Violent conflicts have become so pervasive in Nigeria that one could be excused to say that they threaten to become the new normal. Some years ago, no one could imagine that a Nigerian, child or adult, would become a suicide bomber. That thinking was loudly put to rest by the activities of Boko Haram, the group that erected and foisted a bomb-culture on our nation. Today, the horrendous conflicts between farmers and pastoralists must not be allowed to become another normal.
Armed Fulani herdsmen
Conflicts in the oil fields, including third party interferences, oil thefts and acts of sabotage led to youths of the Niger Delta being labelled as restive whenever they made demands for ecological or social justice. That adjective gave the oil companies some cover over the poor handling and policing of their pipelines, equipment and other facilities. And then to add cream to the cake, it has become normal for oil companies to scream sabotage at the slightest hint of accidents in the oil fields.
Tango in Bonga
The only time a company like Shell did not plead sabotage was when they had the Bonga offshore spill of 20 December 2011. That spill occurred when the top-ranking oil company pumped thousands of barrels of crude oil into the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Ibeno, Akwa Ibom State, instead of pumping it into a waiting vessel. By their admission, they pumped 40,000 barrels of oil into the sea before they knew something was amiss. That speaks volumes of the high standards they maintain in their operations! It may have taken long in coming, but we must applaud the Federal Government of Nigeria for finally instituting a suit against Shell for the damage done to the environment and on our people.
Grazing Times
An intriguing cycle of violence that has become worrisome is that of the so-called herdsmen wielding AK47s, brutally attacking, killing, kidnaping and raping citizens in their paths. The atrocious level of killings and destruction has led some to call these livestock blood cattle. Government action cannot be delayed on this matter.
While it is left to our security agencies to say if these attackers are truly herdsmen or a new band of terrorists, the issue of a Grazing Bill before the National Assembly has added more cause for concern to many Nigerians.
For those who may not know, the Grazing Bill seeks to acquire swaths of land across Nigeria, dispossess individuals and communities of their lands. The bill bars land owners from having access to these lands, territories and resources. Trespass by owners of the land could lead to terms of imprisonment and other penalties. The Bill is a perfection of move to legalise land grabbing and internal colonisation using the obnoxious Land Use Act as a cover. It is interesting that the Bill has now been said not to be on the tables of the National Assembly. Phantom or not, the Bill remains a source for concern. Despite the denial of the existence of any Grazing Bill, we read that there are versions of private members Grazing Bills in the House of Representatives and that one is expected from the executive arm.
Meat, Hunger and Climate Change
While many have linked the herdsmen to the Fulani ethnic nationality, it is clear that owners of the cattle that have become the lightening rod of the peculiar violence rocking the nation in recent days may actually range beyond the Fulani. One interpretation could be that what we are experiencing may be the manifestation of a primitive use of power by a blood-thirsty wealthy class using the poor as canon fodder against other poor and helpless citizens.
If this mayhem is not nipped it threatens to set the nation ablaze. In a situation of rising suspicions, there is need to build bridges between our peoples, build a vanguard of the oppressed against the forces of division and annihilation and ensure that the poor among us are not used as foot soldiers in a proxy war they have no business fighting.
The rich owners of the cattle should set up ranches to support their enterprises. If the nomadic lifestyle is a way of life that cannot be compromised, the range of the movements should nevertheless be controlled. We hear much about value-addition as a way of building our agricultural industrial sector. Is it not time to move meat rather than cattle across the nation?
The world’s appetite for meat is having global impacts on the rate of deforestation and on global warming. Indeed, much of the food grown in the world today go to feeding animals rather than humans, thus entrenching hunger and malnutrition.
With so much blood shed so that cattle may roam roughshod over the land, it does make sense for us to rethink our meat production and consumption patterns.
By Nnimmo Bassey (Director, Health of mother Earth Foundation – HOMEF)
Former Mexican Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa has been nominated to be the new Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), helping to bolster a 2015 Paris Agreement to shift the world economy from fossil fuels, officials said on Tuesday.
Patricia Espinosa
Christiana Figueres, a Costa Rican who is stepping down in July after a six-year term as head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, wrote in a Tweet that U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon had nominated Espinosa to succeed her.
The Bonn-based Secretariat said the appointment needs to be approved by an 11-member U.N. bureau, whose members represent groups of governments worldwide and is now led by French Environment Minister Segolene Royal.
The bureau has no record of challenging nominations by the Secretary-General, diplomats say, even though some had expected that the job would shift from Latin America.
