ETHIOPIA AHEAD OF THE CURVE: THE GREEN LEGACY OF MELES ZENAWI - PART II

A version of this post was first published by openDemocracy.

It is surely better now to concentrate on Meles’ positive achievements rather than dwell on negatives from the past. His legacy will be decided by what happens next. But the “develop now and clean up later” approach enjoyed by the west for a while is no longer an option - for anyone.

WRESTLING WITH ETHIOPIA'S CONTRADICTIONS

Meles Zenawi, Ethiopia’s leader since 1991, was buried in Addis Ababa on Sept 2 in the cathedral where the emperor Menelik II was laid to rest in 1916. The sudden death, age 57, of Africa’s most influential statesman is one of the most significant events in modern African history, and it comes at a critical time for Ethiopia, for Africa and the world.

Tributes have been pouring in from around the globe. He has been called a visionary, national saviour, hero, philosopher-king, one of Africa’s finest sons. Under Mr Meles’ leadership, Ethiopia has been transformed from a virtual failed state in 1991 to become one of the world’s fastest growing economies on the verge of a historic renaissance. He has maintained high levels of peace in a notoriously warlike part of the world. He has given millions of Ethiopians the opportunity to improve their lives and has restored Ethiopia’s pride and position in the world. For some, his greatest achievement is building the foundations of a ‘green’ economy in Ethiopia that can be balanced, coordinated and sustainable. After 21 years of Mr Meles it is now possible to see how this vital but vulnerable “Water Tower of Africa” can be measured, managed and maintained.

There are others who are celebrating Mr Meles’ death, relieved that he has finally gone. To them he was an evil despot, a power hungry dictator, a ruthless, racist bully with little regard for democracy or human rights, leading a band of thugs who brought misery, suffering and death. They will remember him as the one who imprisoned, tortured and silenced them, who threw them off their ancestral lands to make way for mega-scale ‘brown’ development projects – enormous dams, farms and sugar enterprises – that will wreck the environment, wreck the economy and return the country to civil war or worse. For them Meles was a genocidal tyrant who divided Ethiopia, mismanaged the finances and sacrificed vast and precious ecosystems in order to control his enemies and stay in power. Under Meles’ leadership, Ethiopia’s “Cradles of Mankind” have become their graves.

The truth is somewhere in between. As Alexander Solzhenitsyn once wrote, “The battleline between good and evil runs through the heart of every man.” Anyone who has only rudimentary knowledge and experience of Ethiopia can begin to understand the battleline running through Mr Meles as he wrestled for 21 years to reconcile Ethiopia’s enormous and complex contradictions, while generating balanced, economic growth in one of the most imbalanced and impoverished regions on the planet. As his successors prepare the transition in these urgent and uncertain times, for the sake of Ethiopia, its neighbours and the world at large, it is surely better now to concentrate on how his positive achievements can steer the future, rather than dwell on negatives from the past. The Meles legacy will be decided by what happens next.

CONSERVATION-BASED DEVELOPMENT

Even Mr Meles’ greatest enemies cannot deny he had a vision for sustainable development and was a pioneer in Africa’s green thinking where the need for such thinking is most urgent. This first came to light at the Lem (Green) Meeting in Addis Ababa in June 1992. The post-colonial development model in Ethiopia had failed dramatically and the country was in ruins. In his address at the meeting, one year after assuming responsibility for what is one of the most challenging countries on earth, Mr Meles encapsulated the thinking of the day by calling for “conservation-based, people-led, people-centred development” requiring a “multi-disciplinary and broad-spectrum approach for there is no piece-meal solution to the problem at hand.” This speech was the first step on the road to a green economy in Ethiopia.

Over the following 20 years, despite, or perhaps because of, the perennial ravages of drought, war and outside shocks, Mr Meles continued exploring sustainable development in Ethiopia and today there are countless green success stories throughout the country with vast green growth potential. Perhaps his greatest green legacy from his time in office will be the Climate Resilient Green Economy strategy, the first of its kind in the world, announced in Oct 2011 just before the UN climate talks in Durban. This was Ethiopia ahead of the curve.

The May 2012 World Economic Forum on Africa held in Addis Ababa was “Ethiopia’s moment”. It reconfirmed Ethiopia’s historic influence and was the springboard for Mr Meles’ green vision to take off.  His brainchild, the 2011-2015 Growth and Transformation Plan, was designed to make the dream come true. The UN’s Rio+ 20 Summit in Brazil in June was a unique opportunity for Mr Meles as “the voice of Africa” to speak out. Unfortunately, perhaps due to his illness, the voice was not heard, the opportunity was lost and Africa was “sidelined” again.

