By Elias Ntungwe Ngalame
One of the key outcomes of the COP22 in Marrakech was the establishment of a new transparency fund with the injection of some USD50 million by some developed countries, to encourage transparency efforts in the fight against climate change.
African civil society organizations under the aegis of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) to that effect organized an African regional Post COPP22 sensitization workshop in Kampala, Uganda, 19-21 April, 2017 to examine the readiness of African countries and improve on the momentum towards the fund project.
It is also geared at seeking to expand participation, broadening efforts to build partnership with government and other stakeholders, breaking from the past to build stronger and global resilience.
According to Sam Ogallah of PACJA, the sensitization on the cardinality of the GCF was imperative to measure the readiness and highlight the role of civil society organizations in the funding project.
“Civil society organizations have to be accorded the opportunity to be abreast with the operational modalities of the Green Climate Fund to permit them fully participate in the entire project process and also push their governments to make proposals adapted to the realities of their different countries,” Ogallah said.
Participants during one of the sessions examined the goal, objectives, activities and implementation strategies of the Green Climate Fund, the climate finance process at national and international level within the UNFCCC.
Also examined was the outcome and decisions of the just ended 16th Board Meeting of the GCF and the way forward especially for civil society organizations.
According to participants, the GCF was in line with the Paris agreement in COP21. The Paris Agreement implementation they said should go hand in glove with the 2030 Agenda as well as the AU Agenda 2063, “a process which should take the bottom-up approach, be inclusive and transparent.”
It was also noted that the involvement of all stakeholders including government, civil society, development partners, the private sector, youths and women was not only necessary but imperative to drive the agenda to a success.
“It is a partnership of many facets in development in every country,” says Rebecca Muna civil society representative. The participation of the different stakeholders, she says signals the willingness of countries to understand and undertake climate actions that go beyond adaptation and victory for African countries.
Meanwhile the Green Climate Fund (GCF) on Tuesday, April 18, 2017 launched a new web-based guide that provides Partners with detailed information on how to access its resources.
Tagged “GCF 101”, the guide aims to help GCF stakeholders better navigate the many elements of engaging with the Fund. It provides four distinct chapters addressing the different opportunities the Fund provides to help developing countries respond to climate change: These include, Empowering countries; Getting Accredited; Funding projects; and Implementing projects,” the organization stated in its press release.
According to the GCF, each chapter provides a short overview, a simple step-by-step guide explaining how to apply or access the Fund; and a series of frequently asked questions that tease out more information. Through this approach, the guide increases clarity on the Fund’s main processes as well as transparency.
It adds: “GCF 101 uses non-technical language to make GCF processes easy to understand for non-expert audiences. This approach accords with the GCF mandate to support country ownership of climate finance and recognises the personnel capacity challenges facing many of the targets of GCF support – such as Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and African States.
The body notes that, “like the GCF itself, the ‘101’ is a work in progress,” stressing that the guide will be updated and modified as processes evolve.
By Elias Ntungwe Ngalame
One of the key outcomes of the COP22 in Marrakech was the establishment of a new transparency fund with the injection of some USD50 million by some developed countries, to encourage transparency efforts in the fight against climate change.
African civil society organizations under the aegis of the Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) to that effect organized an African regional Post COPP22 sensitization workshop in Kampala, Uganda, 19-21 April, 2017 to examine the readiness of African countries and improve on the momentum towards the fund project.
It is also geared at seeking to expand participation, broadening efforts to build partnership with government and other stakeholders, breaking from the past to build stronger and global resilience.
According to Sam Ogallah of PACJA, the sensitization on the cardinality of the GCF was imperative to measure the readiness and highlight the role of civil society organizations in the funding project.
“Civil society organizations have to be accorded the opportunity to be abreast with the operational modalities of the Green Climate Fund to permit them fully participate in the entire project process and also push their governments to make proposals adapted to the realities of their different countries,” Ogallah said.
Participants during one of the sessions examined the goal, objectives, activities and implementation strategies of the Green Climate Fund, the climate finance process at national and international level within the UNFCCC.
Also examined was the outcome and decisions of the just ended 16th Board Meeting of the GCF and the way forward especially for civil society organizations.
According to participants, the GCF was in line with the Paris agreement in COP21. The Paris Agreement implementation they said should go hand in glove with the 2030 Agenda as well as the AU Agenda 2063, “a process which should take the bottom-up approach, be inclusive and transparent.”
It was also noted that the involvement of all stakeholders including government, civil society, development partners, the private sector, youths and women was not only necessary but imperative to drive the agenda to a success.
