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The recent rains that washed through West Africa didn’t fall just on one country. They caused severe flooding and fatalities across Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Mali and Niger.
The drought that came before this latest disaster didn’t single out one place either. Farmers across the region were faced with destitution from crop losses.
Extreme weather fuelled by climate change does not respect national borders or geographical boundaries. This simple fact has multiple knock-on effects and dictates how we should respond to such crises – including through international coordination.
In September, Nigeria’s Alau Dam collapsed as a result of floods in the country’s northeastern region, killing up to 1,000 people and displacing a million. The rupture of the dam was mainly due to poor maintenance over the years – and a government failure to heed warnings of danger.
A week later, across the border in Cameroon, the government there decided to release water from the Lagdo dam, after the same bout of heavy rainfall had increased levels. This put added pressure on 11 states downstream in the part of Nigeria that was already scrambling to deal with the crisis – although the water releases were regulated, and alerts were issued.
Nepal says China withholds “essential” info on bursting Himalayan glacial lakes
South Asia is also grappling with cross-border river-related threats. Izabella Koziell, deputy director general of ICIMOD, a Nepal-based research centre working to protect the Hindu Kush Himalaya, said the mountain region is “falling under increasing risk from the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss and air pollution”.
“Each of these risks are mobile and not limited by national borders,” she said. The region extends over 3,500 kilometres from Afghanistan to Myanmar, making cooperation between countries essential, she added. “Over two billion people living within the mountains and downstream will be affected by changes that happen here.”
Shared prosperity
Climate change is fuelling new and complex risks that require countries – and the international community – to look beyond their own borders and siloes. But that is not how governments and their partners have typically responded to the threats.
“Adaptation is still very much seen as a local to national issue. Thinking more broadly and working regionally is challenging. We saw this with the COVID-19 pandemic – just how difficult it was to get coordinated regional and global responses on something which affected everyone,” said Sarah Opitz-Stapleton, a senior research fellow at ODI Global, a London-based think-tank.
Opitz-Stapleton has been working with a research programme called “Supporting Pastoralism and Agriculture in Recurrent and Protracted Crises” (SPARC) to help policymakers better understand and manage transboundary climate risks, including in Africa.
She told Climate Home: “Countries tend to think first about their own sovereignty and protecting their own populations. This is understandable – but when we are facing challenges like this, everyone going in on their own is insufficient.”
Food and finance
People’s livelihoods and future prosperity are dependent on a globalised economy and shared resources, with flows of trade and finance binding countries together across continents. And it is becoming increasingly how clear how climate change – which affects the whole planet – can hijack development efforts in an interconnected world.
A simple example of this is food. In Senegal, changing dietary habits have led to a sudden surge in imports of rice from Southeast Asia. This now makes Senegal’s food security dependent on countries far away that are facing their own severe climate risks – because how they adapt to those risks will influence rice supplies to West Africa.
In 2022, India temporarily banned wheat exports after a severe heatwave jeopardised its own domestic supplies. The move led to a sudden jump in the price of this crucial commodity, impacting countries in Africa, such as Kenya, which rely on imports.
Transboundary climate risks come in many guises – from shared ecosystems to migration patterns, infectious diseases and ocean resources.
Finance is one example where the risks and impacts can be indirect and not always immediately clear. Financial firms are often greatly exposed to climate-related risks through investments in sectors from energy to mining.
When a gold mine is hit by drought or flooding, for example, this can lead to plant shutdowns, lower production and a higher probability of debt default.
Money is as transboundary as the climate. Banks that fail to carry out climate risk assessments across whole supply chains could be creating the conditions for stranded assets in the future.
Adaptation winners and losers
By focusing solely on how to adapt to issues within borders the problem is pushed into someone else’s backyard – the adaptation equivalent of whack-a-mole.
“The problem is the way we crafted the policy,” said George Wamukoya, team lead at AGNES, a non-profit which advises African governments on climate issues.
“We focused on ‘national’ adaptation plans and commitments which leads people to think inward. There is competition among neighbouring countries who don’t want to share resources or investment. This is despite the need for regional and global support to achieve these plans. We need to be alive to these facts,” he added.