Without Mr Meles’ energy, influence and vision, Ethiopia’s new government, led by Deputy Prime Minister, Hailemariam Desalegn, faces a historic challenge: to maintain peace and national unity through rapid and sustained economic growth in a world of mounting economic uncertainty. It is here that Mr Meles’ green legacy can be put to greatest effect. By keeping his green vision alive and his green voice strong, Ethiopia is in a unique position to lead Africa and the world in the evolving global green economy, the main theme at Rio+20.

Mr Hailemariam has already said that the government would continue its policies and vowed that all Mr Meles' "initiatives would keep going forward." While this may be reassuring and have a short-term stabilising effect on the current situation, some of the strategies behind Mr Meles’ policies risk having the opposite effect. The hidden costs and unintended consequences of any high carbon, resource intensive, environmentally degrading and socially divisive “brown” development strategies of the GTP could quickly outweigh the benefits.

During the 2007-2008 global food crisis Mr Meles announced his government’s decision to lease large tracts of land to foreign investors for the export of food to the investors’ lands. As this return to the state-led, 20th century development model was contrary to his pioneering, people-led, commercial smallholder farming strategy, Mr Meles was quick to explain the shift was intended to “supplement” sustainable development, not replace it. Citing unequal wealth distribution as one of the hidden costs of such developments, Mr Meles said that adopting large-scale farms as an alternative strategy to smallholder farming would be “patently stupid.”

Along with mega dams and sugar plantations, large-scale land development for food export is the third in a trio of major brown development strategies included in the GTP that Mr Meles hoped would supplement his vision for a green Ethiopia. But rather than supplementing Ethiopia’s economic and cultural transformation these controversial, multi-billion dollar investments in twentieth century technologies risk tipping the balance away from the long-term, evolving green economy back towards the short-term, dominating brown. The hidden costs of these “piecemeal” strategies are well known, there are more of them and they are increasing as populations rise, the planet heats up and eco-systems break down. In Ethiopia these costs are rapid and severe and are already beginning to show.

SOLVING TOMORROW'S PROBLEMS WITH TODAY'S THINKING

The big question Ethiopians must ask is whether twentieth century technologies on the scales envisaged in the GTP can deliver Ethiopia a twenty-first century renaissance. On this subject Mr Meles was puzzling. At the November/December 2011 UN Climate Change talks in Durban he contradicted important elements of his GTP by saying “It doesn’t make sense at all when you are carrying out investment in the green field investment area to start with yesterday’s technology...We have to start with what is viable in the future.” In other speeches he tried to drive this point home by paraphrasing Albert Einstein: “We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them."

One of the latest and most significant hidden cost of the brown development strategies of Ethiopia’s GTP is the opportunity cost of not fulfilling Mr Meles’ green vision. Attracting brown investors because environmental and social rules are slack could deter green investors who will be attracted to Ethiopia because the rules are strict.  The “develop now and clean up later” approach enjoyed by the west for a while is no longer an option - for anyone.

If Mr Meles was an outspoken leader in “rethinking” Africa, his legacy has created a narrow window of opportunity for rethinking some of Ethiopia’s GTP strategies. Mr Meles’ Climate Resilient Green Economy will need climate resilient technologies.  Africa’s Consensus Statement to the Rio+20 Summit, which was largely ignored by the rest of the world, is the single document which begins to explain what Africa can provide and what Africa needs to play a pivotal role in the ‘great rebalancing’ of the planet by expanding the global green economy. Item 24 of the statement, for instance, calls on the international community “to put an international investment strategy into place to facilitate the transition towards a green economy.” This call highlights a specific opportunity for Africa and especially Ethiopia. Instead of waiting for the international community, preoccupied as it is with multiple crises, to deliver a meaningful green investment strategy for Africa on time, Ethiopia is in a strong position to begin the process by proposing strategies and plans of its own.

FROM MEGA-BROWN TO MEGA-GREEN

Over the past 20 years Ethiopia has confirmed its legendary ability to organise large numbers of people in a productive capacity in remote and challenging conditions. The Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front has built a formidable organisational structure with established institutions that have the potential to dramatically transform the rich but vulnerable landscapes of the Horn of Africa. The tools, technologies, knowledge and skills required to fulfil the green dream in Ethiopia are sufficiently developed. The work has already started. The information needed to accelerate the process is literally at our fingertips. With its youthful population Ethiopia’s demographic advantage has never been greater. The possible peace dividend has reached historic highs.

Instead of encircling the plateau with a series of mega-scale brown projects, with their hidden costs and unintended consequences, Ethiopia and its partners have the ability and a historic opportunity to develop mega-scale green projects which include more modest, manageable and sustainable dams, farms and sugar enterprises which could also in the long-term be more profitable.  A series of integrated river basin development projects, one in each of the country’s 12 major river basins to begin with, would be a major rethink of Ethiopia and a significant step towards realising Mr Meles’ original “broad-spectrum” vision and fulfilling the aspirations of Agenda 21.

