Friday
June 5
2020

Viewpoint: Central Banks Must Connect Climate Change and Financial Inclusion

By Johanna Nyman and Eric Zusman

In August 2019, Kerala in India faced a second straight summer of extended downpours and flooding. As rains inundated the region, a colleague working for a local government shared smartphone footage of rising waters moving fast enough to carry away cattle and deer.

While these images filled the screen, the colleague’s words revealed a more worrying result of the rains: climate change was destroying assets and deepening poverty for many of the region’s low-income people and small businesses. The unfortunate truth about Kerala and other parts of Asia is that those who have the least often suffer the most from a warmer climate.

This truth may nonetheless contain the seeds of a solution. Many of the same countries hit hard by climate change have also introduced programs to include the poor and small businesses in the financial system.

Photo courtesy of sasint.

Source: Nikkei Asian Review (link opens in a new window)

Categories
Environment, Finance
Tags
climate change, financial inclusion