Global environment-related initiatives and green growth – investigating the integration of their goals into government policies and prospects for delivery

University of Technology Sydney. Institute for Sustainable Futures.Many low-income countries (LICs), including Bangladesh and Nepal, endeavour to deliver climate mitigation actions by reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and achieving more sustainable resource consumption. However, their prospects of delivering on such goals alongside the rapid structural changes in the economy prevalent in the LICs are not clear. There is also a lack of sufficient country-specific studies about green growth (GG) despite it being an important agenda for notable international development organisations active in many low-income and developing countries. Therefore, to identify ways to navigate the complexity of implementing policies focusing on economic growth and climate mitigation objectives, this study uses quantitative empirical research and predictive modelling of resource use and GHG emissions for a range of future policy and economic growth scenarios. Content analysis of existing sectoral, climate, and environmental policies of Nepal (n=17) and Bangladesh (n=18) that consider the inclusion of climate mitigation actions provide insights into a reoriented focus of policies, their goals, and the extent to which government policies frame climate mitigation actions. Semi-structured interviews (n=12) with policy actors in Nepal, including central and local level policymakers and representatives from the private sector and non-government international organisations provided insights into the role of global environmental policy discourse in changing the government policies’ focus and contents. Our findings suggest that the global environmental policy discourse influences policy actors' knowledge and ideas, thereby changing the national policy paradigm, which is the model for policy formulation. Further, the social context of policymaking creates a knowledge structure on climate mitigation which is reflected in government policies via mainstreaming of climate mitigation actions. The policy actors and their institutions exchange their ideas and interests in a deliberative and collaborative environment to prioritise policies for the energy, forest, and transport sectors to deliver climate mitigation actions in Nepal. However, the energy sector, together with the agriculture sector, has insufficient climate mitigation actions. Reflecting on the high proportion of biomass in the energy mix and the rapid rise in fossil fuel and energy consumption per capita, this research suggests measures to reduce these in an absolute sense. For Nepal, the suggested action is the renewable energy transition—from low-energy intensity biomass-based to high-intensity hydroelectricity—coupled with minimising transmission and distribution electricity. For Bangladesh, the suggested action is a transition from using biomass and fossil fuels to using more renewable energy resources, reducing biomass and fossil fuels use and GHG emissions