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The Green Climate Fund has approved a €264.4 million regional programme that will channel €103.7 million into Uzbekistan to restore degraded land, modernise farming practices and strengthen communities against accelerating climate risks, the country’s National Committee on Ecology and Climate Change announced.
The programme, titled Climate-Resilient Landscapes in Central Asia (CLiCA), was developed by the German development agency GIZ in partnership with Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, with Uzbekistan’s National Centre on Climate Change coordinating the country’s input. The remaining funds under the €264.4 million envelope will be distributed between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
What the Money Will Do
In Uzbekistan, the allocation is earmarked for three broad areas: restoring forests and pastures, introducing climate-resilient technologies across the agricultural sector, and expanding farmers’ access to the financial instruments they need to adapt to changing conditions. The programme sets measurable targets — 164,000 hectares of forests, pastures and farmland brought under climate-resilient management, and a net reduction or sequestration of 1.07 million tonnes of CO₂-equivalent greenhouse gases.
The human dimension is equally explicit. CLiCA is designed to raise climate resilience for 342,000 residents of Uzbekistan, with women expected to make up roughly half of those reached — a figure that reflects the programme’s stated emphasis on supporting communities most exposed to climate shocks.
Regional and Policy Significance
The approval comes as Uzbekistan has been formalising its climate commitments, including targets on land degradation and sustainable resource management. CLiCA is presented by officials as a complementary instrument for delivering those priorities rather than a standalone initiative, with the National Committee describing it as reinforcing existing national goals on degraded-land recovery and climate-smart agriculture.
The trilateral structure of the programme is itself notable: Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan share river basins, mountain ecosystems and pastoral landscapes whose health depends on coordinated management across borders. By pooling a single Green Climate Fund approval across all three countries, GIZ and the fund are betting that joint implementation will produce results that no single national programme could achieve alone.