As thousands of Africans arrive in Europe every month, often risking their lives aboard shaky boats to get to a better life, lack of access to energy could be one of the reasons for their exodus.

Africa’s poverty challenges are well documented. In recent years there has been much discourse around how climate change worsens these challenges and could reverse the continent’s economic fortunes.

Lack of access to energy, for example has been mentioned here at COP 21 as one of the reasons why Africa’s young people leave the continent in search of opportunities, mostly in Europe.

While the International Organisation for Migration outlines that the linkages between human mobility and climate impacts are highly complex, it is critical to point out that, in most situations, people choose or are forced to migrate due to a number of factors and climate change could be the primary one or the key to many secondary factors.

Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank agrees with this reasoning by highlighting lack of electricity in Africa as a reason for young Africans’ mass movement to Europe.

“Droughts all across Africa, the Sahel is burning, Lake Chad is dried-up, livelihoods are devastated, young people across Africa are jumping on boats, jumping to go to Europe because there are no economic opportunities,” Dr. Adesina told IPS at the COP 21 talks in Paris, France.

He says Africa’s lack of access to electricity is stopping the continent’s industrialization, costing Africa up to 4 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

“Africa has no electricity. And therefore, industrialization is not happening, the small and medium enterprises are not functioning at their full capacity. As a result, Africa today loses 3 to 4 per cent of its GDP for lack of electricity,” he said.

Linking his argument to migration, the AfDB President believes lighting-up Africa could transform the continent’s economic fortunes thereby according young people massive opportunities within their own countries.

“It’s also linked to migration by the way…if you turned off this light and it is dark, and you go to an area where there is light, even insects move from where there is dark to where there is light.

“So by lighting up and powering Africa, our young people will be staying on the continent because they can use electricity to do many things. Nobody works in the dark and succeeds, you walk in the dark you always stumble, you fall, that’s why we must light up and power Africa,” he said of the Africa Renewable Energy Initiative which was launched at the COP 21 talks, targeting 10 gigawatts in the next five years and 300 gigawatts by 2030.

This massive initiative dubbed Africa’s commitment to an ambitious outcome of the COP 21 climate deal will require billions of dollars to materialize.

Juxtaposing Europe’s migrant crisis that is set to cost as much as 5 billion dollars, and the cost of climate financing for Africa, there could be an opportunity for longer term investment in Europe addressing the migrant problem at its source.

Niclas Hällström, Director of What Next, a Swedish think-tank, says the renewable energy initiative provides an opportunity for Europe to make serious investments in its own interest.

“It is a moral imperative for developed countries to support Africa’s climate adaptation, but it is also in their interest.

“Take the newly launched Africa Renewable Energy Initiative. This bold effort by African countries is set to reach universal access for all Africans by latest 2030…It requires billions of dollars in climate finance, but will create jobs and enhanced well-being for people across the whole continent. Apart from the need to handle the refugee situations acutely, this is the best longer-term action one can think of,” said Hällström.

Climate finance has remained a sticking point in the climate negotiations for years. With few days to go before the end of COP 21, the trend has not changed much.

Dan Bodansky, Foundation Professor of Law and Faculty, Co-Director of the Center for Law and Global Affairs at the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, shares insights on day 8 of the negotiations.

“Of the ‘crunch issues,’ finance is the most difficult…unlike the other issues, it may not be possible to paper over through artful wording, although the use of terms like “should” and “strive” may provide a middle ground,” he said, pointing out that the negotiating text that emerged from the ADP over the weekend still has many other brackets and options.

As negotiations enter the final frenzy hours with the text expected on Day 9, the African Group of Negotiators and other key stakeholders’ anxiety is reaching tipping points.

“The present reality at the conference confirms that countries have spent the first week restating their old positions leaving most of the key debates unresolved,” said Sam Ogallah of the Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), calling on Ministers to urgently inject energy into the process for a fair deal that would reflect the principle of Common But Differentiated Responsibility-CBDR and addresses the issues of loss and damage, finance for adaptation and mitigation and keeping the global warming well below 1.5 Celsius.

In adding impetus to the climate change and migration nexus, a report released by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) at the COP 21 Talks, accuses world’s top media of failing to identify climate change as a contributor to some of the world’s biggest crises, including migration, food insecurity and conflict.

