Building a climate resilient economy in the midst of floods

Extreme weather is becoming commonplace as the world warms. With rising temperatures, the signs of climate change are everywhere – as more people feel the devastating impacts of stronger storms, droughts and burning heat waves.

Excessive floods are wreaking havoc on people’s lives around the world.

In the last few weeks alone, Cyclone Idai has impacted the lives of millions, killing more than 1,000 in Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe. The affected countries will need over $2 billion to recover, according to World Bank estimates.

Even before the affected receive support, cyclone Kenneth is making a dangerously unprecedented strike in Northern Mozambique.

The economics of climate change is staggering. In 2017 alone, natural disasters – from floods to fires – caused record losses of $330 billion.

The need for people to take bold action in response to the devastation is now louder than before.

When local people are hardest hit

Saturday, July 14, 2018 went down as a solemn day at the Asokore Mampong community in Ghana’s Ashanti region.

Tears flowed uncontrollably as the mortal remains of three children and a woman, all victims of floods, were conveyed for burial after an emotionally-charged requiem service.

A day after torrential rains, the bodies of Christian, Louisa, Liza and Susana were recovered by officers of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO).

The four were among more than 15 people in the region who were swept away by high currents of flood water, following incessant downpour in June 2018.

The situation was dire in other parts of Ghana, including the capital, Accra, which experience perennial flood disasters.

Questions have been asked if such deaths could have been averted. But the rains will not wait for answers before resuming the onslaught in 2019.

Severe rainstorms in the month of April alone have wrecked havoc in parts of Ghana, killing people and displacing hundreds in schools, homes and communities.

Unabated Flood Devastation

In years past, the sign of rains brought joy as children had fun bathing in the heavenly showers of blessings.

Today, many a community in major cities in Ghana begins to panic when the clouds get dark. People run for cover when the clouds gather for fear of losing lives and property to the rains.

Floods have ravaged communities, caused havoc to roads and collapsed bridges. Residents have been displaced, communities cut off, and socio-economic livelihoods impacted negatively.

The worse impacted are farmers – some farms in lowland areas get submerged in high volumes of flood water, after a downpour. Instead of counting their blessings of bumper harvest, farmers wail because they are unable to cart their harvests from farmlands to the market because of bad roads.

The Ghana Meteorological Agency anticipates more rainstorms and floods in 2019, and has warned farmers and residents in flood prone communities to stay alert.

There are likely agricultural losses with dire food security implications, as prices of foodstuff like maize, cassava, plantain and vegetables shoot up on the local market.

Driving Factors

Recent rains in Kumasi have been described as ‘unprecedented’ by residents. Streets and homes have been inundated as vehicles, houses and other property are submerged.

The blocking of drains and canals has been identified as the immediate cause of flooding. Indiscriminate dumping of refuse, especially plastics, blocks the drains and prevents water from running through the drainages and waterways.

Another major cause of flooding is the indiscriminate construction of buildings on waterways and wetland.

Runoff water needs to find space when the ground cannot absorb the rains. With structures sitting on waterways and the ground not able to contain the excess water, flooding is bound to occur.

These flood risks are exacerbated by climate change. Unfortunately, flood-prone communities cannot access accurate flood information to stay alert to stay safe from the floods.

Building Resilient Urban Eco-System

According to experts, rainfall patterns have been distorted leading to variation in the amount of rain. Parts of the country are likely to experience flooding due to a shift in rainfall pattern caused by climate change.

In recent days, local authorities have taken steps to dredge drainage systems and construct storm drains to reduce the impact of water overflow.

However, the effective management of solid waste and enforcement of laws on environmental sanitation are as critical as investing in green infrastructure.

The bigger picture, perhaps, is for local economies to efficiently manage the built environment in anticipation of future climate impacts. The construction of roads, bridges and other infrastructure must take into consideration extreme weather conditions.

The need for climate resilience in planning the urban eco-system should also take into consideration investments in climate-smart construction materials and technologies, while restoring and creating attractive landscapes, creating room for floodwaters by removing silt and restoring marshy riverine.

There should also be the concerted drive to create more awareness around the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and human activities that adversely predispose the environment to degradation. Both State and Non-State actors should have the capacity to identify, create and implement actionable solutions to adapt to climate change.

Afforestation and agroforestry are major entry points to combat climate change and its impact on the environment, hence the need for communities to join forces with State actors in committing to initiate tree planting projects to re-green the environment.

