UNITED CITIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS OF AFRICA (UCLGA)

Capacity Building (CB) and Development 

Ref: CB11 - Climate Change and Environmental Sustainability

Purpose and Description

At global level concerns about climate change have hinged on the relationship between carbon emissions and the depletion of the ozone layer and the subsequent ramifications. Focus has been on how major industrialized nations should seriously take steps to reduce carbon emissions. However, for developing countries, it is the devastating effects that climate change is reeking on agricultural production, environmental degradation, energy and the effects of consequential disasters such as floods and droughts. Local governments are at the forefront of service provision, being responsible for local governance, housing, infrastructure development, and other basic services provision. The negative impacts of climate change are more devastatingly felt by poor communities in Africa as a result of such consequences as droughts, flooding, loss of income due to declining agricultural production, and the advent of new diseases. However, African local governments are ill-prepared to deal with the vagaries brought about by climate change. In order to address this situation, the UCLGA will undertake the following:

1. Establish a think-tank through which the UCLGA can position itself and develop its own plans to drive the process of sustainable energy development, carbon mitigation and management of climate change. 
2. Engage national and regional governments with a view to gaining recognition of UCLGA as a valuable partner in the development and implementation of sustainable energy and to adapt to climate change.
3. Work with national associations of local government together with civil society and similar organisations to develop capacity and expertise in sustainable energy development and adaptation to the impact of climate change.
4. Help capacitate local governments to be informed and take corrective measures including the enactment of necessary legislative to control and regulate activities that impact on climate change and sustainable energy.
5. Build lobbying capacity for sustainable energy development and the proactive management of climate change.
6.  Support the development of linkages and local diplomacy focusing on interventions in climate change and sustainable energy development.
7. Engage regional bodies and relevant international organisations such as the World Mayors’ Council on Climate Change and the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) Africa to build coalitions to push the climate change management agenda more effectively.
8. Identify, and promote the implementation of, energy conservation, relevant technologies and alternative energy supply sources.