Espinosa, aged 57 and who works as Mexico’s ambassador to Germany, won high marks for presiding at annual U.N. climate negotiations in Cancun, Mexico, in 2010 when she was foreign minister.
Delegates gave her a standing ovation after she brokered a deal to get negotiations on limiting global warming back on track after the failure of a fractious 2009 summit in Copenhagen.
Those 195-nation talks culminated in December 2015 with a deal at a Paris summit to cut greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2100, shifting to cleaner energies such as wind and solar power.
The job of the new U.N. climate chief will be to oversee and strengthen that agreement.
The United Nations says the Paris deal, built from voluntary national limits on greenhouse gas emissions, is too weak to achieve a goal of limiting a rise in temperatures blamed for stoking more droughts, floods, heat waves and rising sea levels.
The Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Yury Fedotov, arrives in Nigeria this week on a two-day official mission in furtherance of the long-standing partnership between UNODC and Nigeria in the areas of anti-corruption, terrorism prevention; drug control with a balanced health-focused approach; strengthened criminal justice sector and the rule of law in Nigeria and the Economic Community of West Africa (ECOWAS) sub-region as a whole.
Yury Fedotov, Executive Director, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
Mr. Fedotov will hold high-level meetings with top government officials and strategic ministries, department and agencies (MDAs) of the government of Nigeria as well as with the president of ECOWAS.
Nigeria and UNODC enjoy cordial relationship since almost three decades. Nigeria has ratified the three UN Conventions on Drugs, 15 out of the 19 international legal instruments on terrorism, in addition to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organised Crime (UNTOC) and the United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC), which are all UN Conventions that are under the global mandate of UNODC. UNODC works with some 50 government partners in Nigeria, at the federal and state levels as well as with civil society organisations in the implementation of the Conventions.
Nigeria is one of UNODC’s priority countries, with a large and comprehensive portfolio in the areas of anti-corruption, the response to drugs and related organised crime, justice sector reform, anti-human trafficking/migrant smuggling and counter terrorism. The programme is funded by the European Union in the amount of about $100 million and constitutes UNODC’s largest technical assistance portfolio in Africa and the third world wide. Other international partners of UNODC in Nigeria are Germany, Japan and Switzerland.
Among the major landmark technical support UNODC has provided in Nigeria is the support to the development, drafting and reviewing of new laws. These include the recently enacted Administration of Justice Act; Extradition Act (Modification) Order, 2014; as well as new legislation against human trafficking and migrant smuggling, in line with the UN Convention against Transnational Organised Crime and its protocols. Presently, UNODC is also assisting Nigeria’s efforts in updating its piracy/maritime crimes law and in reinforcing the criminal justice response to these crimes.
The first meeting of the new Subsidiary Body on Implementation (SBI-1) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) opened on Monday in Montreal, Canada, focusing on increasing efforts related to strengthening the review process and enhance on-the-ground implementation at global, national, subnational and local levels.
Braulio Ferreira de Souza Dias, the Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity
The meeting, being held from 2-6 May 2016 at the headquarters of the International Civil Aviation Organisation in Montreal, is expected to adopt numerous recommendations for consideration by Parties to the Convention at their 13th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 13), set to take place in December this year in Cancun, Mexico.
Among other things, it will review progress made in implementing the Convention and its Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020, consider strategic actions to enhance national implementation, particularly through mainstreaming within and across sectors, and also consider the implications of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals, and of other relevant international processes, for the future work of the Convention. The meeting will also consider the topic of how to increase cooperation and synergies with other biodiversity-related conventions. The meeting is expected to propose guidelines for the sixth national reports, the main means of reporting on progress. The meeting will also consider efforts to support implementation, such as capacity building and technical and scientific cooperation and progress on resource mobilisation. Finally, the meeting will consider the future modus operandi for the SBI, including possible mechanisms to assist Parties in reviewing progress on implementation.
The Conference of the Parties, at its twelfth meeting, established the Subsidiary Body on Implementation to replace the Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on Review of Implementation of the Convention. Discussions and negotiations at SBI-1 will primarily centre on four main core areas:
Review of progress in implementation
Parties will review progress towards the implementation of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 and the achievement of its Aichi Biodiversity Targets at the national level. Several Parties have formulated targets related to the Aichi Targets, but many need to match their level of ambition and scope to be commensurate to the Aichi Targets in order to ensure that the aggregate effect of national targets is sufficient to attain the corresponding Aichi Biodiversity Targets at global level. While encouraging progress has been made in meeting some elements of most Aichi Biodiversity Targets, this progress will not be sufficient to achieve the targets by 2020 unless urgent and effective action is taken to enhance implementation.