Two key tools in large-scale, green development are Integrated River Basin Management and Biosphere Reserves based on UNESCO’s core principles. In the past 20 years the thinking behind these has advanced enough in Ethiopia for green investment strategies to be designed and plans made. A revolutionary and democratic combination of top-down and bottom-up development backed by national and international institutions and organisations can give Ethiopia a Green Renaissance from which we can all benefit and learn. Fulfilling the late Prime Minister’s green vision will reclaim Ethiopia’s place in history and could lead us into a twenty-first century green economy. In the face of the inevitable ‘great contraction’ of the unsustainable global brown economy, Ethiopia is well-positioned and well-qualified to inspire and drive the ‘great expansion’ of the sustainable green.

THE GREEN LEGACY OF MELES ZENAWI - PART I

Since Ethiopia's prime minister, Meles Zenawi, died on 20 August there has been an outpouring of opinion on his legacy.  On 21 August, Mark Tran wrote on the UK Guardian’s Global Development site, Poverty Matters blog: “Ethiopia's renaissance under Meles Zenawi tainted by authoritarianism.”  As a response I sent to the Comments section an edited version of my post below – The paradox of Meles Zenawi – where my main message was that 21 years years of Meles Zenawi has created foundations for Ethiopia to build a green renaissance. Jaz Cummins the community co-ordinator on the site replied: “Are you hopeful there is going to be a move towards this?" Here is my answer:

Three things need to happen for me to be hopeful that Ethiopia can bring about a Green Renaissance and become a global leader in the green economy:

First, Ethiopia’s new leadership can quickly reassure the country’s worried populations, neighbours and allies by “rethinking” development strategies, which Mr Meles advocated in 2009, particularly some of those envisaged in its 2011-2015 Growth and Transformation Plan. The multi-billion dollar mega dams, farms and sugar enterprises are out-of-date, they are carbon/capital/resource intensive and subject to huge hidden costs with built-in diminishing returns. Can Ethiopia have a 21st century Renaissance using so much 20th century technology and thinking? The new government could reassure everyone by creating an open forum where these ultra-high-risk investments are given a serious “rethink”. In the meantime, thanks to the positive aspects of Mr Meles’s legacy, Ethiopia is well-positioned and well-qualified to launch a series of integrated, “mega-green” projects to balance the disintegrating “mega-brown”.

Second, Ethiopia’s allies and partners – governments, donars, investors and NGOs – can play a huge role in assisting and encouraging the new leadership to consider the risks involved in some of the strategies of the GTP. It is in no one’s interest (except the arms industry) if the enemies of Ethiopia’s religion are joined by enemies of development strategies. Millions of people in and around Ethiopia who are already living on a knife-edge due to climate change could soon be permanently tipped over. The security costs of such a disruption can hardly be imagined. The outcome of Rio+20, though disappointing on some levels, holds many opportunities for Ethiopia and Africa to put forward green investment plans that could generate huge demand for green technologies, goods and services; create millions of green jobs, and deliver a invaluable peace dividend. The international community knows enough about this final frontier to help build and expand Ethiopia’s Climate Resilient Green Economy.

Third, Item 24 of Africa’s Consensus Statement to Rio+20, calls on the international community “to put an international investment strategy into place to facilitate the transition towards a green economy.” This represents an opportunity for Africa and the new leaders of Ethiopia. Instead of waiting for the international community, preoccupied as it is with multiple crises, to deliver a meaningful green investment strategy on time Africa, led by Ethiopia, is in a strong position to propose a strategy of its own. Ethiopia’s current challenge is an historic opportunity to put forward green investment strategies that would appeal to other’s enlightened self-interest. Enough work has been done on Integrated River Basin Management and Biosphere Reserves (the best tools for the job) in Ethiopia for proposals to begin immediately. The tools, technologies, knowledge and skills are there. Investors are looking for stability with growth. Ethiopia can be a great re-balancer. Mr Meles once said that Africa “was a green field for investment because it is the least developed region on earth.” Ethiopia is one of Africa’s greenest fields. The challenge is to invest and keep the field green.

The Chinese government has recently seen the urgent need to build a “harmonious civilisation”. Ethiopia, the Cradle of Mankind where man’s genius for civilisation evolved, is the natural place for this to begin and succeed.

THE PARADOX OF MELES ZENAWI

This version was first published in openDemocracy on 22 August. A shorter version was published as a letter to the Financial Times 28 August.

