Environmental Investment Fund draws attention to devastating impact of lockdown on communal conservancies

The Environmental Investment Fund of Namibia, in its first newsletter to appear since the outbreak of the corona virus, said it will have to diversify its revenue stream to ensure more local funding and sustainability.

Over the past eight years, the fund has received about N$1.4 billion from international donors and green financing agencies. The fund also receives direct contributions from Treasury which comes from a combination of environmental taxes.

The fund’s new Head of Communication and Corporate Services, Lot Ndamanomhata said that the total amount of funding is a combination of resources accessed through multilateral and development finance institutions. For instance, the Green Climate Fund has financially supported the fund with an amount of N$560 million in grants for climate change adaptation interventions in Namibia. In 2018 the French Development Agency invested N$800 million through the Sustainable Utilization of Natural Resources and Energy Financing programme. From the Treasury, it has received N$105 million.

Writing in the same newsletter, Pandeni Kapia, a certified expert in Climate and Renewable Energy Finance, working as Financial and Risk analyst for the Environmental Investment Fund said Covid-19 has changed the world and the fund cannot proceed operating as usual.

“An adaptive management approach that is flexible is being pursued by the fund coupled with an upgrade in our work environment with regards to health and safety issues. Likewise, the fund has to adopt new ways of interacting with its stakeholders and generally improve the pace of its operations,” Kapia stated.

On sustainable future funding, Kapia said “this pandemic has highlighted the importance of having a secured revenue stream and the fund is working towards being 100% self-sustaining.”

The Environmental Investment Fund receives its money for its own operations through four income streams. 60% is from environmental taxes, 10% is contributed by the government, 25% comes from donors and 5% comes from the loan portfolio. This excludes the fund’s project financing which is carried by donors and green funding institutions.

Recently, the fund has made a commitment to contribute to the Ministry of Environment and Tourism’s Conservation Relief, Recovery and Resilient Facility beyond COVID-19 to mitigate future conservation shocks. Describing it as a noble vehicle, the fund said it is mandated to host the facility and act as its secretariat.

The lockdown has cost communal conservancies supported by the Environmental Investment Fund roughly 5000 jobs and an estimated loss in wages and salaries of between N$65 million and N$80 million. It is estimated that about 238,000 people have benefitted and continue to benefit from the different projects administrated by the fund.