“It is a partnership of many facets in development in every country,” says Rebecca Muna civil society representative. The participation of the different stakeholders, she says signals the willingness of countries to understand and undertake climate actions that go beyond adaptation and victory for African countries.
Meanwhile the Green Climate Fund (GCF) on Tuesday, April 18, 2017 launched a new web-based guide that provides Partners with detailed information on how to access its resources.
Tagged “GCF 101”, the guide aims to help GCF stakeholders better navigate the many elements of engaging with the Fund. It provides four distinct chapters addressing the different opportunities the Fund provides to help developing countries respond to climate change: These include, Empowering countries; Getting Accredited; Funding projects; and Implementing projects,” the organization stated in its press release.
According to the GCF, each chapter provides a short overview, a simple step-by-step guide explaining how to apply or access the Fund; and a series of frequently asked questions that tease out more information. Through this approach, the guide increases clarity on the Fund’s main processes as well as transparency.
It adds: “GCF 101 uses non-technical language to make GCF processes easy to understand for non-expert audiences. This approach accords with the GCF mandate to support country ownership of climate finance and recognises the personnel capacity challenges facing many of the targets of GCF support – such as Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and African States.
The body notes that, “like the GCF itself, the ‘101’ is a work in progress,” stressing that the guide will be updated and modified as processes evolve.
NAIROBI, Kenya (PAMACC News) - More than 2,000 farmers in Kenya have doubled their yields and reduced the amount of money they used to spend on food during drought after adopting an environmentally friendly farming technology.
Ecological farming, a technology that discourages the use of chemicals and genetic engineering in the farm, enriches the soil by ensuring nutrients and water remains in the soil, according to the Institute of Culture and Ecology (ICE).
Josephine Ndambu, an agronomist working in Eastern Kenya says ecological farming encourages farmers to adopt natural approaches that increase their yields such as agroforestry, soil and water conservation, and planting in enriched pits known as Zai pits.
For instance, she says, when it rains, Zai pits can tap the surface runoff and store it for a long time, enabling the plants to survive prolonged stretches when there is no rainfall. They can also tap top soil being washed away.
“The objective of Zai pits is to break the earth pan, conserve water and enable utilization of manure,” explains Ndambu. “They have high and assured yields and can be used for over three years.”
Peter Mutiso has reason to smile after the technology came to his village. When drought struck, he would spend at least $2 (Ksh. 200) every day to buy food for his family.
After adopting the Zai Pit technology at his one and half acre farm in 2014, he can now harvest more than four 90 kilogramme bags of maize where he could get none.
“This is enough to feed my family up to the next harvest,” says the farmer from Eastern Kenya. “Sometimes I can even sell a bag of the harvest to supplement the family income.”
A report by Greenpeace Africa indicates that the ability of farmers in East Africa to produce food is on the decline due to climate change.
In rural households struggling to feed themselves, even small changes in climate patterns could destroy smallholder farmers’ soil and water security, argues the Building Resilience in East African Agriculture report.
“It is important for rural farmers to learn from each other about ecological farming that uses successful strategies that meets local and domestic needs of different communities,” says Iris Maertens, the interim communication officer at Greenpeace Africa, Food for Life campaign.
YAOUNDÉ, Cameroon (PAMACC News) - The United Nations secretary general António Guterres, on Thursday April 13 appointed Cameroon born Vera Songwe as the new executive secretary of the Economic Commission on Africa, ECA.
Vera Songwe has been the regional director for Africa covering West and Central Africa for the International Finance Corporation since 2015.
Ms. Songwe joined the World Bank Group in 1998 as a young professional. She worked in the Middle East and North Africa region covering Morocco and Tunisia in the Poverty Reduction and Economic Management (PREM) unit. She later joined the East Asia and Pacific region, PREM unit where she played several roles including Regional PRSP Coordinator, and Country Sector Coordinator and Senior Economist for the Philippines. She has also worked Cambodia and on Mongolia as Country Economist managing different World Bank programs and the economic and growth policy dialogue.
Prior to joining the Bank, Ms. Songwe was a Visiting Scholar at the University of Southern California and at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, USA. She has published several articles on governance, fiscal policy, agriculture and commodity price volatility and trade and new financial infrastructure.
Ms. Songwe holds a PhD. in Mathematical Economics from the Center for Operations Research & Econometrics from the Catholic University of Louvain-la-Neuve in Belgium. She holds a BA in Economics and a BA in Political Science from the University of Michigan.
