COP30: Africa pivots from pleas to purpose and partnership
Nearly a decade after the Paris Agreement, Africa has taken its climate urgency to COP30 with demands for finance, tech equity, and homegrown solutions over hollow pledges.
James Wakibia has had enough of climate conferences. The Kenyan campaigner watches his country's rivers dry up, its glaciers melt and its crops fail while world leaders gather annually to discuss the same targets, make the same promises, and deliver the same unsatisfying results.
"I find them a waste of time and resources," Wakibia tells TRT Afrika. "We had many targets coming up to around 2030, including an increase in renewable energy and decreased fossil-fuel use. But we don't seem to be going anywhere. Countries are still celebrating fossil fuel discoveries, and renewable energy uptake is still very little."
His words reflect the frustrations of a continent that contributes less than 4% of global emissions but continues to suffer the worst climate disasters: prolonged droughts, destructive floods, and rising sea levels.
As African leaders converged on the ongoing 30th UN Climate Change Conference (COP30) in Brazil's Belém, the sense of exasperation sharpened into a demand for more action rather than just rituals without transformative outcomes.
Familiar story unravels
Nearly a decade since the 2016 Paris Climate Agreement, summit after summit has failed to deliver the resources Africa needs.
Loss and damage costs from climate impacts are projected to soar to between US $290 billion and $440 billion between 2020 and 2030, according to the Kenya-based think tank Power Shift Africa. Still, the continent receives under 10% of adaptation finance and just 3% of total climate funding.
The last summit, COP29 in Azerbaijan's Baku, followed the pattern.
Data from the African Development Bank shows that despite calls for a global annual goal of $1.3 trillion by 2030, including $300 billion earmarked for Africa, systemic challenges remained unresolved.
This time, African leaders say they are drawing a firm line. They want affordable climate technologies tailored to local realities, the removal of patent barriers, and support for local manufacturing that can shift Africa from a consumer to a producer.
"The world will not judge us by how many climate conferences we host, but by the real actions we take to save our planet," President Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah of Namibia told a COP30 session.
The African Union Commission, the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa and the African Development Bank Group reinforced that urgency in a joint statement.
"For Africa – home to 20% of the world's carbon sinks, responsible for less than 4% of global greenhouse gas emissions, yet receiving under 10% of adaptation finance and only 3% of total climate funding – the consequences are existential," the statement reads.
Call for introspection
Wakibia argues that while conferences aren't making the difference that matters, Africa must also examine its role in the climate equation.
"African countries are always saying we bear the heaviest brunt of climate change. But when you look at it clearly, we are also part-big sponsors of the climate havoc, because we are dependent on countries like China to produce our goods," he tells TRT Afrika.
China is responsible for 27% of global carbon dioxide emissions and a third of the world's greenhouse gases, according to the World Bank.
The statistical portal Worldometer, which tracks carbon emissions, ranks China as the world's largest greenhouse gas emitter, primarily through its power and manufacturing sectors. These sectors reported 12.6 billion tonnes of CO₂ emission on an average in 2022.
Wakibia's criticism stems from his lived experience in Kenya, where rising temperatures, erratic rainfall and recurring drought have affected economic stability.
Prolonged dry spells now frequently devastate the arid and semi-arid lands, destroying crops, killing livestock and deepening food insecurity. When the rains come, they are usually violent downpours that sweep away homes and damage infrastructure.
Without urgent adaptation measures, the poorest communities will be hardest hit, and climate change could slash up to 7% off Kenya's GDP by 2050, the World Bank warned in 2023.
Water sources such as the Tana and Ewaso Nyiro rivers are already under severe strain, while the glaciers of Mount Kenya – once a dependable reservoir – are melting rapidly.
These environmental shifts are also altering disease patterns, with malaria and waterborne outbreaks spreading into areas previously considered low-risk.
Need for partnerships
African leaders know that this year's conference, billed as the first "Implementation COP", carries high stakes. They have been calling for a tripling of adaptation finance and the creation of a transparent process to assess evolving needs beyond 2030.
Speaking at the summit on behalf of Ghana's President John Mahama, lands & environment minister Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah stressed the continent's vast potential. "The African position is clear. We are not asking for charity. We are asking for partnership in the truest sense," he said.
But climate campaigners like Lidye Beyene from the UNDP Youth4Climate programme believe it is time the continent stopped looking outwards and searched within for climate solutions.
"Across the continent, young people are already designing the answers they need, using technology, local knowledge and community leadership to solve problems the world still calls too big," Beyene tells TRT Afrika.
She points to innovations that suggest Africa is ready to become a clean energy producer.
In Kenya, a youth-led team uses AI to detect crop diseases before they spread, protecting harvests in regions where nearly all crops are lost every season.
Young Liberian innovators have rolled out the country's first electric tuk tuks, cutting emissions by over 90% while training women to become licensed drivers and business owners.
As COP30 enters its last lap, leaders on the continent hope they will finally secure the long-promised implementation of Article 9.1 of the Paris Agreement, and that the world begins to see Africa not just as a climate finance consumer but as an equal partner.
"We stand ready to be a powerhouse of green energy for the world," Armah-Kofi urged delegates. "We urge you to match our ambition with your action."