Financing the Energy Transition in the Global South | Harvard Climate Symposium Panel
This panel examined financing the energy transition in Africa in the context of climate change. To understand the needs in Africa’s energy transition and the urgency of funding, it is important that we understand the face of climate change in Africa. Extreme weather events have increased in frequency in Africa. In the Horn of Africa, four consecutive years of failed rains have left millions facing famine, uprooting farming, and herding communities. Floods devastated KwaZulu Natal and Nigeria in 2022, causing massive destruction to property and lives. Thirty of Nigeria’s thirty-six states lay underwater. Cyclones have increased in frequency in southeast Africa, wreaking havoc on Mozambique and neighboring countries. African economies are primarily agrarian, dependent on farming, livestock herding, and fishing. Resource extraction by multinational or foreign companies has devastated the African environment, rendering large areas in Nigeria’s Niger Delta unfit for farming or fishing. The nature of Africa’s economies has major implications for how it responds to climate change, the appropriateness of adaptation or mitigation strategies, and Africa’s incapacity to finance its energy transition.
Fri, May 26, 2023