Parties will also review progress made towards Aichi Biodiversity Target 16 (By 2015, the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilisation is in force and operational, consistent with national legislation). While the first element of Target 16 has been met and significant efforts are being made to implement the Nagoya Protocol, further progress is needed to make the Nagoya Protocol operational in line with the second part of this Aichi Target.
The SBI is also “to review the information gathered and analysed by the Executive Secretary with a view to contributing to the third assessment and review of the Protocol and the mid-term evaluation of the Strategic Plan for the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety for the period 2011-2020”. Its findings and recommendations will then be sent to the COP-MOP for its consideration.
Strategic actions to enhance implementation
Parties will review strategic actions to enhance implementation, with a focus on the mainstreaming of biodiversity within and across sectors. The concept of “mainstreaming” biodiversity includes the integration of biodiversity considerations into “cross-sectoral plans, programmes and policies”, such as national planning and development processes, financial policies and budgetary processes, land-use planning, and marine spatial planning, and in sector-specific plans, such as agriculture, fisheries, forestry, mining, energy, tourism, transport and others. Mainstreaming biodiversity considerations across these sectors are essential in ensuring not only the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity but also the continued vitality of these sectors.
A decision taken by COP 12 called for COP 13 to focus discussions on mainstreaming in the agriculture, forestry and fisheries sectors. These three issues were taken up in last week’s meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice. A fourth sector, tourism, will be addressed by the SBI. All four sectors are expected to be discussed in Cancun.
The SBI will also consider strategic actions for “cross-sectoral” mainstreaming. This includes legislation, policies and economic instruments and other policy tools as well as institutional and governance processes that seek to ensure the consideration of biodiversity in decisions and actions that could impact it. Examples include perverse subsidies, ecosystem accounting, and environmental safeguards. It will also consider the role of key actors, such as the business sector and subnational governments, in contributing to implementation of the Convention and the Strategic Plan 2011-2020.
Strengthening support for implementation
The SBI will review issues related to capacity building, technical and scientific cooperation and technology transfer; resource mobilisation, the financial mechanism of the Convention, cooperation with other conventions, international organisations and initiatives, and how to enhance synergies among biodiversity related conventions.
With regard to financial resources, the Strategic Plan states that the strategy for resource mobilisation including the proposed concrete initiatives, targets and indicators to be developed, and processes for developing innovative mechanisms, provides a roadmap for achieving the effective implementation of Article 20 of the Convention (where developed countries undertake to provide “new and additional financial resources to enable developing country Parties to meet the agreed full incremental costs” of implementing the obligations of the Convention), in order to provide adequate, predictable and timely new and additional financial resources, in support of the implementation of the Strategic Plan.
Regarding the financial mechanism, the meeting will, for the first time ever, have a preliminary draft report, made available by the Council of the Global Environment Facility, for its consideration. This includes the draft report of a full assessment of the funds needed for the implementation of the Convention and its Protocols for the seventh replenishment period of the Global Environment Facility.
In order to catalyse support for implementation in a more coherent manner, the three items related to capacity-building, scientific and technical cooperation and the clearing house mechanism have been interlinked in a single document which includes as an addendum draft short-term action plan for capacity building prepared by the CBD Secretariat. This action plan focuses on various activities, tools, mechanisms and processes for strengthening countries’ institutional and human resources capabilities while technical and scientific cooperation links two or more countries to pursue their individual or collective goals through cooperative exchanges of scientific knowledge, skills, resources and technical know-how.
Operations of the Convention and its Protocols: Improving the efficiency of structures and processes
The SBI will consider the impacts and effectiveness of existing processes under the Convention and identify ways and means that increase efficiencies, including an integrated approach to the implementation of the Convention and its Protocols.
The SBI will also develop guidelines for national reports, as well as possible mechanisms to strengthen review of progress in implementation.
Under the Convention, the focus of review for the coming years will be on progress in the implementation of the Strategic Plan. This requires, as reflected in existing mandates provided by the Conference of the Parties, the review of national targets, plans and actions, as well as their outcomes.
Parties will also review issues related to synergies and cooperation. Paragraph 89 of the outcome document of the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+ 20), encouraged Parties to multilateral environmental agreements to consider further measures to promote policy coherence at all relevant levels, improve efficiency, reduce unnecessary overlap and duplication, and enhance coordination and cooperation among the multilateral environmental agreements.
