above discusses just one aspect. They missed out on one significant factor that would have helped them better serve their clients–considering their needs, objectives, ​and ​challenges.​​ We might not necessarily see the people ​we​ work with as obstacles to overcome or irrelevancies to ignore. Still, when we focus only on our goals and what we need from a particular partnership, we have already started operating from a self-focused mindset. We start seeing them as vehicles to further our objectives and needs rather than strategic partners to work with and achieve shared goals. What does it mean to have a self-focused mindset toward clients? As employees, managers, and consultants, we need to realize that our relationship with our clients can be strong when we help them identify what they need and how it can be fulfilled. If we begin to believe that we have to take care of ourselves first and ​only​ ​then ​will we pay attention to the needs and objectives of our clients, they will most definitely sense this sooner or later. Such an approach will not help us invite long-term partners for our brand. If we’re only looking to make our business case, get the deal, and close it, we’re serving neither ourselves nor our clients. With a self-focused mindset, we see what we need from a particular client. While in a business sense, this isn’t entirely wrong, who do you think will be disadvantaged the most because of such an approach? If we’re blind to what our clients need and look for, they will eventually feel worn out in such a relationship and look for other organizations to work and create value with. We might still not choose to see this reality. We might not say it out loud, but we consider our clients blameworthy for the deal’s failure and, eventually, the strained relationship. The next thing we know, because of our client’s word of mouth, we might not even get other people to work with us readily. So, when we think only about our goals, needs, and objectives, we compromise our organization’s results. Making our business case with an impact-focused mindset When we say it’s essential to understand what our clients need, it doesn’t imply that our needs do not matter – of course, they do. But we should find the means and medium to align our needs with our client’s needs and build strategies and actionable principles to achieve them together. We can do that by operating with an impact-focused mindset—to collaborate, not to outsmart our clients and persuade them to use our services. What we focus on is channelizing efforts to attain collective results. Most individuals and organizations must assess if their organizational culture and systemic approach toward their clients are pervasively self-focused. They could be focusing only on their tasks, goals, and growth without considering how their actions could impact the outcomes of their colleagues, subordinates, supervisors, and clients. However, when individuals and organizations develop an impact-focused mindset, it makes the organizational climate positive – to eventually help in building positive interpersonal relationships with clients. With an impact-focused perspective, individuals and organizations start focusing on collective results. They start understanding that what they do as an organization impacts what their clients do. When we have an impact-focused mindset, our clients become valuable to us, and we want to direct our actions toward helping them to the best of our abilities. We then make reasonable efforts to help them achieve better outcomes so they have to make less effort to correct things themselves. Rather than blaming our clients for being inconsiderate and incompetent, with an impact-focused mindset, we work around solutions to the problems in our clients​’​ organizations. We work ​toward​ making them our allies. How can we make the shift​ toward an impact-focused mindset? ​An impact-focused mindset can help us see our clients as people. So how can we make the shift to it? Knowing our clients​’​ needs, objectives, and challenges is a great place to start. Asking ourselves a few questions can be helpful in that regard. What is it that our clients need? What do they want to achieve for themselves? What strategies do they work with? What is their organizational philosophy? What challenges are they encountering in achieving what they want? What problems exist in their systems? What’s preventing them from becoming the best at what they do? When we’re genuinely interested to know our clients through open and honest conversations (that aren’t too invading), there are good chances that we can identify areas where we can add value. When we make ​our​ business case, we can tap into the places where the clients ​might​need a strategic partnership ​and propose how they can benefit from having us on board. An aspect we should keep in mind that can help us humanize our interpersonal relationships ​with our clients is that ‘we need them, just as much as they need us.’ As individuals and organizations, we can’t work in isolation; we need to have strategic partners, we need to have allies, and we need to collaborate if we are to achieve collective results. So, as much as we would want our clients to understand and consider our proposal, we must not give them a perception that working with us will be bad for their organizational integrity. Finally, it’s essential to understand that even if we might change our ways ​to become​ impact-focused, we shouldn’t expect our clients to change along with us. A primary principle of an impact-focused mindset is changing our patterns for good rather than trying to ‘fix’ or ‘correct’ other people. If we give our clients a sense that we’re right and know what’s best for them, they will most likely resist having a professional relationship with us. At this point, it helps to recall what the founder of Arbinger Institute, Terry Warner, said, “We most effectively influence one another to change by letting ourselves be changed.” If we keep this perception in mind while considering our client’s needs, objectives, and challenges, they might see us as an understanding organization. Even if they don’t, we won’t blame them for not accepting our offer. We will know that at least we tried. Aprajita Jha is the linchpin at My Emotions Matter, an education initiative that helps individuals and teams learn the mindset and skills of Emotional Intelligence. You can learn more at myemotionsmatter.com