The world must take climate action through the implementing the Paris Climate Agreement by cutting greenhouse gas emissions to slow the speed of global warming.

But communities in vulnerable economies like Ghana cannot delay in taking adaptation measures to curtail the devastating impacts of climate change.

By Kofi Adu Domfeh

AfDB boosts cyclone response with emergency relief package and measures to combat climate change

Malawi’s recovery and reconstruction plans in the aftermath of Cyclone Idai has received a boost from the African Development Bank (www.AfDB.org), which is supporting the country with an emergency relief package and measures to combat the effect of climate change in the Southern African region.

Mateus Magala, the Bank’s Vice President for Corporate Services and Human Resources, led a delegation to Lilongwe this week, to discuss the institution’s intervention plans with public and civil society officials in Malawi.

Magala had meetings with government officials in Lilongwe, including Hon. Goodall E. Gondwe, Minister of Finance, Economic Planning and Development; Hon. Nicholas Dausi, Minister of Homeland Security; and Dr. Dalitso Kabambe, Governor of the Reserve Bank of Malawi.

Magala conveyed Bank President Akinwumi Adesina’s sympathies to Malawian President Peter Mutharika and the people of Malawi.

“We have come to express our support to Malawi and to partner with the Government of Malawi in its ongoing efforts to provide immediate relief and reconstruction in affected sections of the country,” he said.

Magala informed officials that the development finance institution had set up an Emergency Recovery Fund, which will disburse US$100 million to jumpstart reconstruction efforts in Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe. The Bank is also planning to redirect funding, totaling $1.4 million, to the immediate relief effort, reallocated from savings and extensions of ongoing Bank projects in Malawi’s water, roads and agriculture sectors.

Responding to Magala, a visibly elated Gondwe said, “The African Development Bank couldn’t have come at a better time, to join us in our efforts which are now focused mainly on providing humanitarian relief and reconstruction…We were looking forward to bumper harvests in Malawi this year, but we have lost our entire crop to the cyclone.”

The Bank has already availed $250,0000 to Malawi, from its Emergency Relief Fund, for the purchase of emergency food items to avert hunger following the loss of crops damaged by the severe floods. Gondwe acknowledged receipt of this fund during his meeting with the Bank delegation.

The Bank’s Climate Fund will also release $150,000.00 to Malawi to enable authorities to assist communities and internally displaced persons impacted by the cyclone. The Bank’s long-term plans include designing and developing mechanisms for climate insurance and mitigating climate change.

Close to sixty people have died, and about 1 million persons across 15 districts have been displaced by the severe floods, mostly in the south of the country, where entire villages were submerged in water. Private sector activities and operators in the land-locked nation of about 18 million people were also severely impaired by the cyclone.

“Now is the time to talk about long-term and permanent solutions to the problems of floods in Malawi. We need to build houses and new structures but, above all, we ought to take advantage of this calamity to accelerate our irrigation development systems,” Gondwe remarked.

The Bank delegation also discussed the need for long-term cooperation on economic development and resilience strategies with donors and development partners in Malawi, including the World Bank, World Food Program Malawi, and top diplomats representing the American, Chinese, Egyptian, German, Japanese, Nigerian, Norwegian and Zimbabwean governments in Malawi.

Cyclone Idai hit Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe in mid-March 2019. Hardest hit was Mozambique, where the cyclone killed about 600 people. More than 1,600 people were injured, according to the UNHCR, the UN refugee agency. Malawi’s Homeland Security Minister Dausi estimates that about $365 million will be needed immediately for the reconstruction of bridges, schools, hospitals and homes.

The Bank’s delegation also included Patrick Zimpita, Executive Director for Malawi, Zambia and Mauritius; Heinrich Gaomab II, Executive Director for Angola, Mozambique, Namibia and Zimbabwe; Kapil Kapoor, Director General, Southern Africa Regional Development and Business Delivery Office; and Eyerusalem Fasika, Officer-In-Charge of the Bank’s Malawi Country Office.

Green groups at Africa Climate Week call for less talk and more action on low-carbon transition

Green groups from Ghana and other African countries joined the UN-hosted Africa Climate Week to demand rapid and ambitious climate action by government officials gathered in Accra for the conference.

The conference is one of three regional climate workshops aimed at accelerating the implementation of current national climate plans – nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) – and the definition of more ambitious ones ahead of the special summit called by UN Secretary general António Guterres in September, and the next United Nations climate change conference, COP25, to take place in Chile in December.

