By Nuru Ahmed
The Africa Climate Change Fund (ACCF) has received a commitment of 1 million Euros from the Government of Flanders to support five projects in three African countries: Malawi, Mozambique and South Africa.
In Malawi, the project will contribute to demonstration of an innovative results-based finance model for adaptation to climate change and will be implemented by the Climate Change and Green Growth Department of the African Development Bank.
In Mozambique, the grant will support two projects on “unlocking blended finance and youth/women entrepreneurs for resilient blue-green (or coastal) growth in Mozambique” and promoting “syntrophic agriculture as a strategy to foster resilience, climate adaptation and recovery of vulnerable communities living in degraded marine and coastal ecosystems in Zambezia”. These projects will be implemented by the World Wide Fund for Nature and the Institute of International Economic Cooperation.
In South Africa, the projects seek to support ecosystem-based adaptation and financing for livestock farmers within South Africa’s threatened grassland as well as innovative access modality for the Green Climate Fund; they will be executed by the Birdlife South Africa and South South North.
Simon Calcoen, Policy officer at the Flanders Department of Foreign Affairs, said: “The Government of Flanders looks forward to continue their cooperation on climate change adaptation in Africa”.
The new contribution follows an initial grant of two million Euros to the ACCF in November 2016 from the Flanders government. In early 2017, a total contribution of 11.4 million Euros to the ACCF was converted to a multi-donor trust fund.
Ever since, the ACCF has sustained African Countries in progression to transition towards climate resilient and low-carbon development over a portfolio of eight on-going projects.
This will enable the ACCF to extend its portfolio and geographical coverage and raise its benefits to the population across the African continent.
The renewal of the Flanders aid to the ACCF is an acknowledgment of the impact of ACCF’s work which contributes to the achievement of the African Development Bank’s goal to triple its climate backing to reach US$5 billion annually by 2020, as well as the objectives set up in the Bank’s Climate Change Action Plan (CCAP) 2016-2020 and in the 2013-2022 scheme.
Advancing, the ACCF wishes to secure new funding assistance and scale up its climate finance support to empower African countries to attain the ambitious objectives set out in their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
Contact: g.wanneburg@afdb.org
