ADDIS ABABA (PAMACC News) - The African Development Bank (AfDB) has expressed its commitment to sustaining and extending ongoing collaboration with African countries with a view to deepening partnerships and investments that help in addressing the impacts of climate change and variability.
 
Acting Vice President of the bank, Dr. Kapil Kapoor stated this at the opening plenary of the 6th conference on Climate Change and Development in Africa (CCDA-VI) holding in the Ethiopian capital city, Addis Ababa.
 
Recalling the Banks’ Climate Action Plan for the period 2011 -2015 which prioritised mitigation, adaptation and climate finance as key pillars, Dr. Kapoor stated that approximately 260 projects with climate relevant components were implemented and $12 billion was channeled as climate finance.
 
For the period 2016 -2020, Dr. Kapoor said AfDB will be even more ambitious.

The bank will explore modalities for achieving the adaptation goal, the adequacy and effectiveness of climate finance, capacity building and technology transfer — building technical skills so that African economies can realize their full potential for adaptation in high-technology sectors.
 
“Under this plan, the Bank will nearly triple its annual climate financing to reach $5 billion a year by 2020,” the AfDB Vice President declared.
 
The bank will further examine the implication of the Paris Agreement on Africa’s future economic growth and sustainable development agenda while pursuing agriculture initiatives that complement investment actions and commitments of African countries expressed as national determined contributions (NDCs).
 
The AfDB however called on African countries to identify viable and transformative investment opportunities, reform institutions to make them more efficient, and build capacity to access and absorb climate finance — in readiness to take advantage of the opportunities presented by the Paris agreement, to leapfrog technologies and transition to low-Carbon, Climate-resilient development.
 
Organised by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) in collaboration with ClimDev Partner organisations, the sixth Climate Change Development in Africa conference (CCDA VI) aims to facilitate science-policy dialogue and provide a marketplace for innovative solutions that integrate climate change into development processes.
 
With “The Paris Agreement on climate change: What next for Africa”as central theme, the CCDA-VI aspires to understand the implications, nuances, challenges and opportunities of implementing the Paris Agreement for Africa in the context of the continent’s development priorities.

The conference which ends on the 20th of October 2016 will examine the implications of the Paris Agreement for Africa’s future economic growth and sustainable development agenda; deepen an understanding of the nuances in the decisions of COP21, particularly with regard to the means of implementation (capacity, finance and technology transfer), as well as the domestication of the Agreement in Africa in alignment with the national development priorities of African countries; and identify strategies for implementing the Agreement especially through pan-African initiatives and institutions, public-private partnerships, and the engagement of State and non-State actors.

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (PAMACC News) - “The Paris Agreement is somewhat weak in terms of how African countries will attract the required investments to deal with the challenges of climate change…,”says James Murombedzi, Officer in Charge of the Africa Climate Policy Centre of the United Nations economic Commission for Africa (UNECA).

While heralded as a landmark global deal on climate change, there remains a feeling of impotence from the Africa group on certain nuances of the Agreement and its implications to the continent’s development agenda.

However, signing and ratifying the Agreement is not optional for Parties as it was universally agreed by the then 196 members to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change—UNFCCC, in Paris last year.

This therefore implies that whatever issues Africa has with the Agreement and its implications, would have to be dealt with at the negotiating table, and this is the point at which the Young African Lawyers (YAL) Programme becomes crucial.

Established under the ClimDev-Africa Programme, YAL has the overarching goal of strengthening Africa’s negotiating position and ensuring Africa gets the best at the UNFCCC processes.
 
“Signing and ratifying the Agreement is not optional for us as Africa,” says Natasha Banda, a young Legal Practitioner from Zambia, one of the mentees under the programme.
 
Being part of the legal advisory team for the Zambian negotiators through the UNFCCC country Focal point person, Banda believes ratifying the Agreement is not negotiable and the starting point “because the nature of international Agreements is that you cannot have bargaining power from outside,” and is certain that Zambia, which is yet to ratify, would do so once all necessary processes are complete.
 
In recognition of the importance of addressing the impacts of climate change comprehensively, and the unique roles and responsibilities of lawyers in the process, the Young African Lawyers (YAL) programme brings together young and motivated African lawyers in integrating climate change responses into Africa’s development agenda.
 
According to Dr. Johnson Nkem, Senior Climate Adaptation Expert with the Africa Climate Policy Centre, and Coordinator of the programme, YAL is a crucial component for Africa’s climate governance framework, especially now that the world is moving towards a greener, cleaner future, as espoused in the Paris Agreement.
 
“While providing essential legal support to the AGN, the YAL programme is an important foundation for developing a cadre of African lawyers who are fully engaged in wider climate change issues. Legal advice on low-carbon trading transactions, for example, or integrating climate change into Environmental Impact Assessments are going to be increasingly important as the world heads towards a greener, cleaner future. As Africa anchors itself firmly in this global transition, the YAL programme aims to nurture the legal skills that will be integral to this process,” Nkem explains.

