eBusiness Weekly
HARARE – The European Union has availed a Euro 7, 1 million grant to the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa) to implement climate change resilience programmes within member countries.
The funding is part of the larger Global Climate Change Alliance (GCCA) Intra-African, Caribbean and Pacific program worth Euro 70 million, to be dispersed among ACP countries and regions. The European Union established the GCCA in 2007 to strengthen dialogue and cooperation with developing countries, in particular least developed countries (LDCs) and small island developing States (SIDS).
It started its work in just four pilot countries. Today it has a budget of more than Euro 300 million and is one of the most significant climate initiatives in the world. The GCCA supports 51 programs around the world and is active in 38 countries, 8 regions and sub-regions and at the global level. In a statement, Comesa said the program was being funded by the 11th European Development Fund.
“This programme is a successor of Intra-ACP GCCA Programme funded with a grant of Euro 4 million from the 10th European Development Fund and was implemented from July 2010 to December 2014,” it said.
“The overall objective of the proposed action is to increase the resilience of the Comesa region to climate change and achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals in particular Goal 13 in order to reduce poverty and promote sustainable development.”
SDG number 13 seeks to take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts. Other objectives of the program include improving regional and national adaptation and mitigation responses to climate change. The funding is envisaged to help overcome challenges faced by Comesa countries at operational, institutional and financial levels.
“The program will contribute positively to the mitigation and adaptation efforts of Comesa member states and ensure their full participation in regional and global efforts to combat climate change.
“Furthermore, the program will strengthen the capacity of member states to access climate finance for their mitigation and adaptation projects,” it said.
“In implementing the program, Comesa will work in close collaboration with its member states, government agencies, Non-state actors, Community Based Organizations, academia and other key stakeholders.”
The program interventions will also contribute to the conservation of biodiversity by applying ecosystem-based solutions to climate change adaption and disaster risk reduction. Zimbabwe, which is a member of Comesa, has in the recent past experienced the effects of climate change including droughts and heavy flooding, disasters that have caused the loss of both human and animal life.
In its efforts to deal with the phenomenon, Zimbabwe has signed the Paris Agreement on climate change which was adopted by Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change at COP21 in Paris, France in 2015.
Under the agreement countries set their own greenhouse gas emission reduction targets with the objective of limiting global temperature rise to below two degrees Celsius and, given the grave risks of continued warming, to strive for 1.5 degrees Celsius. – New Ziana