Examples abound of so-called “maladaptation”. This can occur when a country seeks to control coastal erosion and flooding by building protective infrastructure but ends up pushing the problem to shorelines further away where the impacts might be worse. Or switching to climate-resilient crops can reduce harvests – and increase prices – for more mainstream varieties.
Global adaptation goal
On the other hand, done right, adaptation can lead to shared resilience between neighbours and strengthen global supply chains. Instead of redistributing the risk, the idea is to confront it with collaboration.
As the world kicks off two weeks of climate negotiations in Baku next week, campaigners are hoping that transboundary risks are higher on the agenda.
Last year’s UN climate summit, COP28, made only two references to transboundary issues in its final decision text. New work on adaptation did come out of the Dubai talks, including a programme to develop indicators to measure progress on targets under the Global Goal on Adaptation.
So far, the two-year initiative – called the UAE-Belem work programme – has led to over 5,000 indicators being submitted for consideration. Yet only 22 of these are related to transboundary climate risks.
This speaks to a lack of awareness among states of the shared risks they face and the dangers of ignoring them. Both Kenya and Ethiopia – which share a border that is porous especially for pastoralist communities – failed to mention cross-border risks in their national adaptation plans (NAPs) submitted to the UN.
Ensuring that transboundary risks are included in the UAE-Belem work programme is seen as crucial, as its results will dictate how adaptation policy and finance are set in the future. “If we don’t have these indicators, then it becomes very hard to track these particular risks,” said Wamukoya.
COP29 and beyond
Experts agree that national and local governments need to do a better job of assessing cross-border risks and working with their neighbours to understand how to collectively address them. To date, they feel that not enough work has been done to research transboundary risks and work out strategies for tackling them.
“We need to demystify the issue for countries and convince them that, when you include transboundary issues, this will not limit access to resources. We also need to show how and where these risks are occurring within the five subregions of Africa, because some places will be more exposed than others,” adds Wamukoya.
COP29 offers a unique forum to address transboundary risks that are global in nature – and this perspective also needs to be applied to finance for adaptation projects, where multiple countries are involved, Wamukoya said. COP29 is tasked with agreeing a new global goal for climate finance, he noted.
Rich nations “on track” to double adaptation finance but huge gap persists
To date, adaptation financing typically goes to a single country, and there are few mechanisms for allowing funding to be split across states – although the Green Climate Fund has taken a regional approach in some of its projects.
Opitz-Stapleton – who is helping organise several COP29 events on transboundary climate risks at the Climate, Peace and Transboundary Climate Pavilion, the first such COP pavilion – noted that awareness of the issue has grown.
But, she said, “many countries are not adequately assessing these risks and there isn’t capacity to manage them”. “They need to be incorporated within a country’s adaptation plans and actually acted on,” she emphasised.
Sponsored by ODI Global. See our supporters page for what this means.
Adam Wentworth is a freelance writer based in Brighton, UK.
The Climate, Peace and Transboundary Resilience Pavilion at COP29 will host 30 events with world-leading experts, including heads of state and other leading representatives from governments, climate funds, aid agencies, civil society organisations, and more. All events will be livestreamed. For more information visit the Pavilion page here.
The post Cross-border climate risks can’t be solved in isolation appeared first on Climate Home News.
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Prepared by a coalition of nine Western Australian union, industry, conservation, and community organisations—including UnionsWA, the Conservation Council WA, and the Smart Energy Council—the WA Clean Energy, Jobs & Industry Plan provides a practical roadmap to transform Western Australia into a clean energy powerhouse while creating thousands of secure local jobs.
Western Australia stands at a pivotal crossroads: lead the global clean energy economy or watch investment, future industries, and secure jobs go elsewhere. The WA Clean Energy, Jobs & Industry Plan outlines a transformative blueprint to harness the state’s world-class solar and wind resources. Discover how legislated renewable targets, green iron manufacturing, and a dedicated regional training strategy can generate tens of thousands of local jobs, lower household bills, and build a resilient, net-zero future for all Western Australians.
WA needs a clear and forward-thinking plan if it is going to become a competitive renewable energy powerhouse and maintain its economic strength through the energy transition.
“Western Australians know a faster renewable energy transition will lower their household expenses and prevent harmful climate pollution. But the community also needs clear direction to ensure this transition will create jobs, lower costs and not cause undue environmental harm.
