COVID-19 lessons offer hope for global efforts to address climate change impacts
Lessons learned from the global response to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic give positive signals on how the world can deal with the devastating impacts of climate change. In a contribution to an ECA publication on COVID-19, the African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC) of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) says while momentum on climate action may be hampered by the ongoing coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis, the way the world has responded to the pandemic may help the global response in dealing with the existential threat of climate change. In terms of mobilizing private sector finance, the ECA’s SDG7 Initiative for Africa, which is already being piloted in a few countries, can support African countries to review their NDCs to increase bankable clean energy actions that could be fully financed from private sector resources. This is particularly relevant and timely in 2020 as all Parties to the Paris Agreement are required to submit revised or new NDCs. COVID-19, as a zoonotic disease, is a harbinger of things to come in the absence of urgent global actions to tackle climate change, which may claim a lot more people than recent pandemics, says the ACPC, especially as rural-urban migration continues and climate change continues to cause loss of natural habitats and force humans to encroach more into these habitats for energy and other needs.
| Format: | Press release biblioteca |
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| Language: | eng |
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2020-04
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10855/44604 |
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| Summary: | Lessons learned from the global response to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic give positive signals on how the world can deal with the devastating impacts of climate change. In a contribution to an ECA publication on COVID-19, the African Climate Policy Centre (ACPC) of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) says while momentum on climate action may be hampered by the ongoing coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis, the way the world has responded to the pandemic may help the global response in dealing with the existential threat of climate change. In terms of mobilizing private sector finance, the ECA’s SDG7 Initiative for Africa, which is already being piloted in a few countries, can support African countries to review their NDCs to increase bankable clean energy actions that could be fully financed from private sector resources. This is particularly relevant and timely in 2020 as all Parties to the Paris Agreement are required to submit revised or new NDCs. COVID-19, as a zoonotic disease, is a harbinger of things to come in the absence of urgent global actions to tackle climate change, which may claim a lot more people than recent pandemics, says the ACPC, especially as rural-urban migration continues and climate change continues to cause loss of natural habitats and force humans to encroach more into these habitats for energy and other needs. |
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