Fiji has outlined its leadership priorities ahead of its Presidency of COP 23 – the UN negotiations on climate change – on day one of a three-day meeting (30 Jan. – 1 Feb.) between Fijian Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama and a delegation from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) led by its Executive Secretary, Ms. Patricia Espinosa.
Voreqe Bainimarama, Prime Minister of Fiji
The meeting also included Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, Minister for Agriculture and National Disaster Management Inia Seruiratu – who is Fiji’s designated Climate Action Champion – and the Permanent Secretaries for the Office of the Prime Minister, Foreign Affairs, Civil Service, Environment, and Economy.
At the meeting, Fiji updated the UNFCCC on its preparatory work to meet the duties and responsibilities leading up the COP Presidency and its agenda for the upcoming negotiations.
Prime Minister Bainimarama identified climate adaptation finance, effective monitoring of adherence through the rulebook to the Paris Agreement and the objectives of the Climate Action Agenda as key issue areas for the Fijian presidency.
“Our Presidency will keep the interests of all nations – including those that are low-lying and vulnerable – at the forefront of our negotiations. We are also focused on turning the words and commitments of the Paris Agreement into measurable actions on the part of all nations, and are calling for transparent systems of accountability and practical outcomes to ensure the agreement is a success,” he said.
Prime Minister Bainimarama also pointed to the need for greater engagement from the private sector, NGOs and civil society in support of Fiji’s global effort to boost access to climate finance and reduce climate risks to developing economies.
Fiji will serve as the President of the COP 23 negotiations to be held in Bonn, Germany from 6-17 November 2017, making history as the first-ever small island state to hold the Presidency.
Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Patricia Espinosa, has warned US President Donald Trump not to pull out of the Paris climate accord.
Donald Trump, US president
“Ultimately, this is about the competitiveness of the United States,” Espinosa, a former Mexican Ambassador to Austria, Germany, Slovenia and Slovakia, said recently in an interview.
During the election campaign, Trump repeatedly called for a renegotiation of the UN accord, whose aim is to keep global temperature increases well below 2 degrees Celsius by transforming the global economy away from fossil fuels this century.
“We do not know what he will do – all we know so far is that his stance differs from that of the Obama administration,” Espinosa, who served as Secretary of Foreign Affairs in the cabinet of President Felipe Calderón, also said.
The hard-won accord reached by some 195 nations in December 2015 is viewed sceptically by Trump, who has indicated that climate change is a hoax and said environmental regulations were “out of control” at a recent meeting with US carmakers.
“They destroyed my cassava, yam, cocoa-yam, vegetable and my traps as well, everything has been destroyed. Oh! If you see what these herdsmen have done to me, you will weep for me.”
A armed herdsman
This was the lamentation of one Mr. Chijoke Nwachukwu, a farmer from Mgbede community in Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni Local Government Area of Rivers State.
“Every place we used to farm is lama, lama (the local name for cows). Lama has filled everywhere so there is no way we can farm; this is very bad,” he adds.
Mr. Nwachukwu is just one of the numerous people hard hit by the rampaging herdsmen and their cattle. There has been no love lost between the communities of Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni Local Government Area and the herdsmen as some people still remember the tragic events that caused the animosity between the herdsmen and their host communities.
Prince Obinna Peters of Obiakpu, a neighbouring community in Ohaji/Egbema Local Government Area of Imo State, recalls: “I can still remember that fateful day Mrs Akuoyibo Ndudi had gone to farm to weed her cassava farm. As she got there she fell into the waiting arms of the herdsmen who laid an ambush for her, having had an altercation with some members of the community whom the herdsmen’s cows had eaten their cassava. The woman, who was pregnant, was murdered in cold blood. Her unborn baby was removed from her womb and murdered as well.”
These killings sparked off a bitter war between the herdsmen and the Obiakpu community. The youths of the community mobilised and went after the herdsmen who, at the end of the day, were dislodged from the community.
Another woman who tasted the bitter herbs of the herdsmen is Mrs. Adanna Ifeakachukwu, a widow in her late 50s. Mrs. Ifeakachukwu told this Reporter that, last September, she has gone to uproot cassava near the Orashi River along Ndoni Road close to a former PGH Camp site, and she left her bicycle near the road while she went into her farm.
“After harvesting the cassava, I carried the bag of cassava to where I parked my bicycle but the bicycle had been completely damaged. The place looked like some elephants were fighting there,” she says. When she looked up, she saw the herdsmen and their cattle as they headed down the river. She summoned courage and went to the river bank to meet them. The herdsmen denied that their cows were responsible for the damaged bicycle.