Consequently, the SBI will discuss options for Parties of the various biodiversity-related conventions (Convention on Biological Diversity, the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, the International Plant Protection Convention, the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance especially as Waterfowl Habitat, and the World Heritage Convention) to enhance synergies and improve efficiency among them. Specifically, the meeting will consider options for action on eight broad thematic issue areas: The Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020, the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and national biodiversity strategies and action plans; Institutional arrangements and coordination mechanisms; Information and knowledge management; National reporting, monitoring and indicators; Communication and awareness-raising; Science-policy interface; Capacity-building and; Resource mobilisation and utilisation.
The meeting also includes a couple of dialogue sessions. These will be held at the plenary level to provide
Parties with the opportunity to share their experiences in implementing the different objectives of the Convention and receive inputs and suggestions from others.
Over the last five years, the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity has catalysed concerted action, in particular under the Convention and other biodiversity-related conventions, but also the wider United Nations system, the NGO community, academia, and increasingly the business sector. There is no question that progress has been made in implementing the Strategic Plan and achieving the Aichi Biodiversity Targets.
Still, the mid-term review of progress by the twelfth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the CBD, on the basis of the fourth edition of the Global Biodiversity Outlook and the fifth national reports, concluded that while significant progress has been made towards meeting some components of most of the Aichi Targets, the full achievement of all the targets will not be met in 2020 without urgent action to scale up implementation.
With five years left to implement the Strategic Plan, it will be critically important for Parties to significantly increase their efforts. The first meeting of the SBI can help prepare the ground towards achieving the Plan’s 2050 Vision, that, “by 2050, biodiversity is valued, conserved, restored and wisely used, maintaining ecosystem services, sustaining a healthy planet and delivering benefits essential for all people”.
Nigeria, with over 170 million people, is one of the most populated countries in Africa. Before the oil boom, the economy was known to thrive excellently on agriculture and it was no wonder the Naira was able to rub shoulders with western currencies. But, with the emergence of crude oil and the “pot of gold” that came with it, agriculture, like the old wife, was discarded and forgotten.
Agriculture in Africa is rain fed and thus vulnerable to climate change. Photo credit: osundefender.org
Nigeria indeed is a country blessed with vast lands, springs of water, human resources and, most of all, beautiful weather all year round. With all of these factors working in her favour, Nigeria can hardly feed her citizens. It is not news that with the oil crunch, this “pot of gold” is quickly looking like an illusion with the negative impacts it has left in its wake. No longer do the leaders brag that the economy can only survive on crude oil.
Though the current administration has said that it will give priority to agriculture, it leaves a lot to the imagination on how they hope to achieve this goal. The previous administration is rumoured of draining the nation’s funds, the Naira depreciated in value and loan agencies are making the processes for farmers to access loans problematic for large-scale farming. How can the country achieve its agenda of achieving food security when the major players are rendered incapacitated by the powers that be? Once loans and grants are easily accessible and used appropriately, the agricultural industry will flourish, and Nigeria will gradually be restored to the robust economy she was before the oil boom.
Imagine for once, Nigeria with its huge population becoming self-sufficient and being able to feed its populace adequately, all other problems confronting the economy such as: poverty, unemployment, crime, etc. would be abated. I trust that it would be profitable once the current government can, with the tenacity of a bulldog, focus on agriculture. I foresee the populace will feel what it is like to have a progressive and effective government.
Due to the large population in Nigeria, and the low percentage of involvement in agricultural practices, a lot of the staple foods consumed are imported. This is another problem that faces both the farmers and the economy alike. I do not advocate for an abrupt ban on importation by the incumbent government, however, with the aid of agricultural NGOs, it would create a sturdy and thriving structure. A readily available and conducive environment needs to be at the disposal of both the young and old. The youth are the strength of a nation’s success. They are the epitome of a country’s power and ability to generate food security through agriculture, an assurance that cannot be compromised before banning importation. The relationship between the government and aforementioned youth need be “glove in hand.” Sentiments of tribalism and marginalisation need to be entirely eradicated before the government can gain total support from its citizens and achieve her goal. I believe that there are young people who have the passion to go into the industry. All they desire is a guarantee of solid agricultural training, on best practices, subsidised tools and technology for high scale farming projects. A return on investment for the nation would be surplus produce sold nationally and internationally for export. The long term goal of such a concept would be job creation, reduction of crime rate and a sustainable economy.
