ADB, UN Member States, and Partners Discussed Legal Innovations for Scaling Up Climate Action at UNCITRAL Colloquium
On 12 July 2023, General Counsel Thomas Clark addressed UN member states, representatives from international organizations and the international legal community at the UNCITRAL Colloquium on Climate Change and the Law of International Trade which explored the private international law aspects of climate change. He highlighted the need to strengthen legal and regulatory frameworks to catalyze private sector financing for scaling up of climate investments. In particular, he noted the lack of legal certainty in the voluntary carbon markets (VCM) inhibiting their growth potential.
On the day before the colloquium, ADB Office of the General Counsel’s Christina U. Pak and Daniele Quaggiotto likewise participated in a workshop on the legal nature of verified carbon credits (VCCs). The workshop was organized, in parallel with the UNCITRAL Colloquium, by the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT) and the World Bank. The workshop discussed the urgency of defining the legal nature of VCCs to achieve certainty around their ownership and transferability, and thus scale up VCM.