“When I insisted that they should repair my bicycle, one of them pulled out a gun and threatened to shoot me if I made noise or uttered a word of what happened to someone else. I cried and cried, then I wiped my tears and said to myself, at least I am alive, and the worst could have happened.”
Narrating his own ordeal, another farmer, Mr. Nnanna Okoro, who is aged 47 years, told EnviroNews: “The cows ate up the leaves and tubers of my cassava. Even when you harvest and keep it in your farm, they were eaten up, so what will I do now?”
Mr. Tito Ezebuike had gone to his farm one morning in November 2016. He recalls: “As I approached my farm, I saw a herd of cattle feeding on my cassava so I pulled my cutlass and seized the nearest person, saying: ‘You will pay me for my cassava’. He said, ‘No be me o, my brother,’ pointing to the other herdsman. As I made for the other man, he uttered a kind of command and, immediately, all the cows scattered and took to their heels. I followed them, but it was too late; in a minute, they were all gone – cows and herdsmen.
Tito Ezebuike’s story somehow illustrates how potentially dangerous the situation could be.
But these entire episode to insignificance when compared to the wanton destruction of crops going on daily at the Ogbreanya and Ntu Farmland, described as the “scorched earth” by Chief Levi Ekukwu. According to him, “the outcry by the women and men who farm in this area is so unbearable. Everyday, farmers come to me crying about what the herdsmen and their cattle are doing to them.”
Chief Ekukwu told EnviroNews: “The combined losses of farmers run into millions of Naira. So when all the farmers met and on the 20th of September 2016 we raised a letter to the Divisional Police officer in charge of Omoku , Divisional Police Headquarters, describing the damages done to our farms by the herdsmen.”
The letter, which was made available to EnviroNews, reads in part: “It should be noted that some of these farmers whose farms have been destroyed borrowed the money from banks and cooperative societies to finance their farms with a promise to pay back with the proceeds from the farms.”
In an interview, another farmer, Chief Samuel Ogbangwo, from Mgbede-Egbema in Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni Local Government Area, said: “There will be hunger, because the cassava and other crops we are to harvest now have been eaten up by cows.”
Chief Ogbangwo, who is one of the signatories to the petition to the DPO of Omoku Police, said that the Divisional Police Officer arranged a meeting between the affected farmers and the herdsmen (one Alhaji Yahaya and his brother) on the 3rd 0f October 2016. They all agreed on the need to undertake an on-the-spot assessment of the farms.
Chief Ogbangwo continued: “So the DPO assigned some policemen led by the O/C Crimes who were joined by some members of the Joint Task Force (JTF) that led us to the farms. As we got to the farm, Chief Levi Ekukwu said, ‘We saw how the cows have eaten several hectares of cassava farms, we saw fresh cow dung everywhere. I then asked Alhaji Yahaya, ‘Who ate all these cassava?’ And he said, ‘Cows, but not my cows.” Then, I asked him, ‘Whose cows did it?’ But he didn’t answer.”
Chief Ekukwu told this Reporter that when they returned to the station the DPO decided to mediate on the matter. “At a meeting held on the 6th of October 2016 at the DPO’s Office, Alhaji Yahaya and his brother agreed not to take their cows to graze in the farms again. When the farmers pressed for damages for the losses they suffered, Alhaji Yahaya refused to take responsibility.
“Several weeks passed by and the cow were not seen again, so we started replanting the cassava. But, all of a sudden, the cows have come back in full force,” he said sadly.
When the Reporter asked Chief Samuel Ogbangwo, one of the farmers, how they hoped to handle the situation, he said, “We can’t fight but we will seek for justice.” He disclosed that the traditional rulers have been involved in the matter. The traditional rulers could not be reached as at the time of going to the press but their spokesperson, Nelson Ekperi, an engineer, confirmed that the traditional rulers in the area held a meeting on Sunday, 15th of January 2017 and that they would soon officially come out with their position on the matter.
Urban planners, architects, engineers, builders, construction firms, project owners, students and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are targeted participants at the 2017 LafargeHolchim Construction Awards competition, which is seeking smart solutions for cities and the built environment.
Lafarge Africa Plc’s Group Managing Director/CEO, Michel Puchercos
The competition, which awards a total of $2 million in each three-year cycle, seeks projects that go beyond balancing environmental performance, social responsibility, and economic growth.
Already, 26 participants from Nigeria (14 professionals and 12 students) have reportedly submitted entries for the 5th International LafargeHolchim Awards, which commenced on July 4, 2016 and closes for submission on March 21, 2017. The award seeks to recognise and reward high profile projects from professionals as well as bold ideas from students and upcoming professionals in the built environment sector that combine sustainable construction solutions with archirectural excellence.
