Five things to know for Africa Climate Week
The United Nations’ Africa Climate Week begins on Monday in Libreville, Gabon, with more than 1,000 participants expected to tackle the climate emergency as it intensifies throughout the continent.
With severe drought, raging floods, and extreme weather bearing down on Africa’s 54 nations, the five-day meeting will focus on the major elements required to lessen the dangerous effects of the rapidly changing climate.
“Climate week will explore resilience to climate risks, the transition to a low-emission economy, and environmental protection,” says the UN.
Below are five things to know about the climate emergency as it affects the African countries that are the least responsible for the crisis, but are set to pay the highest price.
Deadly drought
The consequences of severe drought for Ethiopia, Somalia, and parts of Kenya continue to worsen.
Somalia risks another famine following one a decade ago that killed hundreds of thousands of people. About 250,000 people died of hunger in the country, half of them children, between 2010 and 2012.
“In Ethiopia, Kenya, and Somalia, we are on the brink of an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe,” said Guleid Artan, director of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) Climate Prediction and Applications Centre, the World Meteorological Organization’s regional climate centre for East Africa, last week.
More than 80 million people in Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Uganda are currently estimated to be food insecure. Read More...
