The government of the United States of America has reinforced its focal commitment to achieving the lofty objectives of the Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA) with an additional funding of US$11 million. At a signing ceremony which held today within the precincts of the U.S Centre pavilion at the ongoing 22nd Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Marrakech, Morocco, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) through the Power Africa initiative provided a second tranche of funding of US$11 million towards fulfilling its overall commitment of US$20 million to the African Development Bank-led Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa. Saluting the US government’s commitment to SEFA, Amadou Hott, AfDB’s Vice President, Power, Energy, Climate and Green Growth, remarked that the second tranche will expand the important work already underway in components 1 and 3 of SEFA that support project preparation and enabling environment reforms. “This demonstration of donor coordination through pooled resources serves as a model and signals to the international community our joint level of commitment to these crucial goals of generation and access,” Hott says. The AfDB Vice President who has vast experience in structuring finance for power and energy projects with a passion for solving Africa’s power and energy need especially in renewable energy and balanced energy mix, likened the signing ceremony as a boost for the bank’s New Deal on Energy for Africa which is aimed at helping the continent to achieve universal electricity access by 2025 with a strong focus on encouraging clean and renewable energy solutions. Andrew M. Herscowitz of Power Africa who moderated the event and signed on behalf of the US government expressed satisfaction with the SEFA-driven mechanisms which have succeeded in increasing access to small and medium-scale renewable energy generation and energy efficiency as well as providing project preparation grants to attain bankability status. According to Herscowitz, “Power Africa has already injected a first payment of US$5 million into SEFA which directly supports the AfDB’s New Deal on Energy for Africa that ensures universal access to modern energy services; doubling the global rate of improvement in energy efficiency; and doubling the share of renewable energy in the global mix.” Regional Director for Sub-Saharan Africa for the U.S Trade and Development Agency, Lida Fitts, Chris Hornor, Founder and CEO, PowerHive, and Kevin Connolly of the Affordable Access Initiatives who participated at the signing ceremony lauded the U.S government-led partnership with SEFA which aims to add 30,000 MW of cleaner and more efficient generation capacity. Fitts added that an addition of 60 million new home and business connections will unlock the energy sector potential through policy reforms and removal of barriers that impede sustainable energy development in sub-Saharan Africa. While Power Africa offers renewable energy developers the combined resources of 12 U.S. government agencies, the World Bank Group, the AfDB, the Governments of Canada, the EU, Japan, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom, as well as partner African governments and more than 120 private sector…

MARRRAKECH, Morocco (PAMACC News) - The period between 2011-2015 has been recorded as the hottest in history with increasingly visible human footprint on extreme weather and climate events with dangerous and costly impacts. The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) report released at the world climate change summit in Marrakech, Morocco, gives a detailed analysis of the global climate that has record temperatures which were accompanied by rising sea levels and declines in Arctic sea-ice extent, continental glaciers and northern hemisphere snow cover. All these climate change indicators confirmed the long-term warming trend caused by greenhouse gases. Carbon dioxide reached the significant milestone of 400 parts per million in the atmosphere for the first time in 2015, according to the WMO report which was submitted to the U.N. climate change conference. The Global Climate in 2011-2015 also examines whether human-induced climate change was directly linked to individual extreme events.Of 79 studies published by the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society between 2011 and 2014, more than half found that human-induced climate change contributed to the extreme event in question. Some studies found that the probability of extreme heat increased by 10 times or more. "The Paris Agreement aims at limiting the global temperature increase to well below 2 ° Celsius and pursuing efforts towards 1.5 ° Celsius above pre-industrial levels. The report confirms that the average temperature in 2015 had already reached the 1°C mark. We just had the hottest five-year period on record, with 2015 claiming the title of hottest individual year. Even that record is likely to be beaten in 2016," said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas. He added, "The effects of climate change have been consistently visible on the global scale since the 1980s: rising global temperature, both over land and in the ocean; sea-level rise; and the widespread melting of ice. It has increased the risks of extreme events such as heatwaves, drought, record rainfall and damaging floods." The report highlights some of the high-impact events, citing statistics on losses and damage provided by other United Nations organisations and partners. These included the East African drought in 2010-2012, which led to an estimated 258,000 excess deaths, and the 2013-2015 southern African drought. Approximately 800 deaths and more than US$40 billion in economic losses were associated with flooding in South-East Asia in 2011. Heatwaves in India and Pakistan in 2015 claimed more than 4,100 lives. Hurricane Sandy, in 2012, led to US$67 billion in economic losses in the United States of America. The deaths of 7,800 people were associated with Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines in 2013. The report was submitted to the Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The five-year timescale allows a better understanding of multi-year warming trends and extreme events such as prolonged droughts and recurrent heatwaves than an annual report. 2011-2015 was the warmest five-year period on record globally and for all continents apart from Africa (second warmest).Temperatures for the period were 0.57 °C (1.03 °F) above the…