IFAD President, Kanayo Nwanze, said “If the world becomes aware of how climate change threatens our food security or why it is a catalyst for migration and conflict, then we can expect better support for policies and investments that can pre-empt future crises.”

Will developed countries at COP 21 recognise this argument? The world will know in a matter of hours.

(End)

A famous saying goes: To whom much is given, much is expected. This is the message that the African Development Bank (AfDB) is carrying and delivering for, and on behalf of Africa at the global conference on climate change, COP21, which opened Monday, 30th November.

“All fingers are not equal. Those who pollute more should do more in saving our planet,” said AfDB President, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, who is leading his bank’s team at the climate change conference in Paris.

Adesina, a former Minister of Agriculture in Nigeria, knows what climate change has done and what its implications are for Africa’s agricultural development if nothing is done to halt global warming.

“The danger that Africa will not be able to feed itself is a real one. And if we don’t have resources to adapt to climate change, Africa will not be able to unlock potential in agriculture,” said Adesina, highlighting the implications of climate change variability on Africa’s agricultural transformation agenda.

He says the bank’s message at the COP 21 was clear: a new climate deal that does not work for Africa is no deal at all.

According to Dr. Adesina, the major and historic polluters must take a fair share of responsibility not only to cut their emissions but also help the suffering adapt to climate impacts.

The AfDB’s stance resonates with a long standing position of the African Group of Negotiators (AGN)which has been pushing for a common but differentiated principle demanding historic emitters to cut emissions to keep warming below 1.5 degrees celsius and provide funding for adaptation for vulnerable countries, most of which are in Africa.

With impacts ranging from droughts and floods affecting agricultural production and water availability in the southern and Sahel regions of Africa, to shrinking rivers, a classic example being Lake Chad, African countries are hoping for a climate deal that would address these challenges both in the short and long term.

“Adaptation as you know is key for Africa but this time we are demanding a high level of adaptation equal to mitigation because we know that the two are closely linked,” Chair of the African Group of Negotiators Nagmeldin Elhassan told a high level panel discussion at the on-going climate talks in Paris.

Nagmeldin said African heads of state are expecting nothing short of a fair and just deal for the continent, a victim of circumstances it never caused.

He said adaptation would be a key issue at the COP 21 negotiating table for Africa as over the years, the African Group of Negotiators has been seeking for parity between mitigation, adaptation and provisions for enhancing means of implementation, noting the increased burden for adaptation in developing countries.

“When we speak adaptation, we link it to means of implementation as a way of getting developed countries involved to provide support,” the AGN chair said.

And the African Union Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture, Rhoda Peace Tumutsime puts it categorically that, “Unless we get a good deal here, that will help with the right technology, we will not be able to modernize and transform agriculture.”

The question of means of implementation is a critical component of this year’s COP. According the African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa-(UNECA), climate change could stimulate developing economies into adapting sustainable development paths, through entrepreneurial opportunities, and spaces for policy makers to address equity concerns in gender and youth policies.

Dr. Carlos Lopez of UNECA argues Africa’s possible positive outcome from danger. “Despite all the negative news that is reported about Africa, there are opportunities that we can take advantage of. It is very important to get the perceptions right about Africa’s challenges and available opportunities. In all the bad news are potential areas for growth,” he said.

Dr Lopez said Africa has a massive advantage to develop differently by embracing the opportunities that climate change offers to develop sustainably.

“It is also important for us to realize that we are not going to make it using the same carbon intensive model…let’s take for example, under the 2063 agenda we have to create 122 million jobs. Following the carbon path, we will only create 54 million jobs, but what about the deficit?” he asked.

Citing various examples of opportunities among which is renewable energy owing to Africa’s natural potential of solar, the UNECA Chief is more than convinced that the continent should be part of the solution and “achieve industrialization which is cleaner, greener, without following the carbon model.”

However, the question of resources still remains. Will the climate deal offer Africa this opportunity? The next week or so will decide what and which way forward.

