19th AMCEN Ordinary Session Side Event: Dialogue and launch of the Regional Circular Economy Guidelines

Background and Objective

SWITCH Africa Green programme is designed to support 7 countries (Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Mauritius, South Africa and Uganda) in Africa to achieve sustainable development by engaging in the transition towards an inclusive green economy, based on sustainable consumption and production (SCP) patterns. The programme aims to turn environmental challenges into opportunities based on the understanding that an inclusive green economy is at the core of sustainable development and has multiple benefits next to environmental protection, notably growth and jobs creation, poverty reduction, economic diversification, and income generation. The programme focuses on key enablers for the transition, including access to green financing, enabling policies and standards, circular practices, awareness and skills on eco-entrepreneurship, and innovative solutions.

The transition to an inclusive green economy requires scaling up on the cooperation and collaborations among countries as well as creating synergies with emerging trends to achieve the objectives – such as circular economy approaches and exploring a workable mechanism for access to finance for green investments among others. Circular Economy approaches will moreover be part of Africa’s transformative efforts to ensure green business development. The SWITCH Africa Green programme promotes circularity approaches through the promotion of biogas technology, E-waste management, promoting organic agriculture, green manufacturing and eco-industrial park and standards, and labelling in the hotel industry, among others.

Implementation of the SWITCH Africa Green programme is also guided by global regional settings and priorities. During the 17th session of the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN) in Durban, South Africa, a regional framework on the circular economy was proposed and reiterated - to focus on contextualizing the circular economy to the needs of African countries. The AMCEN session identified the circular economy as one of the areas where action needs to be taken to promote environmental sustainability and prosperity in Africa. The discussions specifically highlighted the importance of contextualizing the circular economy to the needs and resource profiles of African countries and, on that basis, of developing a regional programme to promote and scale up the circular economy in the region. What is currently missing, and which informs the AMCEN decision, is to scale up and replicate the efforts across the continent in a more organised approach.

Circular economy approaches galvanize and spur green investments, partnerships and continued innovation. To this end, a system-wide approach and behavioural change is required to transition towards a more circular economy. This entails countries having very strong political messaging systems, awareness and capacity development programmes to drive the circular economy agenda. It also requires galvanising public and private financing mechanisms to ensure access to capital for firms of all sizes and a critical mass of people with the capacity to implement the circular economy principles.

With the foregoing, SWITCH Africa Green organized a side event dialogue at the 19th AMCEN session to discuss the developed Guidelines to Accelerate the Transition Towards a Circular Economy in Africa as a robust tool to drive the implementation of a circular economy in Africa. It highlighted the opportunities and challenges, policies, partnerships, financing, and markets, essential for the transition to circularity in Africa. Further, the side event was the perfect opportunity to launch the Circular Economy guidelines and green financing report that were requested by Member States at the 17th Session of AMCEN.

Objectives:

• Stimulate discussions on the importance of circular economy in driving sustainable development.

• Provide guidance and information on the areas and practices where circular economy approaches present benefits in both the short-term and long term.

• Discuss the opportunities and challenges of adopting circularity in Africa.

• Launch and dissemination of the ‘Guidelines to Accelerate the Transition Towards a Circular Economy in Africa’ as a robust tool to drive the implementation of a circular economy in Africa.

Expected outcome

• Enhanced regional and national interventions to scale up green and circular business approaches and national level policy making inspired and implemented.

• ‘Guidelines to Accelerate the Transition Towards a Circular Economy in Africa’ launched and disseminated as a robust tool to drive the implementation of a circular economy in Africa.

AGENDA