African Major Groups’ Dialogue at the Sidelines of the AMCEN

Dakar, Senegral 11 – 12 September 2022: The Resumed Eighteenth Session of the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN) holds in Dakar, Senegal from 12th to 16th September 2022 under the theme, “Securing people’s well-being and ensuring environmental sustainability in Africa”.

The emphasis of this year’s session is the need for people-centered recovery through environmentally friendly actions that both create jobs and improve livelihoods. The 2020 session was held virtually because of the COVID-19 pandemic and this significantly affected participation of stakeholders and especially the major groups. This is the rationale for holding the 2022 session in person.

The Resumed Eighteenth Session of the AMCEN is happening against the backdrop of the triple planetary crisis – climate, biodiversity and pollution – that the world is facing. Globally, there are calls for urgent and transformative action to address these crises.

The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Assessment Report made it clear that there is a narrowing window of opportunity for action and “opportunities for climate resilient development are not equitably distributed around the world”. 

Despite its relatively low contribution to greenhouse gasses, Africa remains the most vulnerable continent to climate change impacts, with poverty, water, food & energy insecurity, vulnerable urban environments, degraded ecosystems and rural environments, facing no climate challenges that inhibit climate resilient development and are further exacerbated by climate change.

Biodiversity in Africa is on a decline trend, with ongoing losses of species and habitats, driven by a combination of human-induced factors. Air pollution is a major threat that needs to be addressed too with a UNEP report indicating that air pollution was responsible for about 383,419 deaths across Africa in 20191.

In addition, Africa loses an estimated 1.2 million people prematurely due to open burning of waste and other air pollutants even as many of Africa’s fast-growing cities face inadequate waste management and landfill facilities.

Land degradation and desertification continue to threaten Africa’s resilience and survival, affect social security, communities, and cause migration and insecurity problems with women, children, and the vulnerable suffering the most. Africa’s implementation of the UNCCD CoP15 outcomes on accelerating restoration of degraded lands, boosting drought resilience, enhancing women involvement in land management, and promoting decent land-based jobs for youth are key to reversing the trend and achieving Agenda 2063 on the Africa We Want and the SDGs.

The Pan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) fraternity warmly welcomes the commitment by African Environment Ministers to step-up the continent’s response to accelerate the green and sustainable recovery programme to tackle the triple planetary crisis at the 18th session of the AMCEN in Nairobi, in September 2021.

However, it was noted that the growing concern among member states and other stakeholders about the slow pace in implementation of AMCEN decisions. This is characterized by the lack of adequate translation of policies, strategies and plans into implemented actions, and in some cases by the lack of the development of policies at the national level.

One example of the latter is the preparation and submission of National Adaptation Plans (NAP). Unsustainable patterns of consumption and production, degraded ecosystems, and environment-related matters largely remain just cross-cutting issues at national level. Adequate political will, commitment and leadership on environment-related issues still lacks though AMCEN has been promoting them since its establishment. There is a need to take stock on why this is so by having a monitoring framework to track this trend.

PACJA further notes and welcomes the urgency of addressing the need to strengthen and enhance implementation of AMCEN decisions in the post-COVID-19 era, including the Africa Green Stimulus Programme, by both the Expert and Ministerial segments of the forthcoming resumed Eighteenth session of the AMCEN in Dakar, Senegal.

This year, the ministers will focus on reviewing environmental challenges and opportunities that presents itself in Africa in the post-Covid-19 era and consider other issues related to sustainable development in the continent. The ministers will also develop policy guidance for the effective participation of the Africa region in the upcoming key global environmental events, including the UNFCCC COP 27 in Egypt in November and the Fifteenth session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (UNCBD-COP15) in Montreal, Canada in December.

Discussion on the outcomes of UNEA 5.2, UNCBD and the past UNCCD COP15 will also be a top agenda.

As the ministers focus on these agenda items, the Major groups also convenes under the theme Securing people’s well-being and ensuring environmental sustainability in Africa to assert the need to establish a robust, clear and transparent Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) mechanism that will regularly track progress, assess results of implementation of the agreed decisions at regional and national level, and document best practices. Further, the group will seek to strengthen resource mobilization strategies at AMCEN and national level. At country level, Member States will be asked to enhance their resource mobilization, innovative domestic resource mobilization and diversification of sources;

• Engagement of all stakeholders by packaging environment-related initiatives into investment portfolio; and strengthen capacity to access multilateral funds for environment-related initiatives;
• Member States to enhance implementation and enhance alignment of AMCEN decisions to global environmentrelated process such as UNEA, and the UNFCCC and UNCBD COPs;
• Enhance strategic partnership with African MGS to leverage on their technical expertise, financial resources, expanding stakeholders reach and link with communities who are the main implementers;
• States should provide conducive environment for African MGS to engage from planning, implementation to monitoring and evaluation at both national and regional levels.

Target Audience

The regional consultation meeting will bring together African Major Groups and Stakeholders (MGS) accredited to UNEP, non-accredited regional MGS partners, UN Environment staff, and resource people relevant to the conference’s theme.

The consultation is targeting 60 participants who will participate physically with another 200 participants engaging virtually.

Objectives of the Meeting

The scope of the two-day consultative meeting is for the African Major Groups and Stakeholders is to prepare their inputs for the next session of the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN) and issue around the four themes indicated above. The outcome of the meeting will be a regional statement by civil society, which will constitute the information document to the UN Environment Assembly. The first day will be dedicated to discussions around the African aspiration for COP 27.

Expected Outcomes:

• Key messages for the next session of the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN) in line with this years’ theme.
• Inclusion of the key messages from the African Major Groups and Stakeholders to the AMCEN, which will also serve as background information to the Conference with specific recommendations pertaining to:
• strengthening partnerships and collaboration between governments and major groups and stakeholders for implementation b improved resource mobilization;
• exploring the benefits of multilevel governance and meaningful participation of all levels of government and their stakeholders for effective, efficient, and inclusive implementation of the decisions of the AMCEN;
• developing a clear and structured monitoring, review and reporting mechanism for the implementation of AMCEN decisions; and dealing with the triple planetary crisis (see suggestion below biodiversity & multilevel governance).
• A statement from the major groups on UNFCCC COP 27 and UNCBD COP15 detailing the aspiration of African major groups and their contribution to UNEA 6.
• A call to Parties to support the adoption of the renewed decision and Plan of Action, as well as supporting a rights-based approach to the conservation, sustainable use and benefit-sharing of biodiversity in the new framework.
• To develop collaborative strategies through which the African MGS can contribute to enhancing implementation of the AMCEN decisions and mechanisms for ensuring accountability, mobilization of meaningful partnerships, and good governance