Over 300 participants representing various interest groups on the continent including governmental and non-governmental organisations, academic, media, women, lawyers and youths have underscored the need for African member-states to integrate the Paris Agreement into Africa’s development agenda and other global governance frameworks.

This came out strongly on Thursday as the sixth conference on Climate Change Development in Africa (CCDA-VI) ended in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital.

The CCDA-VI, which began on the 17th of October 2016 on the premise of facilitating science-policy dialogue and providing a marketplace for innovative solutions that integrate climate change into Africa’s development processes, urged Africa to engage with and embrace the Paris Agreement within the framework of it’s development aspirations as underscored in Agenda 2063, which embodies the vision of the “Africa we want”, and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which sets global targets with a vision of “leaving no one behind”.

Participants were also of the view that most of the intended nationally determined contributions (INDCs) submitted by African states require urgent revision ahead of the coming into force of the Agreement as many of them were vague and inconsistent with national development priorities.

Abdallah Hamdok, Deputy Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), said: “Analyses by various institutions, including the African Climate Policy Center, have demonstrated that there are still several challenges with the INDC submissions of many developing countries.”

These, according to him, include vagueness in their mitigation ambitions and adaptation aspirations; lack of cost estimates for achieving their adaptation and mitigation goals, and absence of clarity on sources of funding (conditional, unconditional, private sector, and/or public) for both mitigation and adaptation.

In a similar vein, the Vice President of the African Development Bank, Dr. Kapil Kapoor, enjoined African states to ensure that the nuances in the Paris Agreement are clarified and contextualised in the run-up to COP22, especially in the case of Africa, whose greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions remain the lowest but which is already bearing the greatest burden from the adverse impacts of climate as evinced by the effects of the unusually strong El Niño of 2015 in East and Southern Africa.

Civil society groups under the auspices of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) cautioned along the same line, urging Africa to utilise the window of opportunity the ratification period provides to revise their INDCs and while identifying strategies for implementing the Agreement especially through pan-African initiatives and institutions, public-private partnerships, and the engagement of state and non-state actors.

“Tackling climate change is therefore paramount if Africa’s development objective as defined in Agenda 2063 is to be achieved,” Mithika Mwenda, head of PACJA, said.

To James Murombedzi, Officer in Charge of the Africa Climate Policy Centre, “the Paris Agreement is somewhat weak in terms of how African countries will attract the required investments to deal with the challenges of climate change.”

While it was hailed as a landmark global deal on climate change, there remains a feeling of impotence from the Africa group on certain nuances of the Agreement and its implications to the continent’s development agenda.

However, signing and ratifying the Agreement is not optional for Parties as it was universally agreed by the then 196 members to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris last year.

This therefore implies that Africa’s fears about the Agreement and its implications, would have to be dealt with at the negotiating table, and this is the point at which the Young African Lawyers (YAL) Programme becomes crucial.

Established under the ClimDev-Africa Programme, YAL has the overarching goal of strengthening Africa’s negotiating position and ensuring Africa gets the best at the UNFCCC processes.

“Signing and ratifying the Agreement is not optional for us as Africa,” says Natasha Banda, a young Legal Practitioner from Zambia, one of the mentees under the programme.

Being part of the legal advisory team for the Zambian negotiators through the UNFCCC country Focal point person, Banda believes ratifying the Agreement is not negotiable and the starting point “because the nature of international Agreements is that you cannot have bargaining power from outside,” and is certain that Zambia, which is yet to ratify, would do so once all necessary processes are complete.

Noting that climate-induced impacts like frequent and prolonged droughts and floods, as well as environmental degradation, have created uncertainties that make livelihoods unattainable for rural and urban communities, key speakers at the conference also identified migration as a trigger and amplifying factor.

The conference further recommended that the causal linkages between climate change and migration be better understood to take appropriate climate response measures to stabilise communities and improve livelihoods.

Examining the implications of the Paris Agreement for Africa’s future economic growth and sustainable development agenda; the conference called on African countries to identify viable and transformative investment opportunities, reform institutions to make them more efficient, and build capacity to access and absorb climate finance – in readiness to take advantage of the opportunities presented by the Paris agreement, to leapfrog technologies and transition to low-carbon, climate-resilient development.

In addressing and responding to the impacts of climate change on socioeconomic development and environmental degradation in Africa, several key regional initiatives have been developed and adopted across multiple countries through partnerships and joint implementation.

Pan-African initiatives such as the Africa Renewable Energy Initiative (AREI), the Africa Adaptation Initiative (AAI), the ClimDev-Africa programme and the Africa Great Green Wall) were identified as key pillars supporting the implementation of the Paris Agreement. Similarly, the Agreement provides a unique opportunity to synergise these initiatives for maximum impact and efficient management and use of resources.

The place of the youth and the future of developmental frameworks in Africa was also put on the front-burner at the conference as Youth leaders linked the success of any development agenda on the continent to the extent of its anchorage on young people.

“In terms of leadership transition, we are still lugging behind because our leaders don’t trust young people, they see them as a threat, they see young people as naïve…but we will rise and fight for climate justice and ensure that 2063 is a reality,” said Ibrahim Cessay of the Africa Youth Initiative on Climate Change (AYICC), a network of African youth organisations and individuals working on climate change & sustainable development.

And Abel Musumali of the ClimDev Youth Platform agrees with Cessay on the need to engage young people saying “climate change is about both short and long term planning, under for Agenda 2063 to be achieved, we should be involved now in solving the climate change problem which has a bearing on our future, otherwise, we are doomed.”