The award, according to the promoters, is relevant to Nigeria, a rapidly urbanising country of over 170 million people and projected to be the third biggest country in the world in terms of population by 2050. As at 2016, the combined population of Abuja, Benin City, Ibadan, Kaduna, Kano, Lagos, Onitsha and Port Harcourt (regarded as the fastest growing cities in Nigeria) was put at 31.4 million; and their number is expected to swell to 54 million by 2030, according to the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat).
There is thus a press need for sustainable urban design and construction in Nigeria, says Lafarge Africa Plc’s Group Managing Director/CEO, Michel Puchercos, while expressing delight that more Nigerians are tapping into the opportunity offered by the award.
His words: “Nigerian professionals and students participating in the country live and work in some of the fastest growing cities in the world. The competition is therefore an opportunity to address the myriad challenges of urbanisation as it develops.
“In Nigeria, like many emerging economies, urbanisation is outstripping the pace at which homes, offices, roads and bridges are being built. An infrastructure deficit and a low degree of industrialisation coupled with the amount of natural resources required highlight the important role which the construction industry will play in the socio-economic and environmental future of Nigeria.”
The competition seeks projects of ideas that embody the target issues for sustainable construction – the five Ps: Progress (innovation and transferability), People (ethical standards and social inclusion), Planet (resource and environmental performance), Prosperity (economic viability and compatibility) and Place (contextual and aesthetic impact), while providing the opportunity to institute the principles of sustainability for future constructions.
The projects are grouped into: architecture, building and civil engineering (Group 1); landscape, urban design and infrastructure (Group 2); and materials, products and construction technologies (Group 3). Past winners include Francis Kere (Gold award, 2012) and Kunle Adeyemi (Acknowledgement prize, 2014).
“I found this demolition as an inhuman and degrading treatment in violation of the right to dignity enshrined in Section 34 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and Article 5 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.”
– Justice Onigbanjo of the Lagos High Court, Thursday, 26 January 2017.
Makoko, a waterfront slum community in Lagos. The court finds the planned demolition by the Lagos government as an inhuman and degrading treatment in violation of the right to dignity as enshrined in the Constitution
Since Justice Onigbanjo of the Lagos High Court delivered his epoch decision on Thursday, 26 January 2017 in a lawsuit filed by more than 20 member communities of the Nigerian Slum/Informal Settlement Federation against the Lagos State Government (LASG), the news have reverberated beyond the shores of Lagos, nay Nigeria. It was instant global news headlines in many online newspapers (including EnviroNews), notable Slum NGOs’ newsletters from different continents of the world, international organisations news portals and commentaries from law pundits/human rights activists, women groups, and globally-acclaimed urban planners.
Justice Onigbanjo was not afraid to act within his legal authority. He acted as an arbiter and interpreter of the law in a dispute between the government and the governed in accordance with the dictates of the Nigerian Constitution, which guarantees “the right to dignity for all citizens.”
Using his discretion and God-given wisdom further, he directed the two warring entities (slum communities and the Lagos State Government) to embrace dialogue and find an amicable solution to the dispute that brought them before the court. To the belief of the learned judge, peoples’ lives must not be degraded at the altar of urban development. There must be a compromise and just compensation for people affected by unavoidable demolition arising from inevitable urban renewal for overall public good.
No Lagosians can doubt the good intention of Governor Akinwunmi Ambode in making the Lagos mega city a place comfortable to live, work, move around unhindered and play under a secure and wholesome environment. He has embarked on a gamut of infrastructural provisioning projects, social amenities, public transportation and environmental improvement and city beautification in the effort to make the Lagos mega city a hub on the African continent and a city of international status. In the process of doing this, it has come at a cost to the government and umbrage from a certain group of Lagos residents, most especially the marginalised urban poor and those living along the ubiquitous lagoon waterfronts whose shanty settlements had either been bulldozed or slated for imminent demolition due to insecurity and subhuman living conditions.
As well-intentioned the aim of the government seems to be, the brute force approach it took was roundly condemned and thus caused the LASG negative publicity both at home and in the international community, particularly among the proponents/advocates of “inclusive city.” Could it have been done differently without degrading the humanity, dignity, and families of over 30,000 slum residents and more without just compensation for the indignity suffered by the families affected? Will urban planning technocrats in government and other professionals have a rethink of slum bulldozing and the courage to press for more inclusive Lagos mega city? Are they ready to honestly advise the government to brace up and plan for urbanisation and not try to halt it? Are the planners ready to assist the government in planning for inclusive cities generally? These are unassailable questions that the LASG must try to reflect upon and be dispassionate in providing very truthful answers.
