Continental Divide. How African can Reverse Climate Change Challenges.
Africa can easily be said to contribute the least of any continent to global warming.
Each year Africa produces an average of just over 1 metric ton of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide per person, according to a research.
While Africa as a whole contributes only 918.49 million metric tons (less than 4%). It is a cruel irony that, in many experts’ opinion, the people living on the continent that has contributed the least to global warming are in line to be the hardest hit by the resulting climate changes.
According to Siri Eriksen, a senior research fellow in sociology and human geography at the University of Oslo, The critical challenge in terms of climate change in Africa is the way that multiple stressor, such as the spread of HIV/AIDS, the effects of economic globalization, the privatization of resources, and conflict converge with climate change.
Another scholar, Anthony Nyong, a professor of environmental science at the University of Jos in Nigeria hold the opinion that climate change could undo even the little progress most African countries have achieved so far in terms of development.
To build a modern, inclusive economy, policymakers in sub-Saharan Africa have begun to focus on economic transformation, moving workers from low-productivity sectors like agriculture to higher-productivity areas like industry and the service sector, as well as increasing productivity growth within sectors. This is the typical path that advanced economies have taken in the past.
Africa’s transition to a new climate economy is underway in many places. The question is: Will developed countries create a tail-wind or a head-wind? How they answer this question will determine whether Africa is positioned to fully capitalize on this opportunity.
While it may not be polite to say so, African countries need money both to build a cleaner more prosperous future for themselves and to avoid the worst impacts of climate change created largely by others.
There is also the need for the continent to invest in greater voice and accountability that are essential to ensure government responds to people’s needs, in the fight against corruption and for more effective management of public budgets.
Intensifying agriculture to boost yields, combined with climate-smart farming techniques, can help boost farmers’ incomes, reduce environmental degradation and strengthen resilience to climate change, and this has not been given a major focus in the Africa.
We also need focused efforts to promote manufactured and tradable service exports through better logistics, special economic zones and other initiatives.
It is estimated that by 2050, sub-Saharan Africa’s cities will increase by almost 800 million people, nearly half of the projected rise in urban population globally.
A shift towards more compact, connected and coordinated cities will assist in creating a more productive, inclusive and clean urbanization. In addition, economic transformation in sub-Saharan Africa will require a large increase in energy supply.
Delivering the benefits of a new climate economy requires ambitious action across key economic systems, creating the conditions for the phase out of coal and rapid scale-up of renewables in the energy sector.
Also investing in shared, electric, and low-carbon transport in cities; scaling up sustainable food and land use systems, including forest landscape restoration; targeting investment to resilient water infrastructure; and reducing emissions from key industrial value chains, such as plastic.
Good policies that recognize the close links between economic, social and environmental priorities can unlock major benefits for the continent over the long run.
As Luther B Anakur, Regional Director, IUCN puts it, “Be the change that you really should be because the small things that you do matters.”
Chopped by