Despite the urgency of the climate crisis, rendered all the more evident by the damage caused by cyclone Idai in Southern Africa – which took the lives of hundreds and impacted an estimated 1.5 million in the entire region- leaders gathered at the Africa Climate Week are failing in making concrete steps forward in heeding the calls for ambitious climate action issued by climate scientists, citizens and activists alike.

"The impacts of global warming are being felt daily by millions of Africans all over the continent. Communities everywhere fear to lose their land and their houses as each season hits one country after the other with exceptional floods, unexpected storms and increasingly long droughts. And cyclone Idai is just another terrible manifestation of what the expansion of fossil fuels means for African people,” said Landry Ninteretse, Africa Team Leader at 350.org.

"The proliferation of fossil fuels projects is happening at the expense of people’s health, climate, and ecosystems. Yet, solutions to this crisis are also well known. They include ending coal extraction and mining in the very short term and stop funding new coal infrastructure, while accelerating investments in renewables."

Ghana Reducing Our Carbon (GROC), 350 Africa and other civil society groups addressed leaders gathered at the Africa Climate Week to demand plans for a rapid phase-out of fossil fuels and an equally rapid and just transition to renewable energy sources, starting from Ghana’s commitment to produce 10% of its primary energy from renewable sources by 2030, which was already postponed from the initial 2020 deadline.

“Over the past four days we have heard representatives of African governments play little more than lip service to the need for ambitious climate action. They will go back to their capitals tomorrow and keep approving plans for new fossil fuel infrastructure, which is going to benefit only a handful of large corporations, some of which are foreign corporations, in Africa to once again exploit its resources and dump the resulting pollution on the most vulnerable and those who don’t have a say in these decisions” said Portia Adu Mensah, Coordinator of 350 - Ghana Reducing Our Carbon (GROC).

“Our continent needs a Copernican revolution, putting people’s lives before profits and achieving development by addressing the climate crisis: a rapid deployment of renewable energy sources and a focus on creating a truly green economy will lift people out of poverty, ensure that our energy needs are met and contribute to stopping the climate from changing even further in dramatic and deadly ways. Ghana can and must lead the way by setting in motion plans to meet its target of 10% primary energy produced by renewable energy sources by 2030”.

Already considered by the UN as possibly the worst cyclone ever to strike Southern Africa, Idai has ripped through villages and towns in three countries over the last few days, taking over 1000 lives and leaving a trail of destruction.

With winds of 195 km/h accompanied by lashing rains, Idai has already affected millions of people, causing floods, landslides and ruining crops and roads.

Promotion of gender equality intensifies at Africa Climate Week

Experts participating in the Africa Climate Week (ACW 2019) in Accra, Ghana have argued that practical solutions hinge on women’s participation in all aspects of the climate change debate.
 

In a presentation at the Africa Consultative Workshop on the sidelines of ACW, Salina Sanou of the Pan Africa Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), said there is need to continue supporting indigenous women-led organisations to empower them as role models.

She added that gender disintegrated data is a good way of identifying and rectifying gaps in monitoring progress in the climate change discussion.

“Women and men are experiencing climate change differently, as gender inequalities persist around the world, recognising the important contributions of women as decision makers, stakeholders, and experts across sectors and at all levels can lead to successful, long-term solutions to climate change. Indigenous women are an important part of the REDD+ process and the climate change discussion and cannot be ignored,” she said.

Climate change represents the most complex challenge which requires a concerted, proactive and holistic response.

Gender inequality may dramatically limit the resilience and adaptive capacity of women, families and communities. It may also restrict options for climate change mitigation.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, if women had the same access to productive resources as men, they could increase yields on their farms by 20-30 percent which could raise total agricultural output in developing countries by 2.5 to 4 percent.

Evidence shows that women’s empowerment and advancing gender equality can deliver results across sectors, and lead to more environmentally friendly decision making at household and national levels.

Across societies, women are often responsible for gathering and producing food, collecting water and sourcing fuel for heating and cooking. With climate change, these tasks are becoming more difficult. Extreme weather events such as droughts and floods have a greater impact on the poor and most vulnerable.

Despite women being disproportionately affected by climate change, they play a crucial role in climate change adaptation and mitigation. Women have the knowledge and understanding of what is needed to adapt to changing environmental conditions and to come up with practical solutions. But they are still a largely untapped resource.

