Environment Minister Hakob Simidyan received the delegation led by Gareth Zaher-Bill, deputy director of the Green Climate Fund. The meeting was attended by Secretary General of the Ministry Sergo Atanesyan, Head of International Policy Department Ruzanna Grigoryan, UNDP Deputy Permanent Representative Konstantin Sokulsky, UNDP Program Manager Hovhannes Ghazaryan, UNDP Climate Change Program Manager Diana Harutyunyan and the UNDP-GCF Program "Reducing the Risks of Investments Aimed at Energy-Efficient Modernization of Buildings" Head Vahram Jalalyan.
At the beginning of the meeting, the minister again referred to the effective cooperation formed as a result of interaction between the two structures in the field of environmental protection and spoke about the need for their continuous development and strengthening.
During the meeting, the parties discussed a number of current and starting projects and in particular referred to the "Reducing the risks of investments aimed at energy-efficient modernization of buildings" project of the UNDP-GCF.
The project has been implemented since 2017 with the financing of the Green Climate Fund (GCF), under the coordination of the Ministry of Environment (MoE), with the aim of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the building stock, which is in line with the country's energy independence goal and the commitments taken by Armenia under the Paris Agreement.
"In the Republic of Armenia, the building sector is one of the largest energy consumers and according to the third national report of Armenia under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the building sector is one of the top priorities for mitigating climate change. The state emphasizes increasing energy efficiency both from the point of view of increasing energy security, reducing the level of energy poverty, and overcoming social vulnerability. Thanks to the project, a large number of residential buildings in the RA marzes have been thermally modernized, contributing to overcoming the energy poverty of the socially vulnerable groups living in the marzes," the minister noted.
Considering this and other components of the program, the program continues to be among the priorities of the RA Government, represented by the Ministry of Environment.
Minister Hakob Simidyan, on behalf of the government and the Ministry of Environment, expressed his willingness to make possible efforts to ensure the uninterrupted progress and continuity of the project.