With 20 sitting heads of States, several past presidents and heads of government, and many high-level dignitaries attending the Africa Climate Summit that ended in Nairobi on Wednesday, the jamboree delivered on the promise of power talk and glitz, but left many pro-Africa climate activists wringing their hands in frustration. The concluding statement was neither rigorous enough in tone nor focused sufficiently on Africa’s climate pain.
Those who were left unhappy waste their emotion because these conferences are never intended to be anything different from what this was. It gave opportunity to African presidents to lament about their national climate realities and demand support from the climate polluters (rich nations) to start fixing the problem.
UN agencies, NGOs and lobby groups got another chance to revisit the Armageddon scenarios we shall confront in another decade or so unless we robustly mitigate global warming and remind the rich countries of unmet commitments they made at past COP meetings.
Plenteous information was shared by well-intentioned and well-funded technocrats about what is really happening to the world in this climate change space, and even some reassuring case studies of innovative initiatives that can be scaled up to score real impact.
The occasions are also one more opportunity for the US, China and their respective allies to police the proceedings to ensure that no commitments are endorsed that bind them to meet their pledges to raise $100 billion to the Global Climate Fund and/or stop greenhouse emissions that are the real environmental polluters. So far, the fund has achieved less than $13 billion and industries in the offending countries continue to belch out poison into the atmosphere.
In Nairobi, Africa got its say but these interests had their way. That is why the concluding statements emphasise on the vague and hard to realise concepts like trading in carbon credits that do not stop dangerous emissions. The statement was vague on what Africa’s critical concerns on climate reparations should be: “real debt cancellations (not debt restructuring), transfer of technology (not imported green tech), extending grants (not loans) for adaptation and economic resilience, and transformation of the global trade, finance and investment architecture”.
These are the issues that would address both the immediate need of funding, and also avoid further damage on the environment, and also the systemic forces that ultimately undermine Africa’s ability to build food resilience and feed its people sustainably and exploit its natural resources and earn equitable returns.
The energy and flights now head to the COP28 Summit in Dubai from November 30 where the cycle will be repeated until a Covid-like catastrophe happens to trigger a knee-jerk response. Climate change has taken decades to get to this level, it will take decades to reverse.
But there are small steps that countries must continue to take individually to protect their environments. National and sub-national governments must continue implementing their national environmental policies. From incentivising the private sector to reduce or stop environment-harming processes, to planting more trees, there is plenty to be done.
President William Ruto, for instance, plans to plant 15 billion trees by 2032, a target that has been embraced by everyone, not least the county governments that have a key role to play right from the ward level where government authority meets grassroots activities.
Looking at some numbers that the Council of Governors shared recently, there is a lot of ground to cover and very little time to execute. As of mid-this year, only 22 counties out of 47 had enacted forestry related Acts, policies and regulations. They had established only 100,822 tree nurseries and had collectively planted 7,336,5488 trees.
Only 34 of them had enacted water-related regulations, and even fewer (24 counties) had developed County Water Master Plans. On the positive side, 45 had enacted Climate Change-related Acts, policies and regulations, had conducted climate resilience assessments and had developed comprehensive climate change actions plans.
This example demonstrates that African countries can do a lot with the resources they can harness and respond to climate change hazards. The big money, when it comes, should find them well on the way in this deadly relay to subdue the negative impacts of climate change.
The writer, a former Chief Editor of the Nation Group, is now consulting. [email protected] ; @TMshindi