The planning and management of cities in the 21st century globally call for inclusiveness of all city dwellers in the social, political and economic fabrics of the city whether rich or poor, male or female and with equal oppourtunity for a decent life. Particularly, national governments all over the world are enjoined by the United Nations to imbibe good governance and be pro-poor in their planning efforts for the marginalised group as echoed at the just-concluded Habitat III Conference held in Quito, Ecuador in October 2016. The adopted New Urban Agenda, a document endorsed by member nations at the Habitat III Conference, called on governments to ensure that “cities and human settlements are participatory, promote civic engagement, engender a sense of belonging and ownership among all their inhabitants.”
The collusion between the waterfront dwellers and the LASG could have been avoided if, ab initio, the latter has carried along the former at the initial stage and intimate the people about the good intention of the government to redevelop the waterfront. During the public hearing/consultation, the issue of compensation and alternate settlement area could have been sorted with relate ease. All things considered, the waterfront dwellers have their nuisance value to the mega city. Their men engage in daily fishing as their occupation while the women are fish sellers. They both occupy an important spot in the food chain supply/food security to most residents of the mega city. They provide an invaluable service.
They also have their political relevance and civic value; they are willing tools in the hands of the politicians who often seek their votes during general elections (Federal, State, and Local Government elections). If the waterfront dwellers discharge their civic duties responsibly by voting for State and Local Governments’ elected officials, it behooves the government to listen to the genuine complaint or agitations of the people in time of crisis. Some of these people are responsible citizens who pay their taxes to the government, no matter how minimal is the amount.
Dislodging them from their source of livelihood and abode without any resettlement plan does not conform to international best practice. This inadvertent gaffe has been the undoing of the LASG, notwithstanding the good intention of the government to turn the waterfronts to a linear development for tourism and entertainment activities.The LASG seems to be at a crossroad on the next step it will take having been ordered to suspend further demolition of the waterfronts pending a court-ordered mediation of the legal tussle through the Lagos State Multi-Door Courthouse for an amicable settlement of the matter.
Any proponent of good city planning would lend support to the ongoing transformation of the Lagos mega city into a more functional, liveable and environment-friendly urban hub. No doubt, the colonies of the shanty and unauthorised structures along the waterfronts are unsightly and constitute a serious health risk for the city residents and a bad image for the entire city. However, it must be pointed out that these shanty developments are a cumulative effect of dereliction of duty and laxity in enforcing planning and building regulations for so many years. As a result, the proliferation of such illegal settlements was intensified anywhere they could be found along the lagoon shores. The human population also increased astronomically raising a social problem and grave moral issue for the government to manage.
The present administration is battle ready to rid Lagos of unauthorised development and unequivocal about its resolve for “zero tolerance” for ramshackle structures along the waterfronts throughout the state in the bid to restore the city masterplans. The LASG cannot be faulted for taking such proactive decision. However, caution must be taken about the approach or methodology applied. Such action should not cause untold human hardship or at the detriment of a particular voiceless group of people. If there are causes to dislocate families, those affected must be adequately compensated and resettled where possible. The scenario that led to the present face-off between the LASG and the waterfronts communities must be guided not to repeat itself in the future.
Therefore, we want to counsel that the remaining unoccupied waterfronts or any area earmarked for future development must not be left unprotected if incursion by illegal developers is to be forestalled. Squatters are like birds, they squat on any available city space. The LASG should mandate that unoccupied waterfronts must be sign-posted with a strict warning to ward-off itinerant or hobo people who are likely to jump on the vacant space and erect illegal structures. The struggle for survival by the urban poor in a rapidly growing megacity like Lagos is a constant struggle. The urban poor would employ any means legal or illegal to eke a living.
Those in government with a remit for urban development should be not deluded with the notion that where one lives determines your access to oppourtunity. It is erroneous. Different oppourtunities must be created for all strata of city dwellers irrespective of their social status. Rather than ignore the existence of the urban poor, it is the duty of the government to strive to accommodate the “left behinds” by providing social safety nets to ameliorate their burden of poverty and not aggravate them with unpopular urban development policy.
By Yacoob Abiodun (Urban Planner and Planning Advocate, Parkview Estate, Ikoyi, Lagos)
A global coalition to create new vaccines for emerging infectious diseases has emerged with the ambitious aim of protecting the world from future epidemics.
Bill Gates of the the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which is contributing $100 million to the initiative
Announced at the recently held World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the initiative has an initial investment of nearly $500 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Britain’s Wellcome Trust and the governments of Japan, Norway and Germany.
