The Durban agreement through the eyes of an African

This week, negotiations on the global agreement have centred on the idea of historical responsibility. Debates have raged around a repeated call to ensure that countries with the greatest historical emissions, have the greatest moral cost to pay. However, of course not everyone agrees. Especially not developed countries who have the greatest climactic debt.

The G-77/China and the African group, for instance, have been very vocal on the need to centre the negotiations on this idea of historical equity. Kenya on behalf of African Group felt that there is no clear reference of the draft text to equity, CBDR, leadership by developed countries and development priorities. The feeling is that the text is vague in terms of highlighting the need to strengthen the capacity of developing countries since according to the convention, developed countries need to take the lead. They feel like emphasis on means of implementation (MoI) should be added in the text as a precondition for action cannot be wished away.

Another issue of discussion to note is that a number of groups would like to see a clear distinction between adaptation and loss and damage. According to Saudi Arabia (on behalf of least developed countries)

“Loss and damage is going beyond adaptation. It is something between adaptation and mitigation and therefore the two should be separated”.

Parties from the developing countries are also pushing for finance and capacity building for adaptation. However, capacity building did not manage to get through and had to be pushed to June, 2015!

From an African citizen’s eye…

The emphasis of negotiations should be anchored on the UN convention, which clearly states the need for climate action based on historical emissions. There is a huge difference between developed and developing countries in terms of levels of all the  greenhouse gasses they have pumped out, and the gap is just as wide when i comes to their capacity to tackle global climate issues. Most developing countries continue to grapple with the impacts of climate change due to a history that has seen developed countries pump a lot of emissions into the atmosphere. Given the binding nature of the convention, parties are obliged to stick to its provisions.

Africa’s level of vulnerability to climate change is so evident. Despite this, most African countries have already put in measures to enhance resilience and adapt to climate change through the national adaptation plans (NAPs) and working on climate change policies that would address these issues. Kenya, for instance, is one of the very few countries that have an elaborate climate change strategy in place and it is in the final stages of drafting a climate change bill. These are examples of national level efforts and commitments geared towards ‘solving’ the climate change conundrum.

Barren land in Africa

The biggest issue here in Africa is turning concepts into reality. To do that, we need more money on the table, support through improved technologies to help adapt and eventually mitigate climate change, and we need to massively increase the levels of awareness. Developing countries are already dealing with other challenges, many of which are linked to climate change challenges such as food insecurity and drought. However, with just support, developing countries can indeed push their limits and positively work towards building the resilience of vulnerable communities in adapting to climate change.

As the negotiations in Lima steer towards achieving a global agreement, the wish of an African like me is that the process will yield results that are all-inclusive, and take on board the aspirations of the developing countries.