Salina said unleashing the knowledge and capability of women represents an important opportunity to craft effective climate change solutions for the benefit of all.

“Restricted land rights, lack of access to financial resources, training and technology, and limited access to political decision-making spheres often prevent them from playing a full role in tackling climate change and other environmental challenges,” she noted.

Betty Maitoyo, a Gender Specialist with indigenous organisation, Mainyoto Peoples Integrated Development organisation (MPIDO), observed Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) for instance should move beyond symbolic measures and ensure gender mainstreaming in all its activities (funding and representation).

Countries, according to her, should robustly involve women, CSOs and indigenous peoples in development of local and national plans and their monitoring and implementation.

“Budget should be set aside in the existing programme to enhance awareness to end gender-stereotypes and to support project women and women leaders,” she said.

In 2015, women made up on the average 38 percent of United Nations Framework Conventions on Climate Change (UNFCCC) national delegation.

According to records from the Roots for Future, IUCN-GGCA, in same year, participation of women on climate finance mechanism boards was not impressive.

Women accounted for 25 percent in Global Environmental Facility, 15 percent in Green Climate Fund, 26 percent in Climate Investment Fund, 11 percent in Climate Development Mechanism, and 35 percent in Adaptation Fund.

This is a trend that the women groups and other civil society organisations at the meeting expressed as woefully inadequate.

For Betty, Climate finance should be accessible to both men and women and designed to generate mutual benefits, not exacerbate patterns of inequity.

Meanwhile, global negotiations have increasingly reflected the growing understanding of gender considerations in climate decision making over the last eight years.

For instance, women accounted for 29 percent whiles the men 71 percent of National Focal Point of the Global Environmental Facility at the Rio deliberations.

United Nations Climate Change negotiations, void of gender-related texts and discussions until 2008, have more recently reflected an increased understanding of the links between gender equality and responding to climate change.

It has become necessary because women bear the biggest brunt of climate change, the impact and effect much more than they affect men.

Climate change impacts and responses are not gender-neutral; thus climate financing mechanisms and resource allocations meant to address these differentiated impacts must be gender-responsive.

Hayford Duodu of the Dedicated Grant Mechanism for Local Communities Project (DGM-GHANA), added that women’s direct participation in climate change decision making is very critical.

According to him, the indigenous knowledge of the indigenous women directly impacted by the effect of climate change cannot be overlooked and must be tapped.

“Their worth of indigenous knowledge is a crucial aspect to effectively and equitably designing, implementing, and funding climate solutions, he said”.

Gender-responsive climate finance architecture can play a profound role in supporting a comprehensive climate change framework and complementary sustainable development pathway that promotes an equal and resilient economy for women and men.

It is therefore important to ensure equal space and resources for women and men to participate in climate change decision making and action at all levels.

Africa Climate Week: Accessing Finance for Climate Action

Access to finance remains critical for vulnerable African countries to take climate action.
 

Ghana, for instance, requires $22.6billion in investments to implement climate mitigation and adaptation actions.

While countries are expected to commit national resources in undertaking climate mitigation and adaptation, overcoming the climate scourge will demand huge international support to efficiently implement the nationally determined contributions (NDCs).

The NDCs are efforts each country makes to reduce national emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change.

The Green Climate Fund (GCF) has been established as a critical avenue to mobilize financial resources to address the challenge of climate change.

Activated in 2010, the GCF operates as the financial mechanism under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to support the efforts in developing countries to respond to the challenge of climate change.

Support to developing countries is to facilitate limiting their greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to climate change.

So far, developed nations have pledged to provide a current target of $100billion by 2020.

The last UN Climate Conference in Katowice, Poland, did not achieve new financial commitments but urged countries to deliver on their pledges.

According to Dr. Samson Samuel Ogallah, Solidaridad Network Senior Climate Specialist for Africa, until the pledges are converted into commitments and contributions, it cannot be said that resources have been attained for climate action.

“We’ve heard countries pledge big amounts but some of the pledges are never converted into contributions which become a challenge in the implementation of real action on the ground,” he observed.

The US, for instance, pledged $3billion but managed to convert $1.5billion during the Obama administration. The other part of the fund never materialized in the Trump administration.

Other contributed funds also go through bureaucracies and approval processes with a chunk of the Fund going into consultancy services, and leaving a pittance for climate action on the grounds.

