MARRAKECH, Morocco (PAMACC News) - The African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) has congratulated COP 21 President, Ségolène Royal for the success of last year’s climate conference which has culminated into momentum for action as Africa hosts COP 22. Speaking during a round table meeting when the French Minister visited and met Ambassadors and other senior delegates at the Africa Pavilion at COP 22, ACPC Officer in Charge, James Murombedzi said UNECA was hopeful that the implementation of the Paris Agreement would be inclusive. “As ACPC-UNECA, we are hopeful that the implementation of the Paris Agreement will be inclusive,” said Murombedzi, adding that Africa would like to see the issue of means of implementation resolved at COP 22. On its part, “ACPC is ready to support African countries in the revision of their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) most of which have been found to be defective,” he added. Murombedzi further highlighted the need for Africa to integrate climate in its mainstream development planning for a holistic approach. “We believe there is no room for isolated planning and it is for this reason that at ACPC, we have prioritised climate research to support African countries in integrated planning,” Murombedzi disclosed. With the eyes of the world on Marrakech, the African Group is hopeful that the unprecedented mobilisation of the international community and political will, which has culminated into the rapid entry into force of the Paris Agreement, would likewise be extended to implementation. The Agreement entered into force in time for COP 22, where the first Meeting ofthe Parties to the Agreement will open on 15 November, and parties are expected to agree on the rules of implementation of the Paris Agreement and establish a viable plan to provide financial support to developing countries to support climate action. On her part, Ms. Royal stressed the importance of climate justice, particularly for Africa. “Africa is the great challenge of this Conference,” she said. “COP 22 is an African COP, and that is where the priority and hopeare,” adding that in Africa, climate change is cruel and unfair as the continent suffers the most through no fault of its own. It is for this reason that an African development pathway that could propel climate-resilient economic growth is possible if an enabling environment that promotes innovation and collaborative actions for climate change solutions is put into place. And a number of African initiatives on collaborative research and capacity development were highlighted at a side event at the Africa Pavilion on Innovations and African collaborative approaches for transformative climate policy and solutions. Organized by the UNECA’s Africa Climate Policy Center (ACPC), the events included the Southern African Regional Universities Association (SARUA) Programme for Climate Change Capacity Development (PCCCD) and WASCAL (the West African Science Service Center on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use) The SARUA Programme for Climate Change Capacity Development (PCCCD), has led to a consortium of seven universities from five SADC countries developing a regional…

MARRAKECH, Morocco (PAMACC News) - Indigenous communities at the ongoing climate negotiations 22nd round of climate change negotiations in Marrakech, Morocco have demanded a direct access to the Green Climate Fund. The Fund, abbreviated as GCF, is a global initiative to respond to climate change by investing into low-emission and climate-resilient development. The initiative was established by 194 governments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions in developing countries, and to help adapt vulnerable societies to the unavoidable impacts of climate change. The indigenous groups, through their representatives at the Conference of Parties (COP 22) said that access to the climate finance will enable them to play a significant role in management of natural resources, which will go a long way to help them adapt to the impacts of climate change. Grace Balawang of Tebtebba, an indigenous peoples' organization based in Philippines said “indigenous people have been in direct contact with forests for a long time, have built indigenous knowledge system over the period and should therefore be supported to continue applying indigenous knowledge to protect the forests.” Tarcila Rivera Zea of CHIRAPAQ, Peru added that despite the indigenous peoples’ wealth of knowledge, they have been hard hit by the impacts of climate change. “We are the ones that suffer the consequences of climate change when droughts, floods, landslides and typhoons occur.” Ms Tarcila said. Through slides, she showed images of indigenous communities hit by drought and landslides. “Some medicinal plant resources useful to the indigenous communities have been lost and there have been limited efforts to recover them.” She continued. Ms Tarcila believes that if indigenous people get the necessary support, they will use their indigenous knowledge to create crops that are resistant to droughts, recover species that are facing extinction especially medicinal plant species important in their culture, improve and produce more environmentally friendly technology like the energy saving stoves that emit less smoke that has been part of their culture for a while. However, the challenge standing between the communities and the necessary climate action is lack of financial muscle. Stanley Ole Kimaren, Executive Director of Indigenous Livelihoods Partnerships, Kenya (ILEPA), said that though pastoralist groups like the Maasai have proven that there is an indigenous science behind the enhanced livelihood systems, there has not been sufficient support towards their initiatives. “What we need is funding and capacity building support to engage more robustly in climate action and livelihood enhancement.” He said. One of the funding sources eyed by the indigenous communities is the Green Climate Fund. However, a number of hurdles hinder their access to the fund meant for adaptation and building of climate resilience among vulnerable communities. “The GCF instruments at the moment do not recognize indigenous people who are often most affected by climate change as a special constituency. We have also been excluded and marginalized from the decision making processes.” Mr. Kimaren said. “The Green Climate Fund should recognize the rights of indigenous people and address the issue of direct access or a…