The partnership will be called the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, or CEPI. It grew out of the lessons from the world’s woeful lack of preparedness for the 2014 Ebola epidemic in West Africa, which killed more than 11,000 people and caused at least $2.2 billion in economic losses in the three hardest-hit countries.
As a result of that and the current Zika epidemic in the Americas, a global consensus has steadily grown among an array of governments, public health leaders, scientists and vaccine industry executives that a new system is needed to guard against future health threats.
Global health experts welcomed the initiative, saying it would complement efforts already underway by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the U.S. Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), part of the Department of Health and Human Services, which are working on Ebola and Zika vaccines.
The United States is not providing funding for CEPI, but it is offering subject expertise. Officials took part in the planning discussions, and “while we are not a formal partner to CEPI, we foresee synergies between our approaches,” BARDA Director Rick Bright said in a statement. One such area is development of the most efficient technology for bio-defence and infectious disease response, he said.
Rebecca Katz, director of Georgetown University’s Centre for Global Health Science and Security, expects the new coalition “will just add much needed resources to a hard problem” and not detract from other efforts’ funding and resources.
CEPI initially plans to target three viruses that have known potential to cause serious epidemics and can be transmitted from animals to humans: MERS, a deadly respiratory virus first identified in Saudi Arabia in 2012 that can be spread by camels and now is in 27 countries, including the United States; Lassa fever, an acute viral illness mainly found in West Africa and spread by rats; and Nipah, a newly emerging infection initially identified in 1999 in Malaysia and Singapore. During a Nipah outbreak there among pig farmers and people with close contact with pigs, nearly 300 people were infected and more than 100 died.
Each virus is among WHO’s priority pathogens. Few or no medical countermeasures exist to combat them.
The current system for vaccine development is in crisis, health experts say, because it’s a costly, complicated and labor-intensive development process that prioritises therapeutics with the biggest possible market.
CEPI hopes to develop two vaccine candidates against each of the target diseases. Officials said they did not choose Ebola and Zika vaccine work because considerable research is already underway.
“The last thing we would like to do is duplicate efforts,” Trevor Mundel, president of the Gates Foundation’s global health division, told reporters during a briefing.
Officials said they have raised $460 million, almost half of their $1 billion target for the first five years. They’re now seeking proposals from researchers and companies and expect to announce which will be funded by mid-year. They’re also calling for other governments and organisations to help complete fundraising by the end of the year.
The Indian government, one of the coalition founders, is finalising a financial commitment, according to CEPI.
Several major pharmaceutical companies are providing support in the form of vaccine technology, expertise and guidance. Industry representatives are on the coalition’s board and scientific advisory committee.
Bill Gates has said his biggest worry is a pathogen, more infectious than Ebola, for which the world is totally unprepared. In a statement, Gates said, “The ability to rapidly develop and deliver vaccines when new ‘unknown’ diseases emerge offers our best hope to outpace outbreaks, save lives and avert disastrous economic consequences.”
Wellcome Director Jeremy Farrar was among those who first proposed a global vaccine development fund in mid-2015. CEPI’s initial $1 billion investment goal, he said, pales in comparison to the tens of billions of dollars in costs from epidemics, starting with the 2003 SARS outbreak.
“Vaccines can protect us, but we’ve done too little to develop them as an insurance policy,” Farrar said.
CEPI’s financial contributions so far for its first five years include:
Japan: $125 million
Norway: about $120 million
Germany: about $10.6 million in 2017 with more funding to come
The Ogun State Government says it has requested for technical support and grant-in-aid from the Federal Government to further boost its reforestation programmes in its nine Forest Reserves.
Ogun State Commissioner for Forestry, Chief Kolawole Lawal
Commissioner for Forestry, Chief Kolawole Lawal, made the disclosure while speaking at a meeting with the Executive Director, Forestry Research Institute of Nigeria (FRIN) in Ibadan, Oyo State.
The Commissioner, through his media aide, Olusola Olubodun, said the meeting was imperative so as to bridge the communication gap between the institution and Ogun State Government as well as to enable the institution identify with the state reforestation project.
Chief Lawal noted that the state needed technical support of the institution on the best ways to safeguard its forestry assets, especially on reforestation of depleted forest reserves in the state.
The Commissioner explained that, to achieve its set objectives, the state government had sourced for grants from the Federal Government to fund agro-forestry projects, saying that more capacity building would be needed especially in the training of forest guards that would combat illegal activities in the reserves.
Responding, Executive Director of the Institute, Dr. Adesola Adepoju, said the institution was established to assist states in capacity building and was ready to support Ogun State in achieving its set objectives, especially the reforestation project.
He promised that the institution would assist the state in accessing the grants by including it in the appropriation bill which would be presented to the Federal Government.
