Member of Parliament (MP) for Klottey Korle Dr. Zanetor Agyeman-Rawlings said the more industrialized nations have a moral responsibility to ensure that as they look at renewable energy technology, Africa is also empowered to do same.
According to her Africa should not be at the bottom of the chain all the time, because if a case is being made for someone to use solar panels and the cost for buying Kerosene for a lamp and the cost for buying diesel into a generator is lower than the cost of buying and maintaining solar panels, then it would be difficult for that person to opt for the solar panel.
“For someone who is struggling to make ends meet, I think the calculation in their mind is not going to be a difficult one; fusel fuel that wins every time less we can ensure that there is proper technology transfer”.
And unless we can ensure we are coming up with proper home grown ideas which are being supported, because, the problem is “we have a lot of ideas but the funding that is needed to commercialize some of these things, so that we can have huge projects across the continent is not happening”.
In an interview, the Klottey Korle lawmaker noted that Africa is being pushed to move towards renewable energy, but do not produce the technology; they have to be imported, which means by the time it gets to the end user to be used to generate electricity, the cost becomes unbearable.
Again, governments need to offset all the taxes and the extra payment involved in importing all of these technology, “which means in the end the most vulnerable yet again are left out of the loop, hence Africa need to be careful whether is drawing up agreement or any kind of contracts, or any development of technology on our soil”.
Communities and countries that are taking part in these should be given the extra support to be able to also rise up to the technological level, if Africa is supposed to stop using fusel fuel, otherwise, “we cannot make a case for someone moving into something else, it is too expense to start anything”.
She noted that on her trip to Brussels during the recess, Europe and the rest of the more industralised nations are talking about how Africa needs to stop using fusel fuel; citing example of how Africa needs to create a scenario where “we can export wind energy, solar energy, to part of Europe”.
“We do not see investments on the continent in technology; we do not see that investment that we become self-sufficient, and as usual we end up being in debt as we are trying to satisfy almost difficult to achieve goals that are constantly being set for us. And if we are dealing with the issue of climate change which is a global issue Europe cannot say they are dealing with climate change without the rest of us”.
She asserts that percentage wise, emissions from Africa only contributes two percent. And from the grand scheme of things, Africa is not the greatest contributor to the problems we are witnessing today with regards to climate change.
However, because of the secured manner in which our quality of life and economies are working out, Africa is so hard hit and suffering the most for things that we did not contribute.
Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com
The resolutions are geared towards finding solutions to the increasing rate of social, environmental and gender violations connected to land grabs and deforestation for industrial plantation expansion by agro-commodities companies in Africa with grave impacts on local communities, forest dependent peoples, small holder farmers with aggravated consequences on women and their families.
Considering the report of the working group on the rights of indigenous communities in Africa, adopted by the Commission in 2003 at its 28th Ordinary Session, and which among others recognizes that protection of communal rights to land is fundamental for the survival of indigenous communities in Africa, Friends of the Earth-Africa (FoEA) through the NGO Forum, hereby calls on the African Commission to:
It noted that in 2020, 331 defenders were killed across 25 countries around the world with at least 227 of them (EHRDs) were either murdered, brutalized or silenced; making the agro-commodities sector one of the most dangerous sectors for Environmental Human Rights Defenders (EHRDs), in Africa.
“If we think UN and IMF would bring something, we are not going to come out of our problems; and the earlier leaders of the country realize that we need to be telling the truth to Ghanaians, the better. At the meeting we were told the people we are leading are tired of long speeches and sweet words, that the people need action, we should walk the talk”.