On the other hand, there are quite a number of NGOs present in Nigeria currently partnering to improve these agricultural pursuits. These organisations have been around for a long time, but the apparent question remains, why no obvious results and deliverables? Could it be that the citizens do not accept their practices, or are there some power plays behind the veil? Most times the organisations and the NGOs that support them are seen dancing to different tunes of music, thereby making the main objective of the organisation or NGO as the case may be, unachievable. In Dorothea Hilhorst’s book “The Real World of NGOs”, she pointed out: “Because of the asymmetry between givers and receivers,” Stirrat and Henkel point out that partnership should not be understood as legal partnership but more as the partnership of marriage, “…the relationship is as much a site of struggle as a cause of harmony.” Whatever the case may be, there is need to strike a balance for restoration.
Nigeria, with more than half of her populace being the youth with over 60 million hectares of uncultivated land, I see great possibilities. Channels if properly utilised will bring about the change this current regime has promised.
Key decisions on nature conservation and sustainable development are expected at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Conservation Congress 2016 in September, after the motions to be debated and voted upon were published.
Hawaii, the 50th and most recent state of the United States of America, is hosting the IUCN’s World Conservation Congress 2016 in September
Held every four years, the 2016 IUCN Congress will be the largest gathering of environmental policy makers since the Paris Climate Agreement and the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals, and presents a major opportunity to start putting these deals into action.
This year’s IUCN Congress motions are indicative of current trends and priorities for conservation, sustainability and the environment. The six key motions primarily identified for debate in Hawai‘i deal with protected areas, natural capital, biodiversity offsets, ocean governance, oil palm expansion and ecotourism. Over 8,000 delegates representing governments, business, the scientific community, NGOs and Indigenous peoples from more than 160 countries will discuss the issues outlined in the motions.
The IUCN Congress will decide and trigger action on a total of around a hundred motions, on issues ranging from closing domestic markets for ivory trade to protecting wild bats from culling programmes, phasing out the use of lead in ammunition or strengthening the role of Indigenous peoples in combating illegal wildlife trade.
An IUCN policy on natural capital, which deals with the value of ‘ecosystem services’ such as water, food, climate mitigation and natural flood defences, is an expected outcome, as is an IUCN policy on biodiversity offsets – actions that compensate for biodiversity losses caused by development projects. The draft decision on ocean governance calls for a legally binding instrument for the conservation of marine biological diversity in the high seas, which account for two-thirds of the world’s oceans.
IUCN Congresses have led the way on thinking in conservation since 1948, flagging climate change as an issue of concern as early as 1960, for instance. Past IUCN Congress motions and the resulting resolutions have been key to developing landmark treaties such as the UNESCO World Heritage Convention, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CDB).
Report on institutions worth $38 trillion finds growth in low carbon investment and support for climate resolutions but little progress on stranded asset risk
AODP CEO Julian Poulter
Climate change is rapidly moving up the agenda for the world’s biggest investors as pension funds and insurers recognise the need for action to protect the savings and financial security of hundreds of millions of people, reveals the annual benchmark report on the industry from the Asset Owners Disclosure Project (AODP).
A fifth (97) of the world’s 500 biggest investors with $US9.4 trillion in funds are taking tangible action to mitigate climate change risk and last year saw a big rise in support for shareholder resolutions and low carbon investment, according to the fourth Global Climate 500 Index. Another 157 worth $14 trillion are taking the first steps.
But very few investors are acting on warnings from Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England and chairman of the international Financial Stability Board, that climate action could leave fossil fuel and other high-carbon investments as worthless stranded assets, and 246 investors with $14.3 trillion in funds are ignoring climate risk completely.
AODP CEO Julian Poulter said: “Climate change risk is now a mainstream issue for institutional investors and last year has seen many significantly step up their action to manage this. However, only a handful are protecting their portfolios from the very real danger of stranded assets, and it is shocking that nearly half the world’s biggest investors are doing nothing at all to mitigate climate risk. Pensions funds and insurers that ignore climate change are gambling with the savings and financial security of hundreds of millions of people around the world and risking another financial crisis.”
The independent non-profit AODP rates the world’s 500 biggest investors – pension funds, insurers, sovereign wealth funds, foundations and endowments with $38 trillion of assets under management (AUM) – on their success at managing climate risk within their portfolios, based on direct disclosures and publicly available information. They are graded from AAA to D while those taking no action are rated X.
