Africa urged to offer incentives for renewable energy

African countries have been told to develop tangible incentives for the adoption of alternative livelihoods and energy sources to mitigate emissions from deforestation. The call was made on Thursday by participants from SADC member countries at the just-ended meeting themed: Reduce Emission from Deforestation and Forest Degradation. They said successes achieved the United Nations Collaborative Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in developing countries (REDD) would also require large scale stakeholders engagement across all levels especially at the grassroots to ensure that communities receive tangible benefits from it. The participants also called for a well designed strategy and policy to achieve positive effects on the conservation of associated biological diversity and ecosystem services as well as livelihoods in forest dependent communities. A participant from Zambia, Charles Masange said the designing of the strategy and policy would greatly increase peoples’ incomes and improve forest governance through better management of forests by the communities. Masange suggested establishment of ‘REDD Desk’ at the South African Development Community (SADC) secretariat to facilitate effective monitoring, reporting and verification of forest resources. Additionally, he said each country should also establish its own ‘Desk’ to be managed by a technical working group that would design appropriate methodologies for the programme. “Currently, Zambia has submitted a national joint management programme to the UN-REDD, so that it can prepare for future REDD implementation,” he said, adding that as one of the nine developing countries, Zambia would soon be piloting the UN-REDD programme.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN