Africa left disappointed as climate change summit ends without deal

The UN Climate Change Conference which concluded on Sunday left Africa disappointed as key issues remained unresolved.

Issues such as finance for adaptation, carbon markets and loss and damage which are very critical to the continent were left unresolved by parties.

Earlier on Friday at a press briefing, Tongie Gahoma, incoming chair of the Africa Group of Negotiators said that Africa is ready to continue the negotiations at COP26, taking place in Glasgow, Scotland.

“We are ready to continue these discussions next year. We want to avoid the Kyoto disease,” Gahoma said.

“For us, it is important that the work here is for Africa by Africa and our concern is mainly adaptation,” he further said.

Africa has been hit by devastating effects of climate change in 2019 – through heat waves, floods, and droughts in an unprecedented manner.

All progress under the UN system in 2019 to deal with this changing climate that Africa and the rest of the world are facing were halted by the government who insisted that it was business as usual.

“We’re disappointed with the lack of willingness by some parties to work together to ensure environmental integrity, to respond to the needs of the most vulnerable communities, and to build upon rather than undermine the Paris Agreement, including resources for the Adaptation Fund,” said Sonam P Wangdi, chair of the Least Developed Countries Group (LCDs) in a statement.

Africa accounts for 33 countries that are listed among the 47 LCDs.

Read also: Adaptation of Nigeria’s transportation sector to climate change

The UN 25th Conference of Parties (COP 25) was meant to achieve five major objectives which are: finalising the rules for global emissions trading mechanisms under Article 6 of the 2015 Paris Agreement, getting finance to deal with loss and damage caused by climate change, making roadmap for long term financing from developed to developing countries and holding developed countries accountable for climate actions.

All these are meant to be achieved before the implementation of the 2015 Paris Agreement which takes effect next year with the integration of gender, human and indigenous rights components into all climate actions.

This means that the Paris Agreement will go into implementation next year without adequate finance as pledges by most developing countries to the Paris Agreement to control carbon emissions and adapt the impact depends on money from the developed countries.

This means the carbon market which is Article 6 of the Paris Agreement will not take effect.

Africa is the most vulnerable in terms of climate change impact despite accounting for less than 4percent of global carbon emissions, says a UN report.

The continent is projected to see the largest relative increase in the size of its population over the coming years.

It is projected by the UN that it will account for 1.68 billion people by 2030.

This means more land will be required for growing more food and constructing more houses for these people, meaning that more forest cover will be destroyed.

The continent still has a low capacity for adaptation, and this is why Africa has continuously requested for more finance for adaptation and technological transfer and capacity building.