The African Forum on Green Economy is a three month online exchange showcasing how African countries are leading the way to greener, fairer economies. The forum runs from 1 April through 3 July 2020, and will feature a series of webinars on such themes as water, agriculture, natural capital and development finance, infrastructure, data for decision-making, and enabling change in the African context. Register below for #AfricanGreenEconomy Forum webinars, where you can hear from the experts, share your experiences, and meet other practitioners online.

#AfricanGreenEconomy Forum Webinars

Session 2: Diving into Water  - 22 April 2020 at 10am BST / 12pm EAT

Session 3: Digging into Agriculture  - 6 May 2020 at 10am BST / 12pm EAT

Session 4: Natural Capital & Development Finance  - 20 May 2020 at 10am BST / 12pm EAT

Session 5: Drilling into Infrastructure  - 3 June 2020 at 10am BST / 12pm EAT

Session 6: Data for Decision Making  - 17 June 2020 at 10am BST / 12pm EAT

Session 7: Enabling Change  - 1 July 2020 at 10am BST / 12pm EAT

Last week, our Special Issue on COVID-19 pulled together policy response frameworks, data and analyses, fast-track funding and projects on the ground from leading global organizations including the ILO, OECD, UNIDO and World Bank. The GGKP will continue to  share the latest knowledge in real time through COVID-19 web spaces on our policy-focused Green Growth Knowledge Platform, Green Industry Platform and Green Finance Platform. Given the importance of the pandemic to the economy and society, additional special issues on COVID-19 are likely to follow. 

Read the Special Issue on COVID-19

On 18 March, the GGKP held a webinar to explore how to integrate three environmental footprint indicators into the Green Economy Progress Measurement Framework dashboard: greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity and water. Panelists discussed the issue of data availability and the appropriateness of databases used for calculating national environmental footprints. An interactive discussion focused on options for moving forward, including merging relevant databases, such as those used by the Life Cycle Initiative and the International Resource Panel (IRP).

Watch the #GGKPWebinar recording

A new report from WWF, "The Loss of Nature and the Rise of Pandemics" illustrates the links between humanity's impacts on ecosystems and biodiversity and the spread of zoonoses - infectious diseases that can be transmitted from animals to humans. The report looks at the pathways of disease, including deforestation, species collection and trafficking, and animal markets. It also recommends the "One Health" approach to limit risks in the future, and urges governments to sign a "New Deal for Nature and People", a globally binding agreement to halve our footprint on nature and stop the loss of natural habitats and extinction of living species.

A new report from IIED, "Making the Market Work for Nature: How biocredits can protect biodiversity and reduce poverty," examines the potential for developing countries to put in place a national biocredit scheme which allows them to be sold domestically and internationally, and promotes fair benefit sharing with rural populations. The report draws lessons from related incentive schemes within carbon markets, especially REDD+ and voluntary community carbon offsets, as well as from wider examples of payments for ecosystem services (PES) schemes.

A new report from Climate Tracker finds that new investments in renewables are cheaper than in coal. As over half of coal plants operating today cost more to run than building new renewables, the report says it could be cheaper to build renewables than run coal in all major markets by 2030, and governments and investors should cancel coal power projects or will waste $600 billion in capital costs. The report also  focuses on two key inflection points: when new investments in renewable energy (either onshore wind, offshore wind or utility-scale solar PV) are cheaper than new coal, and when new investments in renewable energy cost less than the operating cost of coal power.

Read the report

National alliances play a central role in mobilizing key actors in the real estate sector to achieve low emission, resilient and efficient buildings. A new report published by the Programme for Energy Efficiency in Buildings (PEEB), "National Alliances for Buildings and Construction: Long-term partnerships for the energy transition", synthezises the experiences of five existing national alliances in France, Germany, Mexico, Morocco and Tunisia, and proposes recommendations for the establishment of more national alliances worldwide.    

In the report, "Rebooting Quality Infrastructure for a Sustainable Future," UNIDO shares success stories of  quality infrastructure development projects in developing countries that improve national industrial and economic performance as a basis for prosperity, health and well-being. The report goes into detail about the five foundational building blocks of quality infrastructure: metrology, standardization, conformity assessment, accreditation and market surveillance.