President Paul Kagame said he hopes the Africa Climate Summit will serve as a good foundation for discussions later this year at COP28.
He was speaking, on Tuesday, September 5, during the opening of the Heads of State session of the Africa Climate Summit taking place from September 4 to 6 in Nairobi, Kenya.
The summit has been considered an opportunity to build momentum and solidarity for the African Agenda at the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference or Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC (COP28) to be held in Dubai, UAE from November 30 to December 12.
“Ultimately what Africa wants is a fair and equal partnership which takes our priorities into account. That is going to be the basis for trust and solidarity,” he said.
He reiterated that Africa continues to carry the burden of rising temperatures despite contributing the smallest share of global greenhouse gas emissions, but stressed that Africa should seek solutions.
“We cannot just keep talking about it without doing what is required to fix the problem. This is unfair but in the long run, playing the blame game is not the answer. A more pragmatic approach is for Africa to be a key player in the search for global climate solutions. Africa stands united and should remain so in this position,” he noted.
Seeking solutions, he said, should be based on the fact that recent findings indicated that July was the hottest month ever recorded in human history.
He praised President William Ruto for his outstanding leadership of the committee of African Heads of State and governments on climate change.
Engaging private sector in green growth
Kagame demonstrated Rwanda’s desire for the private sector to make a more significant contribution to constructing an environmentally friendly economy.
“Our strategy is to position ourselves as an attractive destination for international climate financing and investment. That is why at the COP27, Rwanda launched Ireme Invest, a green investment facility created by Rwanda Green Fund in partnership with the Development Bank of Rwanda,” he said.
“So far, more than $200 million has been mobilised from domestic and international partners including the European Investment Bank and the Green Climate Fund,” he added.
Kagame said Rwanda has also been working closely with the International Monetary Fund as a participant in the resilient and sustainability trust.
“We have access to long-term financing to further integrate climate into our economic policies. This is a good sign that the international community is taking seriously the core to reform our global financial architecture,” the President said.
However, he noted, that there is still room for improvement. “In this context, I welcome the discussions held at the Paris summit for a new global financial pact,” he said, adding that the Bridgetown Initiative spearheaded by the Prime Minister of Barbados also deserves consideration and serious attention.
The Bridgetown Initiative is a proposal to reform the world of development finance, particularly how rich countries help poor countries cope with and adapt to climate change in a climate crisis.
The island’s initiative, led by Prime Minister Mia Mottley, sets out three ways to change how development finance works. At the start of 2023, it was said that rich countries are able to borrow at interest rates of between 1% and 4%, while it’s around 14% for poorer countries.
“Any meaningful structural change must favour debt restructuring and lower interest rates as William Ruto has eloquently explained,” Kagame said.
‘Africa should mobilise its own resources’
Isaias Afwerki, the President of Eritrea stated: “Africa should mobilise its own resources rather than extend hands for handouts that may aggravate the existing situation. Mobilising our resources will enable and motivate our creativity at the level of the continent. I urge everyone not to be attracted by billions being promised by so-called donors. We should mobilise our own resources and get away from this dependency that will definitely compromise everything on the continent.”
President Ruto said that the summit is dedicated exclusively to the transformation of potential into opportunity and the turning of plans to pull Africa and the planet back from the brink of a climate disaster.
“We are already losing between 5-15% of our GDP growth every year to the adverse impacts of climate change,” he said.
He stated: “Africa’s low rates of greenhouse gas emissions must not relegate us to the margins and footnotes of the global climate agenda; Africa must step forward as the cornerstone around which effective climate solutions are built.”
Ruto said Africa’s untapped renewable energy potential along with Africa’s abundant endowment of natural assets, from carbon sinks to arable land and mineral wealth, confer on it the indispensable fundamentals to swiftly become a cost-competitive industrial hub with ample capacity to decarbonise global manufacturing and green the economies of the continent.
He echoed that the Africa Climate Summit is also a global pre-COP28 convention.
“We have therefore committed to concluding this summit with a declaration that firmly encourages everyone to keep their promises, even in hard times, as a matter of justice, to hold each other to account. To collaborate and to innovate,” he said.