MARRAKECH, Morocco (PAMACC News) - Water experts have called for more attention to water by governments as a way of providing solutions to help implement the Paris Climate Change Agreement. Organisers of the the Action Day for Water at the ongoing UN Climate Change Conference in Marrakech (COP22), which is the first time in the history of UN Climate Change Conferences (COPs), created through the Global Climate Action Agenda noted that countries have identified water as a key to adaptation in 93% of their national climate action plans (Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs). As water is fundamental for food security, human health, energy production, industrial productivity, biodiversity, in addition to basic human needs and its availability, ensuring water security means ensuring security in all these domains. In addition, water is critical for successful climate change mitigation, as many efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions depend on reliable access to water resources. Countries have identified water as a key to adaptation in 93 per cent of their national climate action plans (Intended Nationally Determined Contributions, or "INDCs"). As water is fundamental for food security, human health, energy production, industrial productivity, biodiversity, in addition to basic human needs and its availability, ensuring water security means ensuring security in all these domains. In addition, water is critical for successful climate change mitigation, as many efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions depend on reliable access to water resources. Systematically addressing these challenges is, therefore, key to adapting to climate change and reducing the negative impacts of water-related disasters. The "Blue Book on Water and Climate" was also launched by the Moroccan government and its partners as a concrete outcome of its interim International Conference on Water and Climate, hosted in Rabat in July 2016, in cooperation with the Government of France and the World Water Council. The publication collects the orientations and recommendations brought forth by the international water community to support the implementation of climate commitments and proposes a variety of concrete and applicable solutions related to adaptation and resilience through water management. "This aligns perfectly with COP22, which is striving to be a COP of action. Now, we need to realise what is at stake, since water insecurity leads to increased conflicts, tension between populations, and also provokes migration that threatens overall stability," said Mrs Charafat Afailal, Minister Delegate in charge of Water of Morocco. The leaders noted that climate justice is also a priority of the Water Action Day, as evidenced by the launching of the "Water for Africa" initiative, established by the Kingdom of Morocco and supported by the African Development Bank. The initiative aims to render justice to Africa through the adoption of a specific action plan that will mobilise different international political, financial and institutional partners to improve water and sanitation services and management in Africa, for those most affected by climate change. "While humanity experiences increasing demographic and socio-economic stresses, recent episodes of extreme climate around the world bring additional complexities in finding solutions to reduce these…

NAIROBI, Kenya (PAMACC News) - Agricultural experts and leaders from all over the world have developed an ambitious plan to transform global agriculture, responding to the challenge of climate change and real threats to the production of the planet’s major crops in a hotter world.This is an outcome of a recent roundtable interaction held in Nairobi seeking to create a roadmap that will implement the Global Action Plan for Agricultural Diversification (GAPAD), which is a declaration agreed upon by world leaders during the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC COP 21) in Paris in December 2015.The GAPAD initiative had earlier been designed to support the Sustainable Development Agenda 2030, and to responds to the Declaration on Agriculture Diversification before it was adopted by the United Nations in September 2015. “Currently, over 7 billion people depend on just four major crops to supply three-quarters of their food,” said Dr Dennis Rangi, the Director General, Development, at the CAB International. And according to studies, the population is projected to reach 9 billion by 2050. “It is therefore becoming increasingly accepted that in a hotter world, options for agricultural diversification are needed that include a wider range of crops and cropping systems,” said Rangi, noting that there is need for increased species diversity and more resilient agricultural ecosystems that include new crops for food and non-food uses. The GAPAD initiative is therefore addressing six of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): 2 ‘zero hunger’, 7 ‘affordable and clean energy’, 12 ‘responsible consumption and production’, 13 ‘climate action’, 15 ‘life on land’ and 17’ partnerships for the goals’. Agricultural diversification will also eventually contribute to achieving SDG 1on ‘no poverty’.Among the leaders and experts who deliberated on the initiative included representatives from the African Union Commission (AUC), the Sustainable Development Goals Centre for Africa and the Australian High Commission, representatives from research and development organisations and a host of journalists drawn from different media organisations. According to Ruth Oniang’o, a Kenyan Professor in Food Science and Nutrition, agricultural diversification can improve nutrition, enhance food security and help alleviate poverty amongst other benefits.The experts have therefore developed GAPAD targets based on each of the eight SDG2 targets but focused on the role of agricultural diversification, and have identified the priority activities needed to achieve these targets.The next step will involve a small group of eminent, respected and highly qualified individuals who will distil and refine the output of the Nairobi roundtable, and integrate these with the distilled and refined outputs from the roundtables that addressed the other five SDGs being addressed by GAPAD. The result is expected to be a compelling, credible, inclusive, authoritative and investable global plan for agricultural diversification in a hotter world, which has the support of all the relevant institutions. It is anticipated that GAPAD will be formally launched in mid-2017. At the same time the bold plan for agricultural diversification will be submitted to the secretariat of UNSDA 2030. In the meantime, GAPAD will seek to build a…