Ahead of the inaugural Africa Climate Summit taking place in Kenya, the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet (GEAPP), an organisation bringing together philanthropy, government, finance and technology, has called for increased investment and collaboration to address urgent climate challenges in Africa. 

The Africa Union has stressed similar concerns of late, raising the issue of energy poverty with clean energy as a prospective solution. 

The Africa Summit in Kenya, taking place between 4th-6th September, aims to highlight the opportunities for Africa to play a leading role in bringing together technology solutions alongside philanthropic organisations and thinkers.  

Sub-Saharan Africa possesses some of the world’s most valuable natural assets and unparalleled demographic advantage, including abundant solar potential and untapped wind generation. Despite this, it is the continent with lowest energy access and only receives 12 percent of the $250billion in climate investments it needs per year. 

Over three days at the Africa Climate Summit in Nairobi, the GEAPP and its partners will provide updates on their collaborative work in Africa to scale and accelerate renewable energy minigrids and the use of battery energy storage systems.  

They will also share learnings from their work to increase jobs related to green energy and the crucial steps needed to ensure clean energy also powers economic growth, job creation and equitable progress. 

GEAPP is a collaborative group of 20 partners founded at COP26 by the IKEA Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation and the Bezos Earth Fund. 

Saliem Fakir, executive director of the African Climate Foundation (ACF), believes that a response to the climate crisis is an investment in Africa’s development. 

“In pursuit of its mission, the ACF holds a completely different view from the dominant understanding of climate change,” he told Alliance earlier this year. “It does not see climate change as simply an issue of environmental vulnerability and risk- and emissions- reduction but rather as an integral part of the development conversation and agenda. It treats climate change mitigation as an investment in Africa’s future economy and social resilience”. 

He added that philanthropy’s investment in climate change responses “is insufficient.”  

“Everyone talks about the issue, but financial support does not match the amount of airtime it is given,” said Fakir. 

Read more on Saliem Fakir’s idea on how philanthropy should go about responding to the climate crisis in Africa. 

Shafi Musaddique is a news editor at Alliance magazine.