This archive report was first published on 27 October 2021.
President Uhuru Kenyatta has sounded the alarm on the devastating impact of climate change on Africa's economy, warning that the continent's GDP could contract by up to 30% by 2050 if urgent action is not taken.
Speaking at a hybrid conference hosted by the University of Nairobi in partnership with the Global Centre on Adaptation (GCA) to celebrate Africa Adaptation Acceleration Day, President Kenyatta emphasized the need for accelerated roll-out of adaptation programs in Africa to mitigate the growing adverse effects of climate change.
“Evidence indicates that climate change will have a devastating socioeconomic impact across the world and quite severely in Africa. If we do not take any action Africa could, as a consequence, see its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) contract by up to 30 percent by 2050 due to climate change,” the President said.
He noted that despite Kenya significantly increasing the amount of financial resources invested in adaptation programs in recent years, the country needed more international support to fully implement its updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
“To implement our NDCs, we plan to invest approximately US$8 billion over the next 10 years. This is just 10 percent of the total investment needed of the NDCs and we, therefore, need support from our international partners,” the President said.
He also observed that the financing challenge is not peculiar to Kenya, saying globally funding for climate adaptation, which in 2017 averaged around 30 billion US dollars a year, needed to be increased tenfold to meet the growing needs of vulnerable communities across the world.
