Corruption Undermines Environmental Protections

Corruption is a major global problem that has a direct impact on efforts to manage the world’s resources and combat climate change. Countries in South Asia, northern Africa, Madagascar, Mozambique and Zimbabwe are among the most corrupt places in the world. Other countries are by no means exempt as corruption is pervasive around the world.

According to a Transparency International report titled Global Corruption Report: Climate Change, risks exist in political decision-making, climate finance and the management of public funds. As stated in the report, “Where huge amounts of money flow through new and untested financial markets and mechanisms, there is always a risk of corruption.” The report further indicates that total global climate change investments will reach almost $700 billion by 2020.

The countries that are most vulnerable to climate change tend to be the most corrupt. The TI report on global corruption and climate change ranks nations according to their corruption risk, where zero is extremely corrupt and 10 is “very clean.” Not even one of the 20 countries most affected by climate change scored higher than 3.5.