Investors that recognise climate risk are taking significantly more action than last year, the report reveals. The leaders, rated A to AAA, have grown 29% from 24 to 31 investors with $2.7 trillion AUM. On average, these 12 AAA-rated institutions have outperformed the benchmark return over five years, demonstrating that climate risk can be managed without sacrificing returns.
But the biggest increase has been in asset owners still developing their climate risk strategy, with a 52% rise in those rated C to CCC, from 27 to 41 with $3.4 trillion AUM. There are now 97 investors rated C or above with $9.4 trillion AUM, up from 77, while the D group taking least action has shrunk from 191 to 157 with $14 trillion AUM. However, the number of X-rated laggards has grown from 232 in 2015 to 246 with $14.3 trillion AUM.
Three key strategies for managing climate risk
The Global Climate 500 Index is the world standard for assessing the success of asset owners at managing climate risk. It evaluates them on three approaches: tackling risks associated with high-carbon assets in their portfolios; engaging with the companies they own and with stakeholders throughout the investment chain to reduce climate risk; and investing in low-carbon assets. This year AODP has raised the bar, requiring evidence of tangible action and no longer scores purely for transparency or commitments.
Risk management
10% of asset owners and 74% of the leaders group (rated A to AAA) are measuring carbon in their portfolios, up from 7% and 67% last year. However, only 2% of asset owners have declared a target for reducing portfolio carbon next year.
Just 5% of asset owners and only half the leaders disclose that they are measuring the impact that stranded assets may have on their investments – although this is an improvement on the 3% last year. This indicates that more complex risk management activities are often the last to be implemented.
Engagement
13% of asset owners and 97% of leaders now have staff dedicated to integrating climate risk management into the investment process, up from 9% and 79% last year.
Support for shareholder resolutions on climate change has grown strongly, with 12% of investors voting in favour of at least one, compared with 7% last year. Among leaders support grew from 67% to 84%.
Low Carbon Investment
Low carbon investment grew 63% from $85 billion to $138 billion. General lack of disclosure and difficulties defining low carbon assets mean this is likely to be an underestimate but funds are working to define this better for next year.
The Netherlands is the most active country by far with $39 billion invested in low carbon, 3.4% of AUM. The UK’s Environment Agency Pension Fund has 26% of its portfolio in low carbon assets, the highest in the index.
Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England and chairman of the international Financial Stability Board, has warned that climate change action could make huge reserves of coal, oil and gas unburnable stranded assets threatening investors with huge losses and destabilising markets. The FSB has set up a task force to recommend how Asset Owners the companies they invest in and other financial intermediaries should report the potential impact of climate change on their bottom line.
Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said: “The Paris Agreement has set out the path, direction and ultimate destination for the global economy. Increasing numbers of asset owners understand this and more are coming to that realization. I would encourage all of them to pick up the pace and ramp up their ambition in respect to a low carbon transition—it is the key to reducing risk and securing the health of their portfolios now and over the long term”.
Investors and countries leading on climate risk management
The $4 billion Environment Agency Pension Fund tops the Global Climate 500 Index closely followed by Australia’s $7.1 billion Local Government Super, each coming top or second in all three categories and proving that size is no barrier to managing climate risk.
Other leaders include giant institutions which have been active in campaigning for climate action, $391 billion Dutch pension fund ABP and the $301 billion California Public Employees Retirement System, both rated AAA, and UK insurer Aviva with $445 billion of assets, rated A. Frances’s £180 billion Caisse des Dépôts has jumped from a CC rating to a AA, while and $51 billion Swedish pension fund AMF and the UK’s $26 billion Greater Manchester Pension Fund are both up from D to A.
Scandinavian asset owners are taking the most action to manage climate risk. Sweden tops the Country Index, followed by Norway, and Denmark comes fifth. France, where the Paris Climate Summit brought climate risk into sharp focus, takes fourth place with three funds in the top 20 for the first time.
Pension funds account for nearly two thirds of the index (322) and insurers nearly a quarter (118). However, only four of the seven countries that dominate the global pensions market make the top ten in the Country Index. Australia (3rd), the Netherlands (6th), UK (7th) and the US (9th), which are all well represented in the leadership group of institutions rated A to AAA. Canada ranks 11th, Switzerland 14th and Japan 25th.
Japan’s Government Pension Investment Fund, the world’s largest asset owner worth $1.2 trillion, is rated D, up from X last year. It has committed to taking environmental, social and governance factors into account in its investments and has started asking its asset managers what they are doing to promote better behaviour in the companies it owns.
