Ever since the conferences on the environment have been held at the international level Ethiopia has been an active participant because along with other African countries more or less like Ethiopia, it realizes that climate change has hurt it a lot causing extensive and prolonged damage to its subsistence rain-reliant farmers.
It has been established by extensive research and studies that the less developed countries have had little contribution to how the climate has changed over the decades due to the maximum use of carbon and fossil fuels by the advanced industrial countries and by what they emit from the enormous factories and industrial complexes.
Lately every year, we have been recording the hottest months compared to all other previous years and this has created not affordable property devastations and displacement of millions including the deaths of many more others. The poorer countries have been made to bear the brunt of the major and more serious and more lasting consequences beyond their economic means unless continuously and robustly assisted by the advanced countries admittedly largely responsible for this state of affairs.
African countries and Ethiopia is one of them, have been deeply affected by this phenomenon of climate change destroying their crop harvests due to the continuous aridity or vast inundations with untimely and unexpected very heavy rains. Today, according to every environment academic, the situation is very dangerous as there are clearly evident signs of how the climate has been changed for the worse due to the vast emissions to the atmosphere and the consequent overheating of the earth.
The regular weather conditions that we have known for a long time are now inexistent having been replaced by significant aberrations and unpredictability. Droughts have become more frequent even in traditionally wet countries such as Ethiopia for instance; fires have raged in so many places in the world more commonly and frequently in the western countries burning hundreds of thousands of forests and yet the actions taken to prevent such disasters according to many climate activists have in many cases been too little too late.
Today more than ever before, we are grappling with this serious state of affairs by staging discussion forums at the international level and adopting a new strategy to combat climate change.
Ethiopia has repeatedly shown that it is committed to contributing its part for this cause. At the Baku Conference of Parties, COP29 Ethiopia has taken an active part. The presence of its head of state President Taye Atske Selassie who inaugurated the
The Ethiopian pavilion at the site of the COP29 means a lot. Ethiopia through its prime minister has also called for equity, common but differentiated responsibilities, and historical accountability.
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, (Ph D) has noted that clear and precise definitions of climate finance are essential to track progress with new goals focusing on vulnerable regions, particularly the least developed countries in Africa. The premier said Ethiopia has been advancing its commitment to the Paris Agreement of 2015 and COP28 from last year through several key initiatives.
He talked about the Green Legacy Initiative which has been carried out through the past five years with 40 billion trees planted and in the process has expanded its forest coverage by 6 percent. He also mentioned the irrigated wheat program as another important initiative that has transformed Ethiopia from a grain deficit country forced to import it to one that now harvests in surplus exports wheat and earns foreign currency.
The premier also stated that Ethiopia is carrying out greening its cities with vast parks, green areas, and planted trees along the avenues contributing to a clean and healthy environment. This includes adding to the curriculum of schools and teaching students beginning from their early years the awareness of how to combat climate change and what the contribution of every citizen be such as taking part in all the initiatives of the government including taking an active part in the Green Legacy programs by planting tree seedlings and nurturing them.
Among the initiatives realized must be noted the use of renewable energy, preparing pathways for pedestrians, and the extensive use of electric vehicles which are now a common scene in Addis Ababa. These new initiatives have been extended to other cities besides the capital city.
At the COP29 in Baku scheduled to last from 11 November to 22, 2024, several world leaders, policymakers, and activists were brought together with a renewed commitment to address the worsening condition of climate change. Ethiopia has prepared a pavilion where it was showcasing its programs against climate change and the positive results getting acquired. Many African countries have admired Ethiopia’s achievements in this regard and asked to share its experience with them.
The conference’s main agenda was to seek to increase funding to support lower-income countries in reducing greenhouse emissions. It was stated that finance will be the focus of COP29 and is expected to aim to set a new finance goal that unlocks the trillions of dollars needed and provides confidence that it will be delivered.
Energy supply, human development, food security, and biodiversity have been this year’s other main agenda of the conference. The Ethiopian delegation has been participating actively with high commitment showcasing what it has been undertaking through the past several years. It has been asking for more equitable access to funds for developing countries. Ethiopia’s commitment to rehabilitating degraded lands with forest and the ongoing activities to ensure sustainable land use has been presented at the conference. Ethiopia has asked at this international event for support and partners to expedite its efforts in mitigating the impact of climate change.
Similarly, President of Ethiopia Taye Atske Selassie, present at the conference, has reaffirmed his country’s commitment to the Paris Agreement of 2015 and its being proactive in disaster preparedness. He also urged global action to cap global warming at 1.5-degree centigrade stressing the need for resilience against climate impacts affecting particularly developing countries that lack the finances to cope with the damages and devastation. This situation has been caused activists have stressed, by hostile climatic conditions created by the reckless utilization of certain resources of the earth by the highly industrialized countries creating mass greenhouse gas emissions.
The CPO29 has been deliberating on ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, strengthen financial capacity for climate change, and ensure sustainable climate change with the primary focus being climate finance.
The COP28, COP29, and COP30 presidencies which are called the Troika, have called on the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to mobilize the entire UN System to support Parties, especially developing countries in designing, delivering, and implementing the National Determined Contributions, NDCs. In response to this call, UNECA has been coordinating fortnightly meetings of Pan-African institutions that is the AUC, ECA, AfDB, and AUDA-NEPAD which are mandated by the AU Summit to support Africa’s participation at the global climate change negotiations, logistics support to the African Group of Climate Change Negotiators.
Established in 1992 the UN Framework Conference on Climate Change, UNFCCC treaty arose from the initial findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations to prevent human-driven disruptions to the climate. Since its inception, the UNFCC has underpinned global climate agreements such as the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 and the Paris Agreement of 2015. The convention’s 198 member countries meet annually to assess progress and negotiate collective responses to the climate crisis. This year’s conference in Baku has promised a renewed emphasis on actionable commitments. According to the UNECA at the core of this assistance is the technical backstopping and innovating funding mechanism to drive global progress.
BY FITSUM GETACHEW
The Ethiopian herald November 17/2024
