Impact Of Climate Change On The Economic Development Of Africa

To understand any discussion on the issues of climatic change one much first be conversant with some of the key components of climatic change. These components are deforestation, desertification, droughts, freshwater usage, water pollution, greenhouse gas emission (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases), air pollution, water and refuse waste disposal, land use (e.g. agriculture, mining and bush burning), energy use (oil and industrial processes), and electricity production (see, World Bank, 2008). Out of all these components, the concentration of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases) is the main cause of climate change. For instance, in 2005, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases contributed 77 per cent, 14 per cent, 8 per cent, and 1 per cent emissions respectively in the world (World Resources Institute, cited in World Bank, 2008). And in 2004, 79.2 per cent of carbon dioxide emissions in sub-Saharan Africa were from solid fuel consumption, while South Asia and Europe had 32.7 and 27.5 per cents respectively. In Nigeria, the greenhouse gas emission was 0.3 per cent (World Bank, 2008). In the realisation of this and the need to address the issue of climate change, several climates and environmental conventions/conferences were held. Prominent among them were the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 1992, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) in 1994, the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in 2009, the Paris Agreement (COP21) in 2015, the Kigali Amendment in 2016, the Katowice Climate Change Conference (COP24) in 2018, and the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP25) in 2019. A follow-up to these conventions/conferences were several initiatives such as the Great Green Wall in 2007, the African Climate Policy Centre in 2010, the Africa Climate Change Fund (ACCF) in 2014 and the Africa Adaptive Initiative in 2015 (see, CFR, nd; UPSC, nd; United Nations, 2015).