Africa calls for more funds from the international community to adapt to climate change

African leaders and activists are pressing the international community to do more to help the poorest and most vulnerable nations adapt to climate change, based on evidence showing that the African continent is the one most threatened by the effects of global warming.

The president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and president of the African Union, Felix Tshisekedi, declared that other parts of the world must contribute half of the 25,000 million dollars that the continent needs to carry out an adaptation program during the next five years.

The rest will come from the African Development Bank.

Tshisekedi spoke at a summit on Africa at the UN climate conference in the Scottish city of Glasgow on Tuesday.

He was one of several leaders who highlighted the difficult situation Africa is going through in the face of climate change, despite being the continent with the least responsibility for global greenhouse gas emissions.

Tshisekedi stressed that the global effort against climate change “will not be fruitful unless it is fruitful in Africa”, where 1.3 billion people live.

The 54 African countries contribute just 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

“It is a starting point rather than a limit, and it will help build trust,” Tshisekedi said of the $ 12.5 billion that Africa needs to raise for climate adaptation projects.

He also said he hoped the money would be raised before the next annual climate conference, to be held in Africa.

World leaders are already committing to adaptation tasks, and it remains to be seen how much will be set aside for Africa by the end of the two weeks of the Glasgow conference.

Meanwhile, some African leaders and activists are lobbying, pointing out that a previous promise to raise $ 100 billion for Africa was never fulfilled.

“We don’t need more data. We need more financing, ”said African Development Bank President Akinwumi Adesina.

Patrick Verkooijen, executive director of the Netherlands-based Global Center on Adaptation, said the situation for Africa is “adapt or die,” noting that the effects of climate change “are at Africa’s doors today.”

The International Rescue Committee said Tuesday that in Somalia and other African countries in which it operates, the population is facing “the most acute part of the climate crisis,” including emergency conditions derived from current levels of global warming.

The international community must invest in climate resilience and in preventing famines, the humanitarian group said in a statement.

In Somalia, for example, 3.5 million people face the possibility of starvation after a failed harvest, and farmers who depend on livestock see their animals die of thirst every day, said Kurt Tjossem, the group’s vice president for East Africa. , in said statement.