Africa Climate Conversations.

Africa representing over 17 percent of the world population, is responsible for less than four percent of global emissions. But the continent has significant assets in terms of carbon sinks. Jean-Paul Adam, the director for  Technology, Climate Change, and Natural Resources  at the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), says the Congo basin alone accounts for three years' worth of glob...

A 2021 report Climate Crisis Is a Child Rights Crisis by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) notes that today's children and young people face an uncertain future because of the impacts of climate change. Globally, almost every child on earth is exposed to at least one climate and environmental hazard, shock, or stress such as heatwaves, cyclones, air pollution, flooding, and water scarcit...

This week, we are talking about empowering children to conserve biodiversity and the environment. It is what Miti Alliance has been doing for the last nine years. Miti Alliance  is a social enterprise focusing on planting and growing trees across schools, forests, communities aimed at planting five million trees by 2025 In 2020, the Miti alliance worked with 71 Schools, planted 50 kitchen gar...

Did you know that a third of Africa's forests have already been lost, mainly to charcoal production? Yes, that is according to the world forest organization. In Kenya, the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) notes that more than 70 per cent of the domestic energy demand for cooking and heating has been met by charcoal over decades. For a ton of charcoal produced, about ten tone...

Today we are in Kenya's Nakuru County in a town named Mai Mahiu meaning "hot water" about 60kms drive from Nairobi City. Here we meet Lydia Njung'e, the CEO of Eversave Briquettes Limited. Since 2010, Njung'e has been using agricultural waste materials for manufacturing briquettes. The business started after Njung'e; then, a poultry farmer lost over 2000 birds overnight to carbon poisoning. While...

Human activities have warmed the climate at an exceptional rate as per the latest UN's climate science report on the physical changes globally and expected to occur. The report on the physical science basis is the first outline of the three expected for the sixth assessment report. Publication of the second and third reports looking at how to adapt to these impacts and prevent the worst-case scena...

Korogocho is one of the largest slums neighbourhood's northeast of Kenya's city center. It is home to nearly 200,000 people. We are precisely at the Canaan bridge where the Nairobi river separates Korogocho slums and Dandora suburbs, home to Nairobi's main dumping ground – the dandora dumping site. Here, a group of youths known as Komb Green Solutions has reclaimed a landfill by the Nairobi River....

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says that the world population is expected to grow to almost 10 billion by 2050. Further, by 2050, in every five children born, two will be born in Africa .  Already, the rate of urbanization in Sub-Saharan Africa is unmatched compared to the rest of the world. The urban population is expected to nearly triple to 1.34 billion people b...

In 2016, the Nyongara River flowing out of the Ondiri Wetland in Kikuyu town, Kenya about 20 kilometres from Nairobi city, nearly dried up. Raw sewerage from Kikuyu town drained at the Wetland. Forty-four greenhouse farms around the wetland abstracted water unregulated. Additionally, solid waste dumpsters had found a new dumping site. Fodder harvesters harvested grass around the Wetland, burning t...

We are at the Rwenshama fish landing site in Uganda at the shores of Lake Edward , one of the smallest African Great Rift lakes lying in the Western Rift Valley. Shared between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda Though existed since the '50s, there has not been a toilet or clean water. Fishers and traders defecated at the wetland next to the lake. Fish was actioned on a carpet laid on bar...

A 17-year-old secondary school student from Niger's 2nd largest city Zinder Faiza Habou and her mother earn a living out of cracking nuts and pounding wild fruits on contract under the Sahara Sahel foods. "These fruits were a delicacy back in the village while growing up. My mother worked as a house help to feed and educate our family of 12 children until the packaging of the wild fruits started i...

From 06th July, we are starting a new series highlighting environmental solutions.  We will go to the border of Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo along Lake Edward one of the smaller African Great Lakes shared by these two countries. We will find out how a new fish landing site equipped with water and sanitary facilities is changing fishers' lives who defecated in the nearby bush fo...