The International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) has expressed it support to the statement by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe (SRST) rejecting last week’s United States (US) President’s Executive Order and Presidential Memorandum to expedite the review and approval of the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) and other pipelines. The President’s Memorandums call for the elimination of obstacles to the construction of the DAPL and Keystone XL Pipeline which was blocked when President Obama denied its permit in November 2015.
US president, Donald Trump
The President’s Memorandum on the DAPL called upon the Assistant Secretary of the Army to “consider to the extent permitted by law…whether to withdraw the Notice of Intent to Prepare an Environmental Impact Statement dated January 18th, 2017” which was considered as a significant advance by the SRST in its long standing struggle to protect its Treaty Rights, water and sacred places by halting DAPL construction along its current route. These actions by the President do not override the December 4th 2016 Army Corps of Engineers decision to conduct the EIS, to be completed with the SRST’s active participation, and to consider alternate routes before the permit can be approved.
IITC asserts that the President does not have the authority to violate the US Constitution which states that “Treaties are the supreme law of the land”. The 1851 and 1868 Treaties between the “Great Sioux Nation” (Lakota, Dakota and Nakota) and the US require these Indigenous Nations’ consent before incursions take place on their Treaty lands. The President’s Executive Order and Memorandums fail to acknowledge these nation-to-nation legally-binding obligations.
IITC was recently in Standing Rock to accompany Mr. Pavel Sulyandziga, member of the United Nations (UN) Working Group on the issue of Human Rights, Transnational Corporations and other Business Enterprises. This UN Expert was invited by SRST Chairman Dave Archambault II to collect information about the range of human and Treaty rights violations resulting from the construction of DAPL and the excessive force used by law enforcement as well as private security personnel.
IITC Executive Director Andrea Carmen, IITC Board members William Means and Roberto Borrero, and youth representative Victor Lopez-Carmen were accompanied in Standing Rock by representatives of the American Civil Liberties Union. From January 22–24, IITC and ACLU coordinated a human rights training and a UN hearing as well as a visit by the UN Expert to the Sacred Stone and Oceti Sakowin camps to collect additional testimonies. A total of 56 testimonies were presented to Mr. Sulyandziga for submission to the UN Working Group. The on-site events were attended by more than 200 participants. Over 50,000 visited the Facebook live-stream of the training and hearing.
Jamil Dakwar, Director of ACLU Human Rights Programme, along with Andrea Carmen, remained in Standing Rock last week as international human rights observers. Addressing the President’s actions, Dakwar stated: “Trump’s decision to give the go-ahead for the Dakota Access Pipeline is a slap in the face to Native Americans and a blatant disregard for their rights. By law they are entitled to water rights and deserve to be treated with dignity and respect, not sacrificed for political expediency and profit-making.”
Reflecting on his historic visit, Mr. Sulyandziga stated: “I would like to express my gratitude to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe for the invitation to monitor the situation on the ground. According to the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, States should pay special attention to groups with a heightened risk of human rights violations. In the case of Indigenous Peoples, this means that they have to obtain their Free, Prior and Informed Consent whenever a project may substantially affect their territories and livelihood, as set out in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.”
Ahead of the upcoming 28th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the African Union holding 30th and 31st January 2017 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the African Ministers’ Council on Water (AMCOW) has activated the online portal of the continent’s water sector and sanitation reporting system.
Dr. Canisius Kanangire, AMCOW Executive Secretary
The new Pan African Monitoring and Reporting System serves as a platform to report progress on the implementation of the AU Heads of States and Government Sharm el Sheikh Commitments to accelerate the achievement of the Africa Water Vision 2025, as well as the global high level political commitments on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on water and sanitation. Considered as one of the most ambitious attempts at tracking sectoral progress, the system represents Africa’s readiness to learn from past mistakes in monitoring the implementation of the MDGs as well as efforts being made toattain Africa’s Agenda 2063.
Speaking on the successful activation, the AMCOW President and Minister for Water and Irrigation, Tanzania, Gerson Lwenge, stated: “The AMCOW Monitoring and Reporting System helps to address Africa’s longstanding challenges in producing harmonised water and sanitation monitoring data”.
He recalled that lack of credible national and regional water sector and sanitation monitoring and reporting systems in Africa was widely recognised as a critical constraint to making informed policy and investments decisions on the development and effective use of water resources and sanitation in the continent.
Commenting, the AU Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture, Rhoda Peace Tumusiime, said: “Ongoing actions such as this ensures Africa’s readiness to monitor and report on progress towards achieving the SDGs while providing a great opportunity to establish baselines not just for the global indicator framework, but also for the African commitments for which efforts to monitor progress towards attainment are constrained by the lack of baseline data.”