“Here, sectors representing a broad range of interests have laid the groundwork for those outcomes, clearly outlining what is needed to create a future for WA that is good for the environment, for the climate, for workers and for the economy.
Summary
The WA Clean Energy, Jobs & Industry Plan sets out a strategic roadmap to position Western Australia as a global clean energy superpower while creating thousands of secure local jobs.
The report establishes three overarching goals:
- Creating local employment.
- Maintaining industrial competitiveness.
- Lowering household energy costs
To realize this vision, the framework details actionable measures to follow on from the recent WA Government announcement of a 75% Renewable Energy Target by 2031 for the South West Interconnected System. This includes developing a statewide Renewable Energy Target, coordinating statewide workforce and training pipelines, strategically planning regional infrastructure to safeguard high-value biodiversity and cultural heritage, and ensuring equitable benefit-sharing through household electrification incentives and First Nations equity partnerships. Ultimately, the plan highlights that establishing clear policy and regulatory certainty will unlock lower energy bills, boost power reliability, and secure the state’s global competitiveness in emerging green commodity export markets.
Key Findings
- Statewide Renewable Energy Target and Emissions Reduction Targets: The report calls for a statewide RET and 1.5°C aligned emission reduction targets to remove policy risk, lower capital costs, and attract clean energy investment.
- Transformative Job Creation: Accelerating the transition offers massive employment prospects, including up to 8,800 solar and battery jobs by 2050, as well as 24,000 ongoing and 11,000 construction jobs in a commercial green iron industry.
- Industrial Electrification & Competitiveness: Requiring large gas users to adopt binding electrification timetables and providing concessional financing will protect existing energy-intensive manufacturers from rising energy costs and impending domestic gas shortfalls.
- Green Commodity Export Leadership: Western Australia can build new export markets in green iron, green ammonia, and offshore oil/gas decommissioning by constructing shared common-user infrastructure and setting dedicated Green Commodity Export Targets.
- Coordinated Workforce & Training Pipeline: To address critical skill shortages the plan recommends establishing a WA Clean Energy Jobs Plan 2050, three regional training hubs, and dedicated pathways for female and under-represented apprentices.
- Environmental Safeguards & Community Benefits: Fast-tracked development must be paired with State Planning Policies that avoid high-biodiversity and cultural heritage lands, mandate new data centres to run on additional renewable power, and deliver household electrification rebates and First Nations equity partnerships.
What you can do
WA has an opportunity to lead on sustainable, clean energy and associated industries. You can help by:
- Sending an email to Environment Minister Murray Watt and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, calling on them to reject Browse.
- Sharing this story to help more Australians understand what’s at stake.
- Encouraging your friends and family to take action.
Countries have completed the first “global review” of their progress towards reversing nature loss by 2030 at the COP17 biodiversity talks in Yerevan, Armenia.
The review “notes with deep concern” that, unless action is “rapidly accelerated”, the goal to reverse nature loss and meet a set of 23 targets by 2030 “will not be achieved”.
It “urges” countries to accelerate action, including by “increased ambition in addressing the gaps”.
Much of the discussions in Yerevan focused on how to raise the necessary funds to help developing countries protect nature.
Some major economies pushed to expand the range of nations that are expected to provide finance, with countries agreeing at the end of the two weeks of talks that non-donors that want to contribute can “signal interest” before COP18.
This came after developed countries failed to meet a target to significantly ramp up nature finance over the last few years.
It also came as a landmark fund agreed at COP16 in Colombia to pay communities for the genetic resources derived from nature stands nearly empty two years on.
The Yerevan talks marked the halfway point of the “Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework” (GBF), the “Paris Agreement for nature” first made in 2022 and due to be achieved by 2030.
During the nearly 12-hour-long final plenary, countries voted for Quito, Ecuador, to host the COP18 nature talks, which will be held in 2028.
Countries managed to sign off on all the major negotiation texts, marking a stark contrast to COP16, which ran so far over time that the Colombian presidency lost “quorum”, forcing talks to resume in Rome months later.
Below, Carbon Brief has detailed analysis of all of the key outcomes from COP17.
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