“Africa can become a leader in the energy transition,” says COP26. The United Nations Climate Summit, COP26, began on Sunday in Glasgow, Scotland. It’s been dubbed “the top of the final opportunity” by many. The goal is to keep global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius or less.
However, for some countries, this will be excessive.
IUCN’s Regional Coordinator on Coastal and Ocean Resilience is Thomas Sberna.
He is based in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi. He offers us an overview of the continent’s climate emergency.
“There will be areas of the continent where temperatures will rise one and a half times faster than the rest of the earth, where there will be a lot of drought and even large floods that will directly affect local populations, agriculture, economic activities, and ecosystems on a daily basis.”
During extreme droughts, this implies less drinking water, affecting people’s health and perhaps their lives. In addition, agriculture will produce far less, resulting in more and more repeated famines. It also impacts natural ecosystems that provide sustenance for these local communities, such as coastal fisheries. They’ll have fewer and fewer opportunities to use these resources. As a result, their lives are immediately impacted.
Is it still feasible to go backward in these circumstances?
The truth is that there is no way to go back in time. The climate has a form of inertia, which implies that whatever has already been emitted will impact the climate for hundreds of years.
The reality is that we still have a very small window of chance to avert the worst-case scenario. This does not mean that we will move backward, but rather that we will avoid circumstances that would be painful for local populations, with disastrous consequences for the continent and the rest of the world.
When survival is the top goal, it’s tough to focus on environmental issues. Even though Africa produces the least greenhouse gas emissions, it is being pushed to make the same efforts as other continents that have developed on fossil fuels.
Africa, according to some, should be allowed to catch up.
Europe has already gone too far with a system that no longer works and is unsustainable, as we can see. So we’ll have to go backward and modify everything about how we live to get back on track.
Because Africa is not yet fully committed to this route, moving to a more environmentally friendly energy system will be considerably easier. Furthermore, Africa has a significant edge in terms of its youth and average population age. A population that is also proactive, committed, and conscious of these concerns, with the energy and drive to take charge of its destiny.
There are now all of the ingredients in place for Africa to take the lead on this issue.
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