The system, developed by AMCOW working with the AU Commission, captures the harmonised monitoring and reporting indicators for the continent and links with other global monitoring and reporting processes. The AMCOW Executive Secretary, Dr Canisius Kanangire, believes “the system provides African Member States an opportunity to own and manage the water sector and sanitation data”.
Dr Kanangire reiterated that the issue of water sector and sanitation monitoring and reporting gained momentum in July 2008 with the AU Sharm El-Sheikh Declaration requesting AMCOW to report annually on the state of the continent’s water resources and sanitation to the Summit.
The web-based reporting system was developed with funding from the African Water Facility (AWF), and supported by the M&E Task Force, the German Cooperation as well as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and with technical assistance from UNEP-DHI.
The highlight of the portal, which can be accessed at http://www.africawat-sanreports.org, is the 2016 Status Report of 42 African member states submitted using an online reporting framework. It also contains the 2013 and 2014 data submitted by Member States using a temporary paper based template.
The system, which serves as database on water and sanitation for Member States in Africa, is expected to promote cross-sector learning and knowledge dissemination within the water, sanitation, food, energy and climate nexus while supporting joint sector reviews. The online portal comes with maps and tabular view options which makes it easy to compare progress on various indicators across Member States in Africa.
Launched by AMCOW Ministers during the 2016 World Water Week Africa Focus Day in Stockholm, the online portal supports AMCOW’s efforts in developing regular progress reports for submission to the African Union Heads of State and Government Summit.
A new analysis of the World Bank’s $5-billion-dollar policy loans shows lender supporting investment incentives for coal and other fossil fuel projects in Southeast Asia, South America, Africa and the Middle East, threatening climate change efforts, indigenous groups and natural resources
World Bank Group President, Jim Yong Kim
World Bank policy loans are creating subsidies for coal, gas and oil projects and undercutting initiatives to build wind, solar and geothermal power infrastructure and protect vulnerable rainforests, including the Amazon, a new report by the Bank Information Centre (BIC) and worldwide partner organisations finds.
The study, which examines seven World Bank policy operations from 2007 to 2016 totaling $5 billion in four countries – Indonesia, Peru, Egypt and Mozambique – reveals that funds intended to boost low-carbon growth are instead supporting investment incentives for projects that put the climate, forests and people at risk.
The report sheds light on the Bank’s Development Policy Finance (DPF) operations, which account for approximately a third of all World Bank funding – equal to more than $15 billion in 2016. The DPF operations provide funding in exchange for national policy and institutional reforms mutually agreed to by the Bank and the borrowing government. As part of its Climate Action Plan, the World Bank identifies DPF operations as the main instrument for incentivising countries to transition to low-carbon economies. To meet national commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, new investments in low-carbon infrastructure, especially in the energy sector, are critical. The BIC study therefore examines DPF-funded policy reforms involving investment incentives for large-scale infrastructure projects.
“The World Bank has pledged to help countries adopt a low-carbon development path specifically by phasing out fossil fuel subsidies and promoting a carbon tax,” said Nezir Sinani, Europe and Central Asia Manager at BIC. “However, the Bank’s policy lending does the opposite by introducing tax breaks for coal power plants and coal export infrastructure.”
The report was published by BIC in collaboration with Derechos, Ambiente y Recursos Naturales (DAR) Peru, Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), Greenpeace Indonesia, Friends of the Earth Mozambique, and 11.11.11 Belgium.
Key findings are listed to include:
In Peru, World Bank DPF measures provide subsidies to government-proposed public-private partnerships (PPP) that will develop: a liquid petroleum gas pipeline, a diesel/gas power plant and, in the Amazon, three natural gas pipeline networks and 26 new oil and gas concessions. They will also support two energy efficient street lights and the development of hydropower. No solar or wind power projects are planned.
In Indonesia, the World Bank DPF established subsidies for PPP infrastructure projects, which include four coal power plants and three coal transport railways (on the forest-rich islands of Kalimantan and Sumatra). There are no geothermal, solar or wind PPP projects in the works.
In Egypt, upcoming infrastructure projects targeted to receive DPF-supported subsidies include: more than a dozen oil and gas projects, 12.5 gigawatts of new coal power plants and 12 pending oil and gas exploration agreements.
In Mozambique, Bank DPF-supported subsidies are slated to benefit four coal power plants, three coal port terminals and two coal transport railways. Other planned projects include one hydropower plant and one natural gas plant. No geothermal, solar or wind projects are targeted by the subsidies.
The report points to several substantial climate change concerns and measures that appear to contradict the World Bank’s climate change pledges.