Concerned about the minimal civil society participation in the design, implementation and evaluation of climate projects, the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) and Care International held a day’s workshop on the sidelines of the Africa Climate Week, with a focus on sustainable financing for climate action.

Executive Director of PACJA, Mithika Mwenda, noted that “as representatives of the people and communities on the ground, civil society organizations are very important in any action on climate change, including finance. The Green Climate Fund must be people-driven, people-responsive fund which funds things that cannot be financed by the conventional banks like the World Bank”.

The Accra dialogue, involving 15 African countries, acknowledged the proper and broader engagement of stakeholders in GCF processes to help most African countries develop fundable proposal which can enhance resilience of vulnerable communities and bring about paradigm shift in the entire process.

“The GCF is designed to address the needs of people at the local level, involving small holder farmers, pastoralist communities, labour movement, women and the youth,” Mithika noted.

He said PACJA is undertaking extensive training and outreach to demystify the Green Climate Fund as an instrument to support agriculture, transport and other economic activities.

But Funds available through the GCF and the Global Environmental Facility (GEF), among other financial mechanisms, are currently inadequate to meet the global needs for climate solutions.

According to the African Development Bank (AfDB), African countries need $3trillion by 2030 to implement their Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) targets.

Regional Principal Officer of AfDB, Dr. Olufunso Somorin, said 75percent of the amount will be leveraged from the private sector.

He therefore believes CSOs have a role in brokering increased engagement of the private sector in climate financing.

“The low resourcing of GCF is a concern,” he said. “Attracting private sector investment is a long-term solution”.

Long term engagement of CSO’s towards strengthening broader societal support for transformation and increase accountability of national authorities is critical to achieve GCF paradigms of low-emissions and climate-resilient economies and societies.

By Kofi Adu Domfeh

Africa Climate Week: Groups express concerns over forest decline

Civil society and indigenous forest communities have expressed concerns over the accelerating decline of forests in African countries, and called on drastic measures to reverse the trend.

Around 100 participants from 20 forest-dependent countries across Africa are meeting on the sidelines of the UN “African climate week” to share experiences and exchange ideas on various efforts spearheaded by governments to address deforestation and forest degradation, popularly known as REDD, in Africa.

Welcoming the participants to the meeting, the Executive Director of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), Mithika Mwenda decried the inertia in some governments, but appreciated innovative mechanisms that are being put in place to promote forest preservation.

He particularly pointed at the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF), a World Bank-funded mechanism to support forest programmes in support of the global call for action against climate change.

“It’s not enough to agree, sign and adopt the Paris Climate Agreement,” Mithika emphasised. “It is important to move beyond it and take action at local level, at communities we come from.”

“Climate Justice Movement is growing tremendously and we see how it is being energised by young people across the world,” he said, noting that this is the only way to bequeath a better planet to the next generation.

Mithika also expressed the desire of civil society to contribute at the Africa Climate Week and share perspectives on the climate solutions and how they impact on livelihoods and environment.

Joseph Ole Simel, the Executive Director of the indigenous organisation, Mainyoto Peoples Integrated Development organisation (MPIDO), which is co-hosting the meeting with PACJA, reiterated the strength in the collaboration among organisations and people sharing common heritage and challenges.

“The impact of climate change is affecting the vulnerable communities we represent here and thus we need to be very proactive as we cannot be spectators anymore,” he said, adding that indigenous people in Africa will continue with such collaborative efforts until their visibility and impact is assured.

“So far we are doing very well but I think we must do more,” he noted.

The workshop will facilitate regional exchange to encourage first-hand learning and sharing of experiences from civil society and forest dependent IPs engagement in REDD+ processes, and from the Capacity Building Project being implemented by PACJA and MPIDO

The meeting is part of the activities implemented by PACJA and MPIDO, which are intermediaries for the Pan African FCPF Capacity Building Program on REDD+ for CSOs and Forest-dependent IPs supported by the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) of the World Bank.

The two-day meeting seeks to enhance linkages with national REDD+ processes, identify challenges and best practices in forest preservation in Africa.

It will also broaden conversation around the FCPF Capacity Building Program and broader REDD+ Readiness/ implementation processas well as strengthening the REDD+ community of practice among 18 FCPF Countries in Africa through.

Among the countries represented are Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Republic of Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Liberia, Madagascar, Mozambique, Nigeria, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo and Uganda.

In addition to civil society and indigenous groups, government representatives from some countries also attended the meeting.