Julian Poulter said: “Asset owners in Japan and Switzerland have shown no leadership on climate change and are putting their members and clients at risk. It is the countries with more transparent financial systems where asset owners are more accountable to their members where we are seeing most action.
“This makes it significant that GPIF, the world’s largest asset owner, has taken the first step on the journey to protecting millions of Japanese pension holders from the risks of climate change. We look forward to further action and we hope it will send a signal to a market which has been ignoring the issue for far too long.”
The World Bank has been a leading voice warning about climate risk and high carbon investment, but the report reveals that its $17 billion Group Staff Retirement fund is not translating this into strong action. It is rated D, up from X in 2015. By contrast the UN’s $52 billion Joint Staff Pension Fund is up from A to AA.
The 10 biggest X-rated funds, worth a total $4.9 trillion, include sovereign wealth funds in the oil states of Abu Dhabi, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Qatar as well as China and Hong Kong, insurance companies China Life, Japan Post and Zenkyoren of Japan, and the US pension fund, Thrift Savings Plan.
A week after more than 170 countries signed the Paris Agreement and investors voted on a shareholder climate risk resolution at the AGM of US utility AES Corporation, a global network of more than 270 institutional investors (representing assets worth over €20 trillion) has published a guide setting out the threats facing the utilities sector and investor expectations for how these companies must act to adapt their business strategies to a 2°C climate change pathway.
Stephanie Pfeifer, CEO of the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change
Launching “Investor Expectations of Electric Utilities Companies – Looking down the line at carbon asset risk,” Stephanie Pfeifer, CEO at the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change, said on Friday: “With so many countries now clearly committed to implementing the Paris Agreement, institutional investors are concerned that some electric utility companies are not sufficiently prepared for the transition to a lower carbon economy necessary to limit global warming to well below 2°C. Today the global investor community is setting out as clearly as possible their expectations for utility companies on actions required to address climate change risks.”
Matthias Narr, Engagement Specialist at asset manager Robeco and lead author of the guide, added: “This guidance is designed to shape constructive engagement between investors and electric utilities through dialogue on the long-term risks and opportunities these companies face from climate change. Investors need to understand whether utility companies are prepared for the changing market dynamics that are likely to arise from the policies and actions put in place to limit global warming. Business strategy and capital allocation decisions made now and over the coming years will determine the future sustainability and profitability of electric utilities for decades ahead. Investors therefore have a clear need to establish that capital allocation decisions made by the boards of these utilities give due weight to the low carbon transition in ways that will protect both future sustainability and corporate profitability of the sector.”
Dan Bakal, Director of the Electric Power Program at Ceres, said: “During the 2016 proxy season investors are showing unequivocally through shareholder resolutions to companies such as AES that they expect electric power companies to address carbon asset risk by assessing the impact of a 2°C scenario on their future resilience. Going forward, asset owners and fund managers will need to know how power companies – and particularly the boards accountable for overseeing them – see the future impact of climate change on energy demand and pricing, as well as how they plan to align their business model with the GHG reductions required to deliver binding international agreements.”
In addition to questions about policy, technology and demand changes, the guide also encourages investors to ask utility companies about the management of legacy assets, including power generation plants that are no longer economical to use either due to a shift away from fossil fuels or as a consequence of increased water scarcity.
Commenting further Emma Herd, CEO at IGCC Australia and New Zealand, added: “These risks are not theoretical, they are today’s reality for utility companies and their investors across all markets. Climate change is already driving structural transformation in the energy sector. The risks and opportunities created by the transition to a net zero carbon global economy will continue to grow and the pace of change accelerate. It is vital that utility companies undertake comprehensive <2°C stress testing of their business activities and disclose to investors how their business model will fare in the face of climate change.”
A reduction in the amount of oxygen dissolved in the oceans due to climate change is already discernible in some parts of the world and should be evident across large regions of the oceans between 2030 and 2040, according to a new study led by the National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).
Deoxgenation due to climate change is already detectable in some parts of the ocean. New research from NCAR finds that it will likely become widespread between 2030 and 2040. Other parts of the ocean, shown in gray, will not have detectable loss of oxygen due to climate change even by 2100. Image credit: Matthew Long, NCAR
Scientists know that a warming climate can be expected to gradually sap the ocean of oxygen, leaving fish, crabs, squid, sea stars, and other marine life struggling to breathe. But it’s been difficult to determine whether this anticipated oxygen drain is already having a noticeable impact.