Introduction of new fossil fuel subsidies. The DPFs introduced subsidies for coal in three (Indonesia, Egypt and Mozambique) of the four countries studied. Bank-supported subsidies for coal infrastructure in Indonesia have helped the country become one of the world’s top coal exporters. By propping up coal infrastructure with subsidies in Mozambique, the Bank’s DPF is turning the country, highly vulnerable to climate change due to droughts, floods and cyclones, into a major coal producer.
In addition, Bank-supported subsidies benefitting new investments for coal power plants in Indonesia and Egypt contribute to the planned significant rise in coal’s share of the power generation mix for these countries – from 35 to 66 percent and from zero to 20 percent by 2022, respectively.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report (2014), meeting the internationally agreed goal of limiting global average temperature increase to 2 degrees Celsius requires at least two-thirds of existing fossil fuel reserves must be left in the ground. BIC’s study shows that World Bank policies supporting oil and gas exploration subsidies directly contradict the 2-degree goal.
Specifically, in Mozambique, the Bank supports an accelerated rate of depreciation for oil and gas exploration, which significantly reduces the overall tax rates, and thus, government revenue, associated with these fossil fuel investments. Not only is this a significant fossil fuel subsidy but the loss to government coffers further threatens Mozambique’s debt sustainability crisis.
Inadequate support for renewable energy. Each country examined in the study has potential to develop renewable energy, including vast solar and wind resources in Egypt and geothermal resources – among the world’s largest – in Indonesia. The assessment found that in Indonesia, Egypt and Mozambique, the DPFs did contain actions on new renewable energy laws with feed-in tariffs for one or more forms of renewable energy. However, the report finds that, when effectively used, the World Bank DPFs could have removed further barriers to renewable energy investments. These barriers include, among others, inadequate legal frameworks, a lack of feasibility studies and a lack of incentives for geothermal exploration.
Undermining environmental governance and threatening forests. In three of the case study countries (Indonesia, Peru and Mozambique), the DPF operations ushered in expedited licensing and land acquisition procedures for infrastructure investments. These changes exacerbate already-existing weak environmental governance, ineffective land tenure rights and pressures on forests. Indonesia and Peru have the third and fourth largest, respectively, extent of rainforest in the world. Their forests are of paramount importance not only to the many indigenous peoples that depend upon them for their livelihoods, but also to the climate. Indonesia is the world’s sixth largest emitter of greenhouse gases due to deforestation; the forests of Peru store more carbon than the US emits every year.
Many of the upcoming PPP infrastructure projects in Indonesia and Peru examined in the study include components that could damage forests. These include oil, gas, coal and mining; large hydropower; and roads. As much as 84 percent of the Peruvian Amazon has been granted as oil and gas concessions. The study shows that licensing and land acquisition reforms prompted under DPFs undermine efforts to improve the governance structures critically needed in Indonesia and Peru and to abate forest loss and climate change.
In Indonesia, for example, the DPFs sped up land acquisition procedures that undermined the ability of local communities to protect their lands from development. One particular project, the Central Java coal-fired power plant, had been delayed for over four years due to local landowners’ refusal to give up their land. A law propped up by the Bank gave the government the power to ultimately evict them.
Kate Geary, BIC’s forest campaign manager and a report contributor, said, “Rather than using its development policy lending muscle to protect forests and combat climate change, the Bank is helping to weaken vital environmental laws and governance and undermine local communities’ rights to the resources they rely on for their livelihoods.”
The report urges the World Bank to heed its own advice on confronting climate change by providing the right incentives for a clear pathway to low-carbon development. The report argues that the Bank must go beyond supporting some incentives for renewable energy to steer developing countries towards a low-carbon transition.
“The climate crisis and staying under 2 degrees Celsius warming not only requires increasing investments in renewable energy but also drastically decreasing fossil fuel investments,” Sinani said.
The report calls on the World Bank to support incentives for more renewable energy through DPFs, and to be transparent about the measures and incentives tied to DPFs, as well as the projects that DPFs are slated to support.
“We also want a more rigorous climate- and forest-related assessment of DPFs before they are approved,” Nezir Sinani said. “This call has resonated with several World Bank Executive Directors who believe that the Bank’s approach to environmental and social safeguards should be applied to all types of its lending. At present, the Bank’s DPF falls outside the social and environmental safeguards applied to direct project lending.”
The BIC partners with civil society in developing and transition countries to influence the World Bank and other international financial institutions (IFIs) to promote social and economic justice and ecological sustainability. BIC is an independent, non-profit, non-governmental organisation that advocates for the protection of rights, participation, transparency, and public accountability in the governance and operations of the World Bank Group and regional development banks.
