In The News

A major conference highlights concerns about climate change impacts and the need for green energy – but low expectations for Paris.

n just three weeks, starting 30 November, negotiators from around the world will gather at the Paris Climate Change Conference, aiming to finalize a new global climate agreement. On 28–30 October in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, policy-makers and experts gathered at the fifth annual Climate Change and Development in Africa (CCDA) conference, “Africa, Climate Change and Sustainable Development:  What is at Stake at Paris and Beyond?”

SEI Senior Research Fellow Francis X. Johnson, who attended the conference with ESPA Fellow Anne Nyambane, offered his perspective on the discussions. Both are based in SEI’s Africa Centre in Nairobi.

VICTORIA FALLS, Zimbabwe (IDN) - Just as climate change has been getting popular in development discourse over the past two decades, so has been climate financing, which refers to local, national or transnational funding, drawn from public, private and/or alternative sources.

Climate finance is critical to addressing climate change because large-scale investments are required to significantly reduce emissions (mitigation), and for adaptation (coping with adverse effects).

The notion of Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) in the climate negotiations emerged in the Lima Call for Climate Action, as a lifeline to pause the accelerated increase in global temperature. While INDC is framed as a bottom-up approach intended to expand the action-base for emission reduction, it is however undermined by the intrinsic skewedness in the respective share of emissions currently accounted for by different countries, and the inverse distribution in emission intensity between the top and the bottom emission ranking to merit an interchange. This raises major questions of imbalance in the global pursuit for emission reduction while simultaneously curbing climate risk burden with adaptation.

Africa for example, was a major recipient of ‘benevolent’ support for the formulation of its INDC. For example 23 African countries received support for their INDCs from a single provider! This raised eyebrows in several quarters from where some of the following clarifications have been repeatedly demanded: Read more

À quelques semaines de la 21e Conférence des parties de la Convention-cadre des Nations unies sur les changements climatiques (COP21), la coordinatrice du Centre africain pour la politique en matière de climat, Fatima Denton revient sur trois enjeux cruciaux de l'accord de Paris.

Jeune Afrique : Les négociations actuelles permettront-elles d’obtenir les financements nécessaires à la lutte contre le changement climatique lors de la Cop21 ?

Fatima Denton : Lorsqu’on parle des finances climatiques, on évoque la responsabilité historique des pays industrialisés sur les émissions de gaz à effet de serre. La question sur les finances climatiques est l’une des plus complexes dans les négociations actuelles. Aucune architecture financière ne nous permet actuellement d’aborder tous les problèmes. Nous avons maintenant le fonds vert pour le climat [de l’ONU], doté de plus de 10 milliards de dollars, mais ce n’est pas suffisant. Read more...

Helena Wright, Saleemul Huq, Jonathan Reeves

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) will define the priorities of the UN’s development agenda beyond 2015. But the reality of climate change impacts will render these aspirational goals almost impossibly challenging for the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) unless the current level of ambition in development and climate action is urgently increased. This briefing summarises our analysis of the projected impacts of climate change on the ability of the LDCs to achieve each SDG, based on evidence primarily from the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. We go on to recommend policy pointers for the LDCs and their partners for the upcoming negotiations on the post-2015 agenda, financing for development, and a new climate change agreement.

More information on IIED site

Dr. Johnson Nkem discusses other possible development trajectories for Africa in response to climate change. This blog is part of a series of reflections in response to the upcoming 'Our Common Future Under Climate Change' conference in Paris.

Public dialogues across different stakeholder groups in Africa (such as civil society, youth groups), are generating deep reflections on what awaits the region, following a post Kyoto climate agreement in Paris later this year. At a side event organised by the African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC) during the 2015 AU-ECA Conference of Ministers of Finance and Economic Planning in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, there was an interesting discussion around this topic. Panelists and participants explored the importance of alternative development scenarios and perspectives needed by Africa, both intellectually and practically, to safeguard its interests. After all, there is no one road to being ‘climate smart’ in a development process. Read more...

Tondel, F., Knaepen, H., Wyk, L.-A. van 2015. Africa and Europe combatting climate change: Towards a common agenda in 2015. (Discussion Paper 177). Maastricht: ECDPM. Read more..

With only six months left, the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference in Paris (COP21) is fast approaching. Despite promising progress in recent years, the negotiations of a new agreement to keep the dangers of climate change at bay still face many technical and political hurdles, and are plagued with divisions among countries. Read More..

Malawi, March 2015 - Climate negotiators are discussing how to set a global goal for climate change adaptation. It's important for the negotiators learn from experiences and evidence gained at country level – so they can develop a goal that reflects differing national realities. Read More..

The objective of the scoping visit is to determine the demand for, and practicalities of, implementing the Tracking Adaptation and Measuring Development (TAMD) Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) framework to assess adaptation/development policy in Malawi. Read More..