October 2022: GABON Says Africa Needs More Capital to Adapt to a Hotter Planet

PassBlue UN Podcasts

Gabon is in Central Africa, one of the few places in the world that absorbs more carbon than it emits. One month to COP27, in Egypt, we speak to the country’s ambassador to the UN, Michel Xavier Biang. Africa, he says, needs outside financing to adapt to the hot earth, which is 0.4 degrees from the "at least" 1.5 degrees target agreed in the Paris climate pact. In this episode, we are also joined by Abdoulaye Ndiaye, an economics professor at New York University. Ndiaye wants African leaders to raise more private and multilateral capital without policy strings. Some of the money would have to come from the $100 billion annual fund agreed in Copenhagen and promised to developing countries by richer ones. But observers say the monies are not coming in. Ambassador Biang tells us what African diplomats hope to get from COP27 and he calls for dialog to end the war in Ukraine, despite Putin’s belligerence.