Building and financing climate-resilient agriculture and food systems in Africa

30 June 2022. Building and financing climate-resilient agriculture and food systems in Africa.

Organised by E3G, an independent climate change think tank and co-founder of London Climate Action Week, and WRI, co-lead of the Food and Land Use Coalition, about ongoing efforts to build and finance climate-resilient agricultural systems in Africa:

• Strategies, plans, and activities being implemented to build agricultural resilience in Africa.
• Building and financing climate-resilient agricultural systems in Africa.
• How African institutions can set a bar for action at COP27 on food and agriculture, and how they can move beyond COP27.

Speakers:

The panellists highlighted ongoing efforts to build and finance climate-resilient agricultural systems in Africa including:

• Moderator: Ed Davey, International Engagement Director of the Food and Land Use Coalition
• Dr. Yemi Akinbamijo, Executive Director FARA
  Dr. Yemi Akinbamijo, sketched a roadmap, presenting the African Climate Smart Agricultural (ACSA) Framework. The ACSA Framework, developed in support of the AU Climate Change Strategy, aims to drive emissions mitigation and guide meaningful climate-resilient agricultural activities in Africa.
• Susan Chomba, Director of Vital Landscapes, WRI Africa
  Susan Chomba emphasised the urgent need to address both the ongoing humanitarian food crisis in Africa and the longer-term project to build climate-resilient food systems. She highlighted three areas of work including: integrating the food and land restoration agendas, addressing food loss and waste – estimated at $40 billion lost annually, more than Africa receives in food aid each year, and identifying the role of trade within Africa to enable food access.
• Andrew Mude, Lead – Agri-SME Development and Innovative Finance AFDB
  Andrew Mude  emphasised the need for NDCs and NAPs to include clear food system indicators to enable climate finance for resilient food system action. He pointed to AfDB President Adesina as a champion of integrating food and climate change policy, the Bank’s commitment to ensure 50% of approved deployments are climate-finance compatible, and that 50% of these resources go towards adaptation projects.
• Ann Vaughan, Senior Advisor for Climate Change, USAID Bureau for the Resilience and Food Security
  Ann Vaughan referenced President Biden’s recent G7 announcement of $2.67 billion in US government funding to address food insecurity, particularly in African countries exposed to food system shocks. She flagged the expansion of the Feed the Future Programme to an additional 7 African countries and the US for the Agricultural Innovation Mission for Climate (AIM4C), calling for the submission of innovation sprints.
• Monika Froehler, Chief Executive Officer of the Ban Ki-moon Centre for Global Citizens
  Monika Foehler of the Ban Ki-moon Centre closed the event by setting clear expectations for COP27, highlighting the opportunity to build and finance agricultural and food system resilience, in the context of the climate crisis.

Question asked by Francesco RAMPA of ECDPM:

Is there coordination and Policy Coherence between the new $1.5 billion African Emergency Food Production Facility (focused on fertilizer) and the 25bn Africa Adaptation Acceleration Program? Too much or inefficient use of fertilizer can harm food systems resilience. 

• The African Emergency Food Production Facility. The African Development Bank Group's Board
  
  of Directors approved in May 2022 a $1.5 billion facility to help African countries avert a looming food crisis. It will provide 20 million African smallholder farmers with certified seeds. It will increase access to agricultural fertilizers and enable them to rapidly produce 38 million tons of food. This is a $12 billion increase in food production in just two years.
• The Africa Adaptation Acceleration Program (AAAP) is a joint initiative of the African Development Bank and the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA). It aims to mobilize $25 billion, over five years, to accelerate and scale climate adaptation action across the continent. The AAAP was endorsed at the Leaders' Dialogue on the Africa Covid-Climate Emergency in April 2021. This was the largest gathering ever of African Heads of State and Government solely focused on adaptation.

Answer of Andrew Mude, Lead – Agri-SME Development and Innovative Finance AFDB

@ 46:26 in the YouTube recording

"Carbon Markets are hugely important for Africa. Some countries such as Gabon have and instrument called Carbon bond which is based on regulations and a set of instruments which are meant to secure the Gabonese forests and its great capacity  to act as a mitigate and be able to price this out in the market. The Great Green Wall could similarly be monetised for the Carbon Market. (...) Investments in data systems are crucial"

Related:

23/06/2022 INTERVIEW: Africa needs up to $1.6 trillion in climate finance until 2030.

Kevin Urama, the acting chief economist and vice president for economic governance and knowledge

management at the African Development Bank (AfDB), attended the third edition of the Aswan Forum for Sustainable Peace and Development that was held in Cairo (21-22/06/2022).

The forum discussed Egypt’s preparations to host the UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP27) and explored ways to deal with the ongoing global challenges that affect the peace and security in the continent.

“Adapting to climate change is projected to cost the continent at least $50 billion annually by 2050 to adequately implement its national determined contributions (NDCs). Africa will need a cumulative climate finance of up to $1.6 trillion between 2020 and 2030. This translates into an average of $128 billion annually during that period,” 

"The African Economic Outlook 2022 the AfDB released in May 2022 shows that the structure, flow, and scale of the current global climate finance mirror the present global finance architecture, making it difficult for the most vulnerable African countries to effectively tap climate resilience opportunities."

“The structure is complicated and loosely defined, with multiple, and rapidly evolving sources, instruments, channels, and financing mechanisms. Several development finance instruments are therefore increasingly deployed as climate finance in Africa. For instance, debt instruments constituted two-thirds of all climate finance to African countries between 2011 and 2019. Some 33 percent of this was non-concessional. This raises concerns about further debt vulnerability rise in Africa and potential trade-offs with other sustainable development goals (SDGs) financing commitments and mechanisms,”

"There is a compelling need for a clearer definition, better coordination, and harmonisation of climate finance requirements, while the climate finance commitments should be new and additional. Moreover, the current scale of climate finance is misaligned with nationally determined contributions and SDGs financing requirements in Africa,"

“To adequately implement its NDCs, Africa will need a cumulative climate finance of up to $1.6 trillion between 2020 and 2030. This translates into an average of $128 billion annually during that period." 

"Currently, Africa receives about $18.3 billion per year in global climate finance. In addition, climate finance received by Africa from developed countries would be even smaller if multilateral development banks (MDB) resources are deducted. In total, MDBs committed about $66 billion in climate finance in 2020 – of which $50 billion (or 76 percent) are directed towards mitigation."

"This leaves an average climate financing gap of $108 billion per year during this period. With the current trends, Africa’s conditional nationally determined contributions will not be delivered. The implications of not achieving the NDCs in Africa for global sustainability are obvious – the global climate goals will not be achieved,”

 "African countries need to expand and deepen the utilisation of innovative financing instruments, such as green bonds and loans, sustainability or sustainability-linked bonds and loans, debt-for-climate swaps, blended finance, more efficient and better-priced carbon markets, realignment of perverse subsidies and other progressive tax instruments, as well as financial stability mechanisms to protect their economies from future climate shocks."

"Vlimate change is the most pressing existential threat to economic development, social progress, peace, and security in Africa, which is the second most climate vulnerable region of the world, next to South Asia. The continent also shows the least climate readiness and is the least climate-resilient region in the world."

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