As well as the immediate benefits of providing legal support at the climate negotiations, YAL has the longer-term goal of building the expertise of young lawyers, to be applied in broader aspects of climate change policy and law.
 
And Rachael Rwomushana, a Ugandan Lawyer, testifies to the positive impact that the programme has had on her and on the country’s engagement in the UNFCCC processes.
 
Uganda is one of the African countries that has ratified the Paris Agreement, and Rwomushana believes she played a positive role as a young lawyer working in the office of the Attorney General.
 
“Being involved in the this programme has enabled me to better understand the process and the guidance that I can give to my country and the African Group of Negotiators in the process,” she says, stressing that African countries should not look back on the Paris Agreement but work to strengthen their climate governance so that they get the best out of it.
 
Under the guidance of two seasoned lawyers experienced in Multilateral Environmental Agreements such as Dr. Seth Osafo, former senior legal adviser of the UNFCCC Secretariat, and Matthew Stilwell, a climate change expert and legal adviser to the African Group of Negotiators, the YAL programme could be Africa’s hope for better climate governance engagement in the years to come.

With the availability of additional resources and support, the programme plans to expand to other interested participants and legal institutions across Africa in developing the knowledge-base of legal experts on climate change issues.

SIAYA, Kenya (PAMACC News) – When an American investor arrived in Siaya County in 2003 with a promise of transforming thousands of hectares that form the Yala Swamp into an agricultural and fish production potential, Mary Abiero, a mother of five children from Yiro village knew that a new brighter day had come.

But today, the 63 years old widow is one of the 280 women camping at the foot of Mt. Kilimanjaro in Arusha, Tanzania, representing over one million women in Africa who have been oppressed, and denied the right to own property, in particular land. 38 of the women will climb the mountain to the top as a symbol of elevating women voices to the highest physical location in Africa.

When he started his investment, the American farmer who had already acquired the entire Yala Swamp from the government decided to increase the portion from the original 3,700 hectares to 6,900 hectares so as to have enough reservoir of water for irrigated rice farming.

And to do so, he offered to buy land from all the neighbouring households at a predetermined price, which some farmers accepted, but others including Abiero rejected. But despite the objections, he went ahead to release water, which covered all the demarcated area including Abiero’s 10 acre (4 ha) piece, submerging houses, thus driving everybody from their private properties regardless whether they sold it or not.

Today, despite a court ruling that was issued in favour of the residents, Abiero is among hundreds of residents who watch from afar as someone mint profits from what belongs to them.

“We have tried all we can, we have visited administration offices time and again, but nobody seems to be interested in our plight,” said Abiero. “It is in this regard, despite my age, I have volunteered to follow other women and shout from the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro for the world to listen,” she said.

In another scenario in Malindi, along Kenya’s coastal line in Kilifi County, the story is no different. In 2001 for example, Chadi Charo Mwaringa, also a widow from Kanagoni Gundasaga village arrived home one day to a devastating reality. Her house, where she had been living with her late husband and children for decades had been pulled down by a salt mining company, which had allegedly bought the place.

“I got married here 40 years ago, and you can be sure very few local resident own land title deeds,” said the 67 mother of three grown up children. Along the entire coastal strip covering hundreds of thousands hectares of land, people have always lived a communal lifestyle for ages. The land has always belonged to the community, and not to particular individuals.

As a result, private developers have taken advantage to process title deeds for chunks of land, and used the legal document to forcefully evict residents from their ancestral homes.

“Lack of legal documents for land ownership is now the biggest problem in this area,” said Katana Fondo Biria, former area councilor who has not been able to process the title deed for his land due to bureaucracies, despite having served as a politician for five years from 1992.

Part of his land, including an airstrip which used to serve guests coming to his former Giriama Village Hotel has been taken over by a salt mining company.

“There are several cases of this nature in this area,” said Sifa Edward, who works for Malindi Rights Forum, a community based organisation that engages humanitarian organisations in an effort to solve the land equation in Malindi.

According to Philip Kilonzo, of ActionAid International Kenya, millions of people particularly women in the country and the entire continent are suffering due to land based injustices.

“Some cases are cultural, some are due to corrupt and inefficient systems, and others are political,” said Kilonzo.

It was based on these reasons that ActionAid, in collaboration with several other civil society organisations all over Africa organised for the ‘Mt. Kilimanjaro initiative’ whose aims is to create space for rural women to be able to participate in decision making processes about issues dear to them.

With access to and control over land and natural resources as an entry point, four regional caravans have already departed simultaneously from the North, South, East and Western Africa regions. This will culminate into a mass African rural women’s assembly and a symbolic ascent by a delegation of women.

The women plan to proclaim a charter of principles and demands specifically on women’s access to and control over their land.

END