                                                                                                                                  
He embodied the eternal paradox that is Ethiopia: a land of ‘great abundance’ where so much poverty exists; a Garden of Eden whose potential has never been fulfilled. 
                                                                                                                                

The death of Ethiopia’s prime minister, Meles Zenawi, on 20 August raises immediate and grave concerns for security in an extremely complex, fragile and unpredictable part of the world. Ethiopia sits at the end of an arc of instability stretching from Kashmir to the Horn of Africa and is one of the world’s most dangerous flash-points. Ethiopia’s 85 million people, with millions more in surrounding countries, are at the frontline of rapid climate change - last year’s drought in the region affected 13 million people. And although Ethiopia is one of the fastest growing economies in the world on the verge of a historic Renaissance, it is also extremely vulnerable to global economic volatility. As “the voice of Africa” and a key player in “the war on terror”, Mr Meles’s death after 21 years in power comes at a critical time for Ethiopia, for Africa and the world at large.

While politics and security issues surrounding Mr Meles’s death understandably dominate the assessment of Ethiopia’s situation, it is also important to consider three other vital areas where the late prime minister had considerable national, regional and international influence: the economy, development and climate change. Whoever leads Ethiopia, the management of these three interconnected issues will determine levels of peace and stability achieved in the region. On these, Mr Meles embodied the eternal paradox that is Ethiopia: a land of ‘great abundance’ where so much poverty exists; a Garden of Eden whose potential has never been fulfilled. 

Since the June 1992 Lem (or Green) Meeting in Addis Ababa, held in conjunction with the UN’s first ‘Earth Summit’ in Brazil and only a year after he assumed responsibility for one of the most challenging countries on earth, Mr Meles championed sustainable development in Africa, fought for  Africa on climate change and was a leader in Africa’s green thinking. A major influence on US president Bill Clinton’s “New Africa”, for the past 20 years Ethiopia has played a pioneering role in environmental research, management and development, combined with historic experiments in ethnic federalism and democracy. In 2011 Ethiopia was the first African country to launch a Climate Resilient Green Economy Strategy.

Over the past two decades Mr Meles’s coalition, the Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Party has laid solid enough green foundations, based on commercial smallholder farming and ambitious environmental rehabilitation schemes, for Ethiopia to become a global leader in the green economy, the main theme of the UN’s Rio+20 ‘Earth Summit’ in June. Following this path, any new or reformed government in Addis Ababa stands a good chance of managing a 21^st century Green Ethiopian Renaissance that would be good for Africa and the world.

The paradox that threatens Ethiopia's current advantage resurfaced around 2003 when Mr Meles took a turn back to the 20^th century by embracing the 'China model' for development. There are many explanations for this return to the state-led model: the fallout from the 1998-2000 Ethio-Eritrea war; the slow progress of “bottom-up” green development; the 2002 drought and contraction in GDP; China’s big push into Africa, which coincided with the beginning of the biggest global economic boom in history. And like other African leaders Mr Meles often said, “Rapid and sustained growth in Africa is a matter of life and death...We have to run just to stand still.” Ethiopia, like China, also has a long history of central rule to overcome; change does not come easy in such ancient lands.

The 1980s model worked. The last 8 years have seen unprecedented advances in Ethiopia on many levels including double-digit annual economic growth with great growth prospects. Ethiopia has become “the China of Africa” with tremendous potential, poised to regain its place in the world.

But this has not been achieved without the hidden costs or externalities associated with such an outdated development model as China’s, whose “top-down” strategies Mr Meles said in 1992 were the cause of so much of Ethiopia’s suffering, hardship and senseless natural resource depletion. If the China model in China, as China’s leaders often remind us, is “unbalanced, uncoordinated and unsustainable” these hidden costs in Ethiopia could be greatly magnified. Transforming the ecological, social and economic landscapes of the fragile Horn of Africa on the scales envisaged by Ethiopia’s 2011-2015 Growth and Transformation Plan - through a series of mega dams, farms and sugar enterprises - could result in unintended consequences on mega scales to match. 

In the 1770s Gibbon famously wrote: “Encompassed on all sides by enemies of their religion Ethiopians slept for near a thousand years, forgetful of the world by whom they were forgotten.” Those enemies are still there, there are more of them, they are well armed and their resources are disappearing. Depending on Ethiopia’s development path, brown or green, there is a great danger that they might be joined by enemies of Ethiopia’s growth and transformation strategies.

Whatever government emerges from the uncertainty in Ethiopia, the green route is the quickest, surest way to a balanced situation. Ethiopia’s green foundations, combined with its tremendous undeveloped natural resources and youthful population, puts this ancient land in an historic position to bring about a Green Renaissance focussed on the most