“Loss of oxygen in the ocean is one of the serious side effects of a warming atmosphere, and a major threat to marine life,” said NCAR scientist Matthew Long, lead author of the study. “Since oxygen concentrations in the ocean naturally vary depending on variations in winds and temperature at the surface, it’s been challenging to attribute any deoxygenation to climate change. This new study tells us when we can expect the impact from climate change to overwhelm the natural variability.”
Cutting through the natural variability
The entire ocean – from the depths to the shallows – gets its oxygen supply from the surface, either directly from the atmosphere or from phytoplankton, which release oxygen into the water through photosynthesis.
Warming surface waters, however, absorb less oxygen. And in a double whammy, the oxygen that is absorbed has a more difficult time traveling deeper into the ocean. That’s because as water heats up, it expands, becoming lighter than the water below it and less likely to sink.
Thanks to natural warming and cooling, oxygen concentrations at the sea surface are constantly changing – and those changes can linger for years or even decades deeper in the ocean.
For example, an exceptionally cold winter in the North Pacific would allow the ocean surface to soak up a large amount of oxygen. Thanks to the natural circulation pattern, that oxygen would then be carried deeper into the ocean interior, where it might still be detectable years later as it travels along its flow path. On the flip side, unusually hot weather could lead to natural “dead zones” in the ocean, where fish and other marine life cannot survive.
To cut through this natural variability and investigate the impact of climate change, the research team – including Curtis Deutsch of the University of Washington and Taka Ito of Georgia Tech – relied on the NCAR-based Community Earth System Model, which is funded by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy.
The scientists used output from a project that ran the model more than two dozen times for the years 1920 to 2100 on the Yellowstone supercomputer, which is operated by NCAR. Each individual run was started with miniscule variations in air temperature. As the model runs progressed, those tiny differences grew and expanded, producing a set of climate simulations useful for studying questions about variability and change.
Using the simulations to study dissolved oxygen gave the researchers guidance on how much concentrations may have varied naturally in the past. With this information, they could determine when ocean deoxygenation due to climate change is likely to become more severe than at any point in the modelled historic range.
The research team found that deoxygenation caused by climate change could already be detected in the southern Indian Ocean and parts of the eastern tropical Pacific and Atlantic basins. They also determined that more widespread detection of deoxygenation caused by climate change would be possible between 2030 and 2040. However, in some parts of the ocean, including areas off the east coasts of Africa, Australia, and Southeast Asia, deoxygenation caused by climate change was not evident even by 2100.
Picking out a global pattern
The researchers also created a visual way to distinguish between deoxygenation caused by natural processes and deoxygenation caused by climate change.
Using the same model dataset, the scientists created maps of oxygen levels in the ocean, showing which waters were oxygen-rich at the same time that others were oxygen-poor. They found they could distinguish between oxygenation patterns caused by natural weather phenomena and the pattern caused by climate change.
The pattern caused by climate change also became evident in the model runs around 2030, adding confidence to the conclusion that widespread deoxygenation due to climate change will become detectable around that time.
The maps could also be useful resources for deciding where to place instruments to monitor ocean oxygen levels in the future to get the best picture of climate change impacts. Currently ocean oxygen measurements are relatively sparse.
“We need comprehensive and sustained observations of what’s going on in the ocean to compare with what we’re learning from our models and to understand the full impact of a changing climate,” Long said.
Two more countries have signed the Paris Climate Change Agreement, bringing the total number of signatories to 177 Parties (176 countries and the European Union) since the agreement was opened for signature at a high-level ceremony in New York on 22 April 2016. The two new signatories are Seychelles, who signed on 25 April 2016, and The Gambia who signed on 26 April 2016.
The Gambia’s low line coastal areas are vulnerable to climate change impact including sea level rise and flooding
The number of States that have deposited their instruments of ratification remains 15: Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Somalia, State of Palestine, Barbados, Belize, Fiji, Grenada, Saint Kitts & Nevis, Samoa, Tuvalu, Maldives, Saint Lucia, and Mauritius.
Nigeria has neither signed the international treaty nor deposited an instrument of ratification to that effect.
The Paris Agreement will enter into force on the 30th day after the date on which at least 55 Parties to the Convention accounting in total for at least an estimated 55% of total global greenhouse gas emissions have deposited their instruments of ratification, acceptance, approval or accession with the Depositary in New York.
