The UN said no fewer than 427,000 people have been affected by heavy flooding across Somalia since April, 2018.

The UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said nearly 175,000 out of the 427,000 have been displaced as a result of the flash and river flooding in Hirshabelle, South West and Jubaland states as well as Banadir region.

The UN agency said in its latest flooding update released on Thursday (April 26, 2018) night that rainfall has been above average over broad areas of Somalia, adding that short-term forecasts suggest heavy rainfall is likely to continue over the coming week both inside Somalia and within the Ethiopian highlands.

“Other central and northern parts of the country are expected to receive moderate to high rains in the coming week with regions of Puntland being the exception,” said OCHA.

The UN agency said the projection for heavy rains coupled with the high river levels mean that riverine flooding will continue in the Juba and Shabelle river basins in the coming week.

In Jubaland, the number of displaced people spiked from an estimated 28,200 on April 22 to 42,300 people who are part of the 165,000 people affected in the state with the worst affected areas of Bu’aale, Garbahaarey, Ceel Waaq, Luuq, Baardheere and Saakow.

The Horn of Africa nation’s local authorities have called on the federal government and humanitarian agencies to help those who are in very critical conditions.

In Baidoa town alone, about 174,000 people have been affected by flooding, said the UN, adding that over half of their existing shelters cannot withstand heavy rains, and many have already been washed away.

Many community latrines have been destroyed or filled with flood water. Forecasts predict more heavy rains in the coming week.

“In Hiraan region, the Shabelle River has already burst its banks, displacing over 122,000 people in Belet Weyne town and nearby riverine villages,” said the UN.

The UN agency said some 54,000 people in makeshift shelters in the Mogadishu area have been affected in settlements for the displaced.

More flooded communities are reported in the Galgadud, Gedo and Middle Shabelle regions.

The death toll from this week’s Southern Israeli flash floods rose to 10 on Friday, April 27, 2018 after another teenage hiker was found dead in the area, local media reported.

The toll now includes nine females and one male aged 17 and 18.

The teens were among a group of 25 young hikers hit by flash floods in Nahal Tzafit, a riverbed near the Dead Sea on Thursday.

The group was part of the Bnei Zion pre-military academy, which had approved the expedition, despite repeated warnings about adverse weather conditions.

Local media reported that two staff members at the academy, including its head, had been detained and questioned by police and that a third was placed under house arrest.

Several days of heavy rain in Israel have caused flooding throughout the country.

On Tuesday, a 17-year-old Palestinian girl near Bethlehem and an Israeli-Arab teenager in southern Israel were killed in flash floods.

Consequent upon its commitment to reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) through the implementation of REDD+ Readiness activities, Nigeria has commenced moves to assess its historical emissions to establish a Forest Reference Emission Level (FREL). The FREL is a benchmark on which REDD is measured.

The initiative, which is a way of verifying whether the nation’s actions REDD+ Readiness actions are yielding the desired results, will likewise put in place a National Forest Monitoring System (NFMS) to monitor, report and verify (MRV) results of REDD+ activities.

In achieving this, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) is supporting the government to undertake a Forest Inventory in various states.

Mr Suffyan Koroma, the FAO Country Representative in Nigeria, in Lafia, Nasarawa State on Thursday, April 26, 2018 at the opening of a two-day workshop to raise awareness on “National Forest Inventory under REDD+ programme’’ restated the UN body’s desire to help Nigeria achieve the objective.

Koroma, who was represented by Mr John Fonweban, Regional Technical Adviser, FAO REDD+ Programme, said the inventory would sample all forest and land use types in Nigeria.

He said the step would enable them to estimate emission factor for accurate figure based on the destruction of the different types of forest in Nigeria.

Koroma said FREL would serve as a standard on which future REDD+ activities would be measured during the implementation of the strategy in the Country.

The FAO official said the workshop had become imperative to raise awareness mostly on data collection because inadequate data had been a major factor militating against forestry development in Nigeria.

He said the socio-economic aspect of the inventory was also very crucial as they provided a better understanding of forest resource use by the population.

Koroma said the inventory would also help in the establishment of possible links between forest resources use, employment and livelihoods.

“It is an inventory that covers all the land use types in the sense that you have one hectare of forest destroyed and used for agric plantation you will be able to see how much you are losing,’’ he said..

The FAO official said that the workshop would also serve as tools for advocacy and resource mobilisation for sustainable forest management at the country level.

S. O. Tiamiyu, a Deputy Director representing the Director of Forestry in the Federal Ministry of Environment, described the planned forest inventory as, according to him, “our problem is inadequate data.”

“We need this to plan and assess our performance in the forestry sector. Please assist us whenever our officials come to your state,” he stated.

