Africa should adapt to climate change effects

A statement issued by the acting Director of Presidential Communications said that the head of state is also expected to meet with her counterparts from different countries for bilateral talks.

She is also expected to meet with heads of institutions, organisations and business people for the sake of enhancing the cooperation and relationship between Tanzania and the international communities.

The COP26 summit  brings parties together to accelerate action towards the goals of the Paris Agreement and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Last Thursday, President Samia attended a virtual meeting on a just ended climate transition organised by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change.

During the meeting, participants are expected to  discuss  different issues on climate change as well as challenges on implementation of the development agenda in Africa.

Contemporary climate change includes both global warming caused by humans and its impacts on Earth's weather patterns. There have been previous periods of climate change, but the current changes are more rapid than any known events in Earth's history.  The main cause is the emission of greenhouse gases, mostly carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane. Burning fossil fuels for energy use creates most of these emissions. Agriculture, steel making, cement production, and forest loss are also significant sources.[3] Temperature rise is also affected by climate feedbacks such as the loss of sunlight-reflecting snow cover, and the release of carbon dioxide from drought-stricken forests. Collectively, these amplify global warming.

The global center on adaptation says climate change will push 120 million people into extreme poverty by 2030, and a third of them will be Africans if nothing is done to mitigate its effects. The findings are in the center’s report on Africa released recently.

Releasing the report looking at present-day and future climate change risks in Africa, the head of the Global Centre on Adaptation, Patrick Verkooijen, says the climate crisis may create millions of poor people on the continent.

“In fact, worldwide climate change, if unchecked, will push 122 million new people into extreme poverty by 2030, of these in sub-Saharan Africa alone, 43 million new poor people pushed into poverty by climate change, and even if development is rapid and inclusive up to 12 million people in Africa could be pushed into poverty in this time due to climate change alone," said Verkooijen.

The Netherlands-based organisation that works on climate adaptation solutions around the globe said Africa’s failure to adapt to the recurrent climate shocks will also increase the cost of borrowing, reducing investment opportunities for its people.

According to the Africa Development Bank (AFDB), the continent needs $7- $15 billion a year to create adaptation programmes. Akinwumi Adesina, the Africa Development Bank president, says it is making $25 billion available to scale up climate change adaptation actions and drive investment in green growth.

“We will scale up access to climate-smart digital technologies and associated data-driven agricultural and financial services to at least 30 million farmers in Africa,” said Adesina. “Infrastructure, we will ensure that the climate risk and resilience are integrated into at least 50 percent of the total value of new infrastructure investment in Africa across all infrastructure sectors.”

The AFDB said it will invest $8 billion to create sustainable jobs for Africa’s youth and innovative financial initiatives that help increase financial flows for adaptation and resilience.

Kenya’s President, Uhuru Kenyatta, addressing the gathering online, said his government is ready to handle the adverse effect of climate change.

“To implement our nationally determined contributions, we plan to invest approximately $8 billion over the next ten years,” said Kenyatta. “This is just 10 per cent of the total investment needed of the NDC’s and we, therefore, need support from our international partners.”

Verkooijen says, apart from the effort to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees, investing in communication tools, water and health can help Africa.

 High-level officials and heads of state from around the world were scheduled to meet in Glasgow, Scotland on Sunday for the COP26 climate summit, and to accelerate action toward the goals of the 2019 Paris Agreement meant to limit global warming.