LocationsChanging the Climate Finance Conversation in Cambodia
April 28, 2025
Stakeholders collaborate during the Multi-Stakeholder Dialogue on “Integrating Climate Actions into District and Municipality Plans and Budgets,” held on December 13, 2024, in Phnom Penh.
For years, discussions about climate finance in Cambodia were largely confined to high-level government offices and international donor meetings. While national policies set the framework for climate action, local governments—the ones dealing with the direct impacts of floods, droughts, and soil erosion—had little say in how funds were allocated or used.
At the district, municipality, and khan (DMK) level—the local governance units responsible for implementing national policies—this meant that climate adaptation remained an unfunded priority. Local leaders understood what their communities needed, but they lacked the financial resources or decision-making power to act.
This was not just a funding problem. It was an awareness and advocacy problem. Climate finance was seen as a technical issue, rather than a public concern that required local engagement and leadership.
On August 14, 2024, local leaders, NGOs, and private sector representatives gathered in Pursat Province to map climate challenges and launch a new Climate Change Task Force. The workshop brought together 46 participants, including 8 women, to strengthen collaboration on local climate action.
Bringing Climate Finance into Public Engagement
That shift became possible when the Coalition for Partnership in Democratic Development (CPDD) and its partners—Action for Development (AFD), STAR Kampuchea (SK), and the National School of Local Administration (NASLA)—received support through the Climate Finance Network (CFN) Grants Initiative, which aims to strengthen local climate finance governance and advocacy across the region. This funding, through a grant from UNDP’s Climate Finance Network (CFN), supported by the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO)n enabled the project to take climate finance discussions beyond national policy circles and into local government planning, public discourse, and national advocacy efforts.
A national media campaign was launched to shift public perception. Instead of treating climate finance as a distant policy matter, the campaign brought it into everyday conversations, making it relevant to the people most affected by climate change.
Radio talk shows aired in December 2024 gave local communities a chance to hear directly from government officials and climate experts, with discussions focused on what climate budgeting means for their daily lives. Many listeners asked questions about the basics of climate change—its causes, impacts, and what actions citizens could take—showing a growing public appetite for climate literacy. NASLA responded by highlighting the importance of raising awareness among sub-national authorities, especially as government budget allocations to DMKs for social and environmental services continue to grow.
Social media campaigns and online petitions built on this momentum. One petition calling for stronger climate budget commitments reached tens of thousands of people and received strong engagement from stakeholders, reflecting a wider public interest in how climate funds are allocated.
Traditional media coverage through articles, press events, and news interviews kept climate finance in the spotlight, ensuring that policymakers felt public pressure to act.
Students explore climate change solutions at a local school exhibition—part of ongoing efforts to raise awareness among youth and communities.
Bringing Local Leaders into Climate Finance Decisions
Beyond media outreach, the project also worked on ensuring that DMK administrations were directly involved in shaping climate finance decisions. The lack of local input had long been a challenge—budgets were set nationally, but the impact of climate disasters was felt locally.
To change this, the project helped establish Climate Change Finance Taskforces (CCFTs), which brought together local officials, civil society, and private sector actors to ensure that DMK administrations were not just recipients of climate funds but active participants in deciding how they were spent. At the same time, research and policy advocacy supported these efforts. Joint climate finance analyses and prototypes provided local governments with data and recommendations on how to integrate climate finance into their annual budget planning. This made it easier for DMK administrations to argue for a greater share of climate funding and take a more active role in financial planning.
What’s Next for Local Climate Finance?
The work done so far has created new opportunities for local governments to take part in climate finance planning. But to keep this momentum going, continued advocacy, clearer policies, and stronger engagement with the private sector are still needed. As H.E. Kong Chanthorn, Vice President of the National School of Local Administration (NASLA), put it: “Climate action must be built into national and sub-national planning. To strengthen resilience, we need stronger collaboration between ministries, SNAs, and the private sector.”
Mr. Thorn Chanrith, Deputy Director at the Ministry of Economy and Finance, noted the government’s continued efforts to support decentralization: “We’ve increased sub-national budgets, but continued training and technical support are essential for SNAs to manage climate risks effectively.” While overall allocations to SNAs have grown in recent years, project partners clarified that their contribution has focused on strengthening the climate content of local budget proposals—not necessarily on increasing the total amounts.
Next steps include:
• Making the Climate Change Finance Taskforces (CCFTs) a regular part of local planning;
• Tracking local budgets to ensure climate goals are being followed;
• Expanding advocacy and public awareness efforts to more provinces; and
• Building partnerships with businesses to support local climate projects.
To help make this work last, NASLA is developing a climate finance manual for DMK administrations, which will be included in its official training programs. Project partners like STAR Kampuchea and AFD also plan to keep pushing advocacy efforts and find new funding to expand the initiative. The project is already influencing local policy—Pursat Municipality has committed to including climate finance in its 2025 budget, and several CCFTs are now actively involved in guiding climate-related decisions.
The project is also supporting practical approaches. CPDD, AFD, and SK are working with Thanks Carbon to expand the use of Alternate Wetting and Drying (AWD) in dry-season rice farming. They’re exploring whether this technique could also help generate carbon credits—linking local action to long-term climate finance.
By keeping pressure on decision-makers and raising public awareness, the goal is to make climate finance a long-term, well-supported part of Cambodia’s planning system.