MARRAKECH, Morocco (PAMACC News) - Thousands of people on Sunday 13th took to the streets of Marrakech, Morroco, and trekked for three kilometres from El Harti Gardens to Place Bab Doukkal, singing and chanting slogans demanding climate justice, and the need for an ambitious outcome from the ongoing climate negotiations summit in the country.Among the over 10,000 protesters were representatives from different civil society organisations particularly from the developing world, among them climate scholars, indigenous people most of them who live in forests, and many other interested groups.“We demand for climate justice now. And if we fail to act now, we risk being judged harshly by the future generations,” said Dr. Muawia Shaddad, of the University of Khartoum, and the President for the Sudanese Environment Conservation Society based in Sudan.Mithika Mwenda, the Secretary General for the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) pointed out that the outcome from the Marrakech negotiations should be ambitious enough to protect the rights of poor and vulnerable on the continent who are the most impacted by climate change, and provide adequate climate finance to address the impacts.“We are also in solidarity with the American people, who are protesting against the election of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States,” said Mwenda.Trump, during his presidency campaign came under heavy criticisms especially from his opponent Hillary Clinton, for his remarks on twitter that; "The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive."“He is not a believer in climate change, and we are afraid that he might derail the process, thus undoing all the progress that has been made through painful struggles over several years,” said Mwenda.Robert Chimambo of Zambia Climate change Network said that during the Marrakech negotiations, there is need for the developed country Parties to include and provide clarity on their contributions on all the elements including provision of money for adaptation for developing countries, and particularly Africa.“This should be done in respect of the Paris set of negotiations, where we demanded for equity, fair deal and a legally binding agreement that is now the Paris Agreement,” said Chimambo. The 22nd session of climate negotiations is taking place in Marrakech from November 7 to 18 2016.

MARRAKECH, Morocco (PAMACC News) - Climate experts and development partners at the ongoing summit on climate change in Marrakech, Morocco have said that the world needs an integrated approach for climate resilience, and landscape management in order to feed the ever increasing global population.Speaking at an event alongside the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 22nd session of the Conference of Parties (COP 22) on climate change, Rawleston Moore of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) said there is need to sustain ecosystem service flows by ensuring healthy soils and vegetative cover, need to diversify land use so that farmers have options in production systems, and also need to safeguard high value species to ensure availability of adaptive genetic resources for food, fuel and fiber.“For the world to remain climate resilient, there is also need to preserve local traditional indigenous knowledge in an integrated approach,” said Moore, the Senior Climate Change Specialist for Adaptation at the GEF.According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) the world population is expected to grow by over a third, or 2.3 billion people, between 2009 and 2050, with nearly all the growth taking place in the developing countries.These trends, according to FAO, mean that market demand for food would continue to grow. Demand for cereals for example, for both food and animal feeds is projected to reach some 3 billion tonnes by 2050, up from today’s nearly 2.1 billion tonnes.Amid the changing climatic conditions, experts have warned that without extra effort and innovative means of adaptation and food production, there will be a huge food deficit in the near future.As a result, the GEF has released some $120 through Islamic Development Bank to support food security programmes in 12 African countries.“Projects have been initiated in different African countries, and am very happy that people’s livelihoods have changed for the better,” said Dr Bashir Jama Adan, the Manager, Agriculture and Food Security Division at the Islamic Development Bank. “Those who depended on food aid can now feed themselves, and people are able to generate income from simple climate resilience projects,” he added.According to Ketty Lamaro, the Under Secretary Department of Pacification and Development in the Office of Uganda’s Prime Minister, dryland food production projects in Northern Uganda have restored peace in areas such as Karamoja, where households who solely depended on pastoralism can now cultivate food as an alternative way of survival.However, for communities to respond well to climate resilience programmes, Moore said that there must be political goodwill. “We need policies to promote incentive mechanisms for good practices that deliver environment and development benefits at scale,” he said.The Islamic Development Bank provides interest-free financing to vulnerable communities, where profits are shares equitably with the beneficiaries, and losses shared if at all they occur.