Mrs Achuna Obi-Amadi, Director of Forestry in Enugu State, spoke on behalf of the Directors of Forestry, saying: “We are excited about the programme. We are looking forward to it, and we promise that we will deliver.”

Dr Moses Ama, National Coordinator, Nigeria REDD+ Programme, said that the objective of the workshop is to sensitise and raise awareness on the upcoming field data collection in various states where the inventory would be conducted across the country, as well as solicit support of stakeholders towards a smooth forest inventory.

“The meeting should be as engaging as possible. Beyond forestry, we should interact and reconnect with ourselves,” he said.

Participants at the workshop were drawn from Forestry Departments domiciled in various Ministries across the country, relevant agencies and non-governmental organisations.

Sixteen leading banks from four continents, convened by the UN Environment Finance Initiative (UNEP FI), on Thursday, April 26, 2018 published a jointly developed methodology to increase banks’ understanding of how climate change and climate action could impact their business.

The understanding is said to be fundamental to enable banks to be more transparent about their exposure to climate-related risks and opportunities in line with the TCFD. It will also inform banks’ strategies to contribute to and benefit from the low-carbon economic transition and help them engage and support their customers to that effect. This, the proponents say, is key because the climate-related risks and opportunities that banks face arise primarily from their services to clients.

The methodology and supporting materials are the first output of a unique and collaborative process over the past 10 months. It has brought together various functions from within the banks including credit risk, stress testing, sustainability and business development with leading scientists and risk and investment management experts.

The banks that are leading this work and that are currently piloting the methodology are ANZ, Barclays, BBVA, BNP Paribas, Bradesco, Citi, DNB, Itaú Unibanco, National Australia Bank, Rabobank, Royal Bank of Canada, Santander, Société Générale, Standard Chartered, TD Bank Group and UBS. They were guided by the consultancies Oliver Wyman, Mercer, Acclimatise and supported by scientists from the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK).

“Many of the environmental challenges that the world faces today, especially climate change, can be traced back to one fundamental root cause: short-termism. Financial markets can become a catalyst for action on sustainability, but for that they need to become more long-term oriented,” said Erik Solheim, Head of UN Environment. “The beauty of the TCFD framework is that it encourages organisations to consider and disclose long-term impacts. This change in perspective is what we need to achieve sustainable development. That’s why as UN Environment we are excited to be working with such committed leaders in the finance industry.”

The methodology provides the first publicly available guidance designed specifically for banks to carry out forward-looking, climate-related risk and opportunity assessments as envisioned by the TCFD. More specifically, the methodology helps banks to apply the state-of-the-art global climate change scenarios that are available today – such as those developed and offered by PIK, IIASA, and the International Energy Agency (IEA) – to evaluate the risks and opportunities that the low-carbon economic transition may present to their lending portfolios.

“When we published our recommendations less than a year ago, we were deliberate in viewing banks and other financial institutions not only as consumers of climate-related disclosures, but also as preparers and issuers of such disclosures. We did so to emphasise the key role that financial institutions will have to play both in safeguarding financial stability and financing economic decarbonisation,” said Christian Thimann, UNEP FI Co-Chair, TCFD Vice-Chair, and Senior Executive at AXA. “That is easy to understand. The hard part is finding effective yet practical ways for financial institutions to take such action, to carry out the required assessments, and to meaningfully disclose. I am thankful for the contribution that this group is today making to that effect.”

The methodology is designed to:

• Build upon existing risk assessment expertise, procedures, and models already used by banks;
• Enable informed assessments of how risk exposures – and new potential opportunities – might develop in the future, under various climate mitigation scenarios;
• Allow institutions to examine risk and opportunities across a range of geographies and sectors, and
• Provide longer-term insights that go far beyond the usual stress-testing horizon of 2-3 years.

The progress made through the publication of this framework is foundational. “Through this highly collaborative effort of scientists, risk practitioners and sustainability experts, we have set forth an innovative methodology that will serve to underpin enhanced climate-risk aware decision making and resource allocation,” said John Colas, Oliver Wyman Partner and Vice Chairman, Financial Services Americas. “We expect that this methodology will be further strengthened, as practices evolve and new and more granular data emerges from industry practitioners, corporates, policy makers, and climate scientists.”

Additional work is still needed across sectors and areas of expertise to develop best practices. Most publicly available scenarios are not intended for financial risk assessment. Together the scientific community and financial institutions could improve the granularity of the models and advance the financial risk variables generated. There will also be value in banks and borrowers engaging so that enhanced borrower-level information becomes available. Like the development of macroeconomic stress testing at financial institutions, forward-looking climate assessments and disclosures will continue to improve over time.