Tackling Environmental Challenges Despite Economic Hardship

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Tackling Environmental Challenges Despite Economic Hardship

15 juil. 2021 16:41

Most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa are facing the uphill task of tackling environmental degradation. Similar problems occur in other parts of the world, but the situation in Africa is compounded by the scarcity of resources and heavy dependence on foreign aid.
The complexities in tackling ecosystem degradation certainly pushed the World Bank Group to carry out a research on the need to avoid major distortions in the patterns of life due to climatic changes. A projected drop in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of up to 9.7 per cent in Sub-Saharan countries by 2030 has even raised more concerns about consequences of climate change on economic growth and human survival. Added to the recent instability caused across the globe by the Covid-19 pandemic, the crisis environmental hazards generate can be disturbing to everybody such that those who keep thinking Africa may suffer alone have to revise their position.

Pooling resources together to face issues related to ecosystem degradation is the best way to go in terms of getting the world out of disagreeable climate change hurdles. It is obvious that Sub-Saharan Africa carries the highest burden in the negative impact of ecosystem degradation not just because they are always on the receiving end, but most probably due to their inability to harness resources to pursue development. For example, World Bank statistics for 2019 indicated that about 900 million people or 85 per cent of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa lacked clean cooking fuel. And out of the 20 countries in the world that are without clean fuel, 10 are said to be from Sub-Saharan Africa. On the contrary, countries like China, India, Indonesia and Brazil are said to have increased their combined access rate to clean cooking by two per cent from 2010-2019.

Although since 2010, the World Bank reported significant progress in access to energy worldwide, tracking Sustainable Development Goal VII which is The Energy Progress Report; there are still imbalances that need to be taken seriously; the most critical being in Sub-Saharan Africa. Lofty declarations on affordable, reliable, ...