Leaders discuss desertification

NINE African heads of states attended yesterday’s opening session of the UN’s COP15 talks to fight desertification and land degradation that have devastated large swathes of the continent amid climate change .

The UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), 196 countries plus the EU, is meeting for the first time in three years, in Abidjan.

Decades of unsustainable agriculture have depleted soils worldwide and accelerated global warming and species loss, the UNCCD says, with an estimated 40% of land degraded.

“Our summit is taking place in the context of the climate emergency which harshly impacts our land management policies and exacerbates drought,” Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara announced.

Nigeria’s Muhammadu Buhari, Niger’s Mohamed Bazoum and the DRC’s Felix Tshisekedi were among the continent’s leaders listening to the Ivorian host.

Ouattara presented the Abidjan Initiative to raise $1.5 billion (about R24bn) over five years to restore Ivory Coast’s “degraded forest eco-systems” and promote sustainable soil management.

Ivory Coast is among numerous African nations badly affected by desertification. Forest cover has fallen by 80% since 1900 – from 16 million hectares to just 2.9 million last year.