Climate and African Development at WEF on Africa 2016
The World Economic Forum 2016 was held in Kigali, Rwanda from the 11th to the 13th of May 2016. World leaders from public and private sectors, business, civil society and other sectors came together to engage in meaningful discussions that will promote partnerships between the government and private sector for inclusive growth and sustainable development in Africa and globally. Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa accompanied by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan attended the 3 day summit, along significant industry role players such as the South African Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) CEO Geoffrey Qhena.
Some of the interesting engagements were around how world leaders are transforming Africa’s production and manufacturing agenda, and also looking at the technologies and facilitating home-grown innovations; as well as upskilling for a digitised world. Qhena, talking about the IDC’s business investments approach mentioned that the IDC focuses on sustainability and ability of a project to indirectly or directly create employment. New technologies can be considered a challenge to Africa’s labour Market due to lack of skills; Qhene also mentioned that it is important to upskill labours in the process of embracing new innovations; adding renewable energy as one of the key solutions to SA and Africa’s manufacturing.
Engagements also focused on Climate Change and mobilising people and drawing green investments into Africa. This included an in-depth discussion about innovative solutions that leverage green growth to mitigate the catastrophic impact of climate change in Africa. One of the challenges identified as barriers in the Green Economy space include the ability to rapidly scale up solutions that work and providing access to capital and finance innovation. "We need to be able to reinvent ourselves and develop new working solutions that will work in the changing world," said Mamadou Biteyem, Managing Director of the African Region, Rockefeller Foundation. Also, looking at existing mechanisms and support them to work, supporting research, access to information, ensuring the right policies in place and implementing them. Sandy Andelman, Chief Scientist, Conservation International said that to solve climate change problems it is necessary to have partnerships across sectors from government to private sector, civil society and was optimistic that, that is now beginning to take place. Also joining the panel discussion was Markhtar Diop, Vice president for Africa, World Bank giving an economic perspective.
These and many more discussions at the World Economic Forum on Africa 2016 are available on the WEF website. Rwanda was praised as great host for the event. Minister Pravin Gordhan announced the 2017 edition of the World Economic Forum on Africa would take place in South Africa.