BY OWETHU DLAMINI
EZULWINI- Eswatini Government officially goes green!
The Minister of Agriculture, Jabulani Mabuza, launched three agricultural projects under the Green Climate Fund Readiness Program at the Happy Valley Hotel today.
The Green Climate Fund Readiness Program focuses on providing grants and technical assistance to National Designated Authorities (NDAs) or focal points (FPs) while developing countries to strengthen their institutional capacities, governance mechanisms and planning as well as programming frameworks towards a transformational long-term climate action agenda.
The three projects that were launched by the minister today under this program are ‘Accelerating the financing and implementation of low carbon and climate –resilient priorities in agriculture and energy for agriculture in African countries’, ‘Laying the foundations for increased climate adaptation and mitigation in Eswatini’s agriculture sector’ and ‘Strengthening the National Designated Authority (NDA) institutional and technical capacity to mobilize gender –responsive climate finance for Eswatini’.
The minister who is also Pigg’s Peak Member of Parliament (MP), expressed that the effects of climate change were visible and how the issue could not be taken lightly and sobbed over, action needed to be implemented, which was why the government had taken a stand to prevent these situations before they occurred.
“The nation is now well aware of the effects of climate change, the droughts, floods, flush floods, heat waves, hailstones and strong winds, are all common now. As a nation, we cannot afford to just lament about the situation, government is committed and duty bound to implement appropriate adaptation strategies.
“It is an indisputable fact that prevention is better than cure, the cost of timely adaptation to prevent climate change related disasters is far lower than the cost of response to an occurring disaster or post occurrence response,” said the minister.
The National Designated Authority (NDA), under the able leadership of the Principal Secretary (PS) for the Ministry of Tourism and Environmental Affairs, Khangizwe Mabuza, was thanked and congratulated by the minister for preparing the projects and managing the process from conceptualisation and through all the stages until approval.
The minister went on to urge the program director on the importance of time as these different projects were run across the country as he noted that development partners are eager to assist with projects that will be implemented in a timely manner.
“I emphasise the importance of effective and timely implementation of projects. Development partners are always keen to finance institutions and projects that deliver on the objectives and on time, which attracts further funding in most cases.”
The Minister of Agriculture, who also doubles as the Acting Minister of Natural Resources and Energy, urged all stakeholders here to familiarise themselves with the content of the programme across the three projects for maximum involvement and participation in the proposed implementation arrangements.
“I believe there will be more engagements for both planning activities and reporting, we do request collaborating departments within government and stakeholder partners to commit and apply themselves,” added the minister.
In closing, the minister officially launched all three projects financed under the Green Climate Fund Readiness Programme and wished all the involved stake holders fruitful deliberations as they engaged each other on this project and wished them success in the implementation stage.
The three projects are expected to deliver the following:
• A robust climate change coordination mechanism for the country
• Climate change adaptation policies including incentives
• Capacity building on conducting climate change studies
• Plans for resiliency infrastructure
• Risk assessment and early warning mechanisms
• Baseline information and readiness for future programing and projects
