Nepal will receive $20 million from the United Nations’ climate loss and damage fund following devastating floods along its border with China’s Tibet region in August, the government has said.
The August 26 disaster killed about 1,500 people, while more than 5,000 remain missing, according to official figures.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Forests and Environment said in a statement late on Thursday that the assistance from the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) would help address the severe damage caused by the climate-related disaster.
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The floods affected about 60,000 people from 15,000 families and caused an estimated $2.7 billion in damage to infrastructure, including roads, bridges, schools and 13 hydropower plants.
Early official estimates indicate that reconstruction costs could exceed $4.7 billion, leaving the $20 million UN assistance covering less than one per cent of Nepal’s estimated needs.
Nepal requested the assistance in a letter to the fund in August, less than a week after the disaster.
In his maiden address to the United Nations in September, Prime Minister Balendra Shah, 36, described the disaster as a warning to the world and attributed the floods to climate change, despite Nepal’s negligible contribution to global emissions.
