Representatives of the various technical departments and specialized agencies grouped within the Interdepartmental Committee on the Environment of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) held their fifth meeting for the finalization of the draft Regional Climate Strategy (RCS). The meeting took place on April 05 and 06, 2022 in Abuja (Nigeria) with the main objective of collecting the latest observations and contributions from all the Departments of the ECOWAS Commission in order to finalize the draft RCS.

This meeting was the culmination of an inclusive and participatory process initiated since the beginning of 2021 by the ECOWAS Commission, with the technical and financial support of the Global Climate Change Alliance (GCCA+) West Africa project funded by the European Union and executed by Expertise France.

The meeting was chaired by Mr. KOFFI Yao Bernard, Head of the Environment and Climate Change Division and brought together the staff of the Departments in charge of the following sectors: Agriculture, Energy, Environment, Macro-economy, Trade, Finance, Transport, Business, Humanitarian and Water Resources.

The discussions during the plenary sessions made it possible to revise and agree on the content resulting from the contributions collected during the four previous meetings of the said Interdepartmental Committee. Thus, the vision, the general objective, and the specific objectives were refined accordingly. Then reformulations and adjustments were made to the actions proposed in the action plan relating to the various sectors such as Agriculture, Energy, Transport, Water Resources, Climate Services and Disaster Risks, Trade, Industry, Health and Coastal Zones.

The draft Regional Climate Strategy should enable the ECOWAS Commission to consolidate and harmonize its intervention framework for the fight against climate change in the region, taking into account both the dimensions of adaptation and mitigation of  the impacts of climate change in connection with the Paris Agreement, the 2030 Agenda and the AU Agenda 2063.

Taking these observations into account should make it possible to obtain an improved draft RCS document which will be submitted to the Member States during a regional validation meeting scheduled in hybrid format on 26 and 27 April 2022 for experts and April 29, 2022 for the Specialized Ministerial Technical Committee on Climate Change.