Africa facing crisis in funding for climate adaptation- Report

The Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) says Africa is facing a critical shortfall in funding climate adaptation.

The Netherlands-based center engages in policy activities, research, communications, and technical assistance to governments and the private sector.

Founded on Sept. 18, 2018, it also engages in policy development, research, advocacy, communications, and partnerships.

Its Chief Executive Officer, Prof. Patrick Verkooijen, made the declaration about the state of adaptation in Africa on Friday in a report on the "State and Trends in Adaptation in Africa 2022."

He stated that cumulative adaptation finance up to 2030 would come to less than one-quarter of the estimated needs stated by African countries in their National Determined Contributions (NDCs).

The only thing that would guarantee against this was for more funding to be secured for climate adaptation, he added.

"In 2019 and 2020, an estimated 11.4 billion dollars were committed to climate adaptation finance in Africa."

"More than 97 percent of the funds came from public sources and less than 3 percent from the private sector."

"This is significantly less than the estimated 52.7 billion dollars African countries will need up to 2030," he said.

The report made some recommendations to increase the volume and efficacy of adaptation finance flows to Africa over the coming decade.

"Financial institutions must mainstream resilience into the investments that they are making."

"`Policy makers and other stakeholders must build the enabling environment for adaptation investments."

"Financial innovation for adaptation must match country-level policy and market conditions," he added.

Verkooyen said that adaptation finance was scaling too slowly to close the investment gap in Africa, even as the costs of inaction rose.

"As we look forward to COP27, we must generate a breakthrough on finance for climate adaptation," he stressed.

COP27 is the UN climate change conference to be held Nov. 6–18 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.

"AU's Africa Adaptation Acceleration Programme is the best vehicle we have to ensure the adaptation investment shortfall in Africa is met with action from all available sources, including the private sector," Verkooyen stated.

Also speaking during the launch of the report, Nigeria's Hajia Amina Mohammed, Deputy Secretary-General of the UN, said COP27 must be a turning point.

"Developed countries must put forward credible plans to double adaptation finance to reach 40 billion dollars a year by 2025.

"The Secretary-General has called for a new business model to deliver adaptation finance by turning adaptation priorities into pipelines of investment for projects," she said.

In his remarks, Nigeria's Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank Group, said the GCA was doing incredible work in mapping out needs and how to make climate-resilient infrastructure.

"Already the upstream financing facility at the GCA is doing so much analytical work to support countries in building climate resilience into their infrastructure.

"It is also working around agriculture and to mainstream climate finance into national institutions but also into the financing of large multilateral development banks," he said.