EU's green new deal and Africa

Business Daily

BBC

Business

4.4 • 816 Ratings

🗓️ 9 November 2021

⏱️ 18 minutes

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Summary

Will Africa’s economic development be held back for the world’s net zero climate targets? And could banning investment in their fossil fuels do more harm than good? Tamasin Ford speaks to NJ Ayuk, the executive chair of the energy industry lobby group, Africa Energy Chamber who says the decision is a disaster for countries in Africa and to W.Gyude Moore, a Senior Policy Fellow at the Centre for Global Development and Liberia's former Minister of Public Works who says Africa can’t catch up without fossil fuels. Dr Olumide Abimbola, is the Executive Director of the Africa Policy Research Institute, a Berlin based think tank that works on Africa policy issues. He’s in Glasgow for the climate talks and Tamasin asked him whether there’s a fear the EU Green deal could restrict goods from Africa. And Adenike Oladosu, one of Nigeria’s youth delegates in Glasgow says people in her country do want to go green but it’s just not affordable.

Pic: Smoke emerging from chimneys Credit: Alexandros Margos/Getty

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, I'm Tamerson Ford. Welcome to Business Daily from the BBC.
0:06.4	Ending investment in fossil fuels seems the smart way to go. But what does that mean for countries in Africa?
0:13.9	It will be a tsunami, massive austerity. I would not be surprised to seeing similar style Arab Spring demonstrations because of bad
0:24.2	climate policies that are affecting a lot of young people in the continent.
0:28.7	Sub-Saharan Africa is responsible for less than half of one percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions.
0:35.7	So is a pledge to ban investment in fossil fuel projects a climate-smart
0:41.0	solution? It seems unfair that the people least responsible for the crisis are forced to bear
0:48.3	the brunt of the cost of transition. It is just morally wrong. As world leaders continue to thrash out climate change policies at the UN summit in Glasgow,
0:58.9	we find out what ending fossil fuel investment means for countries in Africa.
1:04.5	That's in Business Daily on the BBC.
1:09.3	We're already seeing climate change pledges come out of COP 26, the UN summit in Glasgow, that's still going on this week.
1:17.3	More than 20 countries and financial institutions have pledged to end funding for fossil fuel development overseas from next year.
1:26.1	However, the countries involved, like the UK, the US and Canada,
1:30.9	will still be allowed to continue to develop their own fossil fuel projects. Is that fair? And what
1:38.2	does it mean for the emerging countries who need that investment? NJ. Ayuk is the executive chair of the energy industry lobby group, Africa Energy Chamber.
1:49.2	He says the decision is a disaster for countries in Africa.
1:53.7	It will be a tsunami, massive austerity, and let me be very clear,
1:59.9	you're going to see political unrest because you're going to lost jobs.
2:05.1	Africa is going to be the first casualty of bad climate policies coming from Western countries.
2:12.7	You're already seen that in Mali, Guinea-Connor Cray, in Chad, and in Sudan.
2:18.6	When you can provide energy and jobs and opportunity, you're going to see more austerity.
2:26.8	They cannot finance it.
	...

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