President Hage Geingob has called on leaders of developed nations at the United Nations (UN) climate conference to support developing countries by capitalising on the Green Climate Fund.

He said the “African COP” offers another opportunity for the international community to bring its full weight behind efforts at ensuring we meet our global climate mitigation targets.

The Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC COP27) is taking place in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. The two-day climate implementation summit, attended by world leaders, kicked off the 27th United Nations climate change conference (COP27), hosted by Egypt, who holds the COP27 presidency.

Delivering the country’s statement yesterday, Geingob said only US$23 billion have been committed so far, which he regrets, but added that he is confident that “the African COP” will serve as a potential tipping point for greater consensus, resulting in the mobilisation of support in practice. “The Climate emergency remains one of the key challenges facing humanity. It is a test of the multilateral system. However, it offers an opportunity to justify the unique purpose of the multilateral system. Namibia joins the rest of the developing world and a broader community of nations in appealing for sustained efforts towards meeting the global target of warming by 1.5C,” said Geingob.

Furthermore, Geingob said Namibia would continue to strengthen its efforts towards greening the country’s energy economy through ongoing efforts to support a nascent green hydrogen industry.

He said, through national green hydrogen efforts, Namibia remains well positioned to become a major supplier of clean and green energy to the world.

“Our green hydrogen agenda, which is premised on harnessing cleaner sources of energy, has now set sail,” Geingob said.

In building the country’s commitments under COP26, Geingob said for COP27, Namibia has unlimited priorities, which include, among others, scaling up the levels of climate finance.

He said this would be done by providing concrete long-term targets for climate finance pathways and accounting methodologies for the collective goal of developed countries to reach US$100 billion a year from 2025 and beyond.

Other priorities, according to Geingob, include the splitting of climate finance evenly between adaptation and mitigation.

“Proceeds from the global carbon market system set up under the Paris Agreement should go to the Adaptation Fund to finance projects and programmes in developing countries,” he told world leaders.

Calling on developed countries to provide the means of implementation and support for the effective implementation and enhancement of nationally determined contributions by developing countries will also be one of the countries’ priorities, Geingob said.

Among other priorities, Geingob said, Namibia will support the acceleration of climate technology transfer, by creating access to information and knowledge on climate technologies and fostering collaboration among climate technology stakeholders.

Grant 

Meanwhile, Namibia secured a 40 million euro grant from the Netherlands. On the margins of COP27, prince Jaime de Bourbon de Parme, the climate envoy for the Netherlands, announced a grant of 40 million Euros as seed capital to establish a green hydrogen ecosystem in Namibia on behalf of Mark Rutte, the Prime Minister of the Netherlands.

Namibia launched its Green Hydrogen Strategy last Friday, which will, among other things, ensure overall direction and cohesion between new policies needed for the industry as well as existing legislative frameworks.

Geingob also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the European Union (EU) to establish a strategic partnership. The agreement was signed by Geingob and the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. The partnership aims to ensure the development of a secure and sustainable supply of raw materials, refined materials and renewable hydrogen to support the green and digital transformation of the partners’ economies. 

Namibia and the EU have committed to developing an operational roadmap for 2023-2024 with concrete joint actions agreed upon within six months of the signature of the agreement. 

Caption: (COP27)