Climate change may hamper Africa's economic growth and development

BY AGENCIES

IF climate change is left unchecked, then it will hamper Africa's economic growth and development, says Sim Tshabalala, Chief Executive of Standard Bank SA.

Addressing a media briefing ahead of the start of the COP17 proceedings in Durban, Tshabalala said the future risk created by carbon emissions and the consequence of climate change cannot be ignored.

He said as a corporate citizen, dealing appropriately with the environment makes perfect business sense and is a commercial imperative.

He said it would be interesting to see which direction the deliberations at COP17 would take.

"Hopefully we will unlock the power of the market to address the issues," he said.

"Our future depends on a green and prosperous Africa and we will contribute all we can to achieve this noble goal," he said, referring to initiatives undertaken by Standard Bank.

Geoff Sinclair, Head of Carbon Trading at Standard Bank, said the COP17 negotiations would be baffling, extraordinarily complex and "a mesh of so many different interests that it will be almost impossible to follow even if you are in the middle of it."

He said there will be a lot of noise and backroom negotiations, with the most important period being the last 12 hours.

Sinclair, who is a world expert in his field, said most in the climate change community do not believe that an agreement will be achieved.

The first legally binding protocol was ratified under the UNFCCC at COP3 in Kyoto, Japan, in 1997. In the document, industrialised nations agreed to decrease their greenhouse gas emissions 6%-8% from 1990 levels. The first period of the protocol went into effect in 2008 and will expire on December 31, 2012.

"If we get a binding agreement, it will be a fantastic outcome for SA as convener of the conference," he said.

He said at the moment there was a lot of "finger pointing" going on among the various countries, in the developing and developed world.

He said it would be positive if a specific agreement could be reached that ensured the clean development mechanism (CDM) would continue. He said the private sector market was looking for certainty over that.