(End)

Recurring droughts have destroyed most harvests in the Sahel. Credit:Kristin Palitza/IPS

By Brendon Bosworth
JOHANNESBURG, Sep 21 2014 (IPS)

It is a critical time for international climate change negotiations. By December 2015, world leaders are due to decide on an international climate change agreement covering all countries that will take effect in 2020. 

Going into the upcoming United Nations negotiations — the December COP 20 talks in Lima, Peru, where the agreement will be drafted, and the pivotal COP 21 next year in Paris, France, where it is due to be signed — African climate change negotiators are driving for leaders to up their commitment to climate change adaptation.

“No matter what we do, we are at a stage where we need to adapt. Adaptation should be at the centre of the deal in Paris,” South Africa’s director of international climate change, Maesela Kekana, a negotiator with the African Group of Negotiators, told IPS. “If we do not get adaptation, then it means Africa would not have got anything since the beginning.”

The African Group has proposed that a global adaptation goal should be part of the 2015 agreement.

Africa is one of the continents most vulnerable to climate change. As the world continues to warm it is likely that land temperatures in Africa will rise quicker than the global average, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Climate change impacts would place added stress on already stretched water resources in parts of the continent and affect crop production. For instance, roughly 65 percent of maize-growing areas in Africa would experience yield losses for just one degree Celsius of warming, with impacts worsened by drought, according to a 2011 study published in the journal Nature Climate Change. 

Coastal areas run the risk of damage from sea level rise. In Tanzania, for example, it is estimated that with sea-level rise by 2030 as much of 7,624 square kilometres of land could be lost, with up to 1.6 million people at risk of being flooded, according to researchers from the University of Southampton.

Adapting to climate change will be costly. Developed nations have pledged to mobilise 100 billion dollars a year for climate action in developing countries by 2020.

“We want to disaggregate [the 100 billion dollars] and have an adaptation target or goal for supporting adaptation,” Mali’s Seyni Nafo, a lead negotiator with the African Group of Negotiators, told IPS.

While the group hasn’t yet decided on the specific amount, it wants to ensure funds are set aside for adaptation and mainly channeled through the Green Climate Fund, a United Nations fund set up to channel climate aid to developing countries, he explained.

In the past the majority of global climate finance has gone to funding mitigation measures. Of the 30 billion dollars developed countries gave to developing countries between 2010 and 2012 for climate change action just 21 percent went into adaptation, according to a 2012 Oxfam report.

The Green Climate Fund aims to split its funding 50: 50 for mitigation and adaptation.

Germany recently pledged one billion dollars to the fund, but other developed nations are yet to make large pledges.

“As one of my African colleagues says, ‘it’s still an empty vault,’” Matthew Stilwell, an adviser on climate change negotiations and policy with the Institute of Governance and Sustainable Development, told IPS. “Developed countries’ tendency is to withhold some of the money and offer the money as part of the quid pro quo in Paris as part of the negotiations.”

Mithika Mwenda, secretary general of civil society coalition the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance, welcomed the potential of the Green Climate Fund but remained sceptical.

“Based on the experience of the other existing funds, which are just shells, our fear is that we are going to have the Green Climate Fund going the way of the Adaptation Fund and the Least-Developed Countries Fund, and the others — we have celebrated them but eventually they end up a disappointment,” Mwenda told IPS.

As 2015 draws near, the urgency of dealing with human-induced climate change is becoming more apparent since the effects of climate change are already being seen.

“Higher seas, devastating heat waves, torrential rain and other climate extremes” are being felt around the world as a result of human-produced greenhouse gas emissions, says a leaked draft report from the U.N., The New York Times reported.

The report notes that continued emissions “will cause further warming and long-lasting changes in all components of the climate system, increasing the likelihood of severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts for people and ecosystems.”

While there are hopes for an ambitious 2015 climate agreement some civil society actors, frustrated with continued political wrangling over climate change, are not holding their breath.

“There are a lot of unfulfilled promises from the first COP to now,” Rajen Awotar, executive chairman of the nonprofit Mauritius Council for Development, Environmental Studies and Conservation, told IPS.

“The 2015 agreement: I bet we’ll see a very weakened agreement,” he said. “There will be no winner; everybody will be a loser. The biggest loser will be the climate.”

Edited by: Nalisha Adams