Agenda 2063 heralds Africa’s dream for development in the next 50 years. And Dr. Seth Osafo, former legal advisor at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) secretariat, would like to see investments in scientific research especially for young scientists.

“We need to develop young people’s expertise at the highest level to contribute positively in their country processes. There are already some experts in all the other areas but we need a lot of research scientists, and I look forward to having a programme soon that could be mentoring young scientists for Africa to be much involved in the climate scientific governance framework considering that climate change threatens to hinder Africa’s aspirations as enshrined in the Agenda 2063,” concludes Osafo.

Courtesy: PAMACC News Agency

The New development bank set up by the BRICS will lend $2.5 billion in 2017, the President of the new lender told the leaders of the bloc who last weekend gathered in the Indian state of Goa for the annual summit.

BRICS is the acronym for an association of five major emerging national economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

“Broadly, in the coming year we will look at lending another 2.5 billion dollars. We also said that in the coming year we would cooperate with other business groups in our member countries and BRICS Business Council to create a platform for sharing knowledge,” Kundapur Kamath, the President of the NDB told the BRICS leaders on Sunday.

Earlier this year, the BRICS Bank approved loans amounting to $900 million to green projects in each member state.

The new lender also sold 3 billion yuan ($449 million) of yuan-denominated, green bonds in China’s interbank market in July.

Leslie Maasdorp, NDB’s vice president and chief financial officer, has said the bank is also planning to sell bonds in Russia and India to fund green projects in these countries.

The first regional office of the Bank will be set up in Johannesburg, South Africa and “will be the face of NDB for the continent”.

BRICS members, China, India and Russia are also the three largest shareholders in the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

Both the BRICS Bank and the AIIB will extend China’s financial reach and compete not only with the World Bank, but also with the Asian Development Bank, which is heavily dominated by Japan.

Young people will be gathering in Marrakech just before the 22^nd Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP22) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) holding 7 – 18 November in the Moroccan ancient city to help support ambitious climate action and to highlight the role of youth in the effective implementation of the Paris Agreement that will enter into force on 4 November.

The main focus of this year’s Conference of Youth (COY 12, 4-6 November) is on the role of education and capacity building in empowering young people to take action on climate change and to bring about positive change in society.

“Only by empowering youth in the various decision-making processes that a transition to low carbon and greater resilience require is climate protection possible. We are looking forward to provide a platform for young people at the location of COP22 to demonstrate the importance they have in climate action and to strengthen networks of African youth working on sustainability and low carbon development,” said Fadoua Brour, member of the Moroccan youth organisation in charge of the Conference of Youth.

Since 2005, the Conference of Youth has been held every year, a few days before the annual UN Climate Change Conferences. This year, it is organised by Moroccan youth organisations together with YOUNGO, the official non-governmental youth constituency of the UNFCCC, in order to give youth a voice during the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UNFCCC.

“The historic Paris Climate Change Agreement is about to enter into force, and as governments move to fine-tune and implement it, they need the full support of all sectors of society, not least of young people,” said Nick Nuttall, UNFCCC spokesperson.

The outcomes of the youth conference will be presented at the Young and Future Generations Day at COP 22 on 10 December, which is being organised by UNFCCC’s Action for Climate Empowerment (ACE) team.

The UNFCCC promotes youth participation under its “Action for Climate Empowerment” (ACE) focus, which relates to education, training, public awareness, public participation, public access to information and international cooperation.

Civil society organisations (CSOs) have accused some developing countries of insecurity and double standards by implementing projects that increase greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions into the atmosphere in their quest for industrialisation.

They singled out Nigeria and Morocco as countries that are investing in coal production.

The activists thus called for more financing to African countries to implement low-carbon development pathways. Indeed, they urged the developing world in general and the African continent in particular to pursue low carbon-emission pathways in line with the Paris COP21 agreement.

Speaking ahead of the sixth Climate Change and Development in Africa (CCDA VI) conference, Mithika Mwenda, the Secretary General of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), expressed surprise that only 15 African countries have so far ratified the Paris Agreement.

“We want African countries to pursue low carbon-emissions pathways and implement bottom-top projects that will deliver justice to impacted people and communities,” Mithika said.

“Whatever the challenges, African countries need additional financial and technological resources that would enhance their capacity to pursue a low-carbon path of development,” says Azep Girmi of Least Developed Countries (LDC) Watch.

However, civil society actors noted that low-emission pathways do not apply only to the energy sector. In some African regions, land-use development, particularly infrastructure expansion, is identified as a key variable determining future GHG emissions.

“For most developing countries, adaptive and mitigative capacities are low and development aid can help to reduce their vulnerability to climate change,” said Johnson Nkem of African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC). “It can also help reduce their emissions growth while addressing energy-security and energy-access problems,” he added.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), Africa’s energy consumption will increase by 80% by 2040; but, with the continent’s population almost doubling, the energy consumption footprint will reduce per capita.

However, studies have projected that nearly one billion additional people will have access to electricity by 2040.

The IEA report however outlines another possible future – what it calls the “African Century” – in which Africa’s governments and donors invest an extra $450 billion in energy. This would sharply increase the use of fossil fuels, reduce much of the most polluting renewables, and provide energy access to 230 million more people. Providing more – and more reliable – power to almost two billion people will increase GDP by 30% in 2040.