In Africa, approximately 51 million square miles of land - 43% percent - of the continent is classified as rangeland. Mostly occupied by pastoralists, rangelands support meat supply within cities. Rangelands are also home to Africa's big five games like the elephants, leopards, lions, buffalos, rhinoceros hence contributing highly to countries GDP through tourism. Loupa Pius says unfortunately the...

70 percent of GLF Africa participants were aged between 18 to 35 making up 3000 of the 7000 registered participants. Cities Alliance, a global partnership fighting urban poverty and promoting the role of cities, notes that almost 60 percent of Africa's more than 1 billion people are under the age of 25, making Africa the world's youngest continent. The youth are a massive resource. The youth are t...

Today Salina Abraham, the Global Landscape Forum strategic adviser joins me as we investigate what was achieved last week during the conference. In this conversation in we talk about the critical issues of finance. How do Africa finance dryland restoration this decade now identified as the UN decade of restoration? How best can Africa take advantage of its massive population of robust youth, among...

The Global Landscape Forum Africa 2021 kicks off tomorrow, the 2nd June, for two days. The digital conference dubbed "Restoring Africa's Drylands - Accelerating Action on the Ground" will be 2021's only conference on drylands restoration. The conference will play an essential role in identifying knowledge gaps while seeking solutions to the challenging issues facing drylands and the people that li...

Every year, research by the World Resources Institute WRI indicates that Africa losses nearly 3 million hectares of forests. The continents 65% of the land is affected by degradation, and three percent of GDP is lost annually from soil and nutrient depletion on cropland. To tackle the high rates of degradation, African countries, after the Paris agreement, pledges to restore 100 million hectares o...

In 2014, the Strategic Climate Fund (SCF) under the Climate Investment Fund (CIF) funded the Strengthening climate resilience project in the Kafue sub-Basin in Zambia . Engineer Indie Dinala, the project manager, told Africa Climate Conversations that farmers in the Kafue sub-basin would depend on wild fruits and wild tubers during drought.  But today, the USD 38 million projects have introdu...

African drylands are home to more than half a billion people who live and work in the drylands. "We need to rethink restoration within the dryland. The voice of the people must be part of the design, implementation, and the monitoring process," Lalisa Duguma, a scientist with the World Agroforestry, told the Africa Climate conversations. "Restoring drylands is not a walk in the park. It needs a ve...

Today on the Financing change in Africa series we are asking ourselves how Africa can balance between its development plans and emission reduction, given that over 600 million people in Africa do not have access to electricity. In 2019, the United Nations University Institute for Natural Resources (UNU-INRA) report on Africa's stranded assets warned that Africa must forego burning 90percent of kno...

The Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) Africa Conference Digital 2021 conference will be happening on the 2nd and 3rd of June this year. It is the first-ever digital conference focused entirely on Africa's drylands and how integrative restoration practices can see them flourish once again. The meeting takes place when the world is still finding means to cope with the global pandemic, already impacting...

Climate change impacts men and women differently. When the COVID-19 pandemic has led to income losses increasing the poverty burden in many countries, Sheila Oparaocha, the  ENERGIA  International Coordinator and Programme manager tell us why access to energy is critical for women to achieve the SDG goals. Anne Kuriakose, a senior social development specialist at the climate investment f...

Mental health is not often directly linked to climate change . But let's be honest, temperatures are rising, floods, droughts, heatwaves, bush fires, rising sea levels are getting real and affecting real people. Their livelihoods and day-to-day quality of life is adversely affected. Not to mention the Covid-19 pandemics and high cost of living which adds on to the economy and mental effects. In Ke...

Africa forest cover accounts for 23 percent of its planned area. Africa is also home to the most significant proportion of forest-dependent subsistence households globally. More than half of the continent's population relies directly or indirectly on the forests for livelihoods. Ines Angulo, the Forest Investment Project (FIP) coordinator at the Climate Investment Funds (CIF), says Africa is...

Africa accounts for total funding of 300 million USD of the The Pilot Program for Climate Resilience. The pilot project for climate resilience is a USD1.2 billion adaptation funding window of the climate investment funds under the Strategic Climate Fund. Lorie Rufo, the project coordinator of the, says the adaption funds worked with Mozambique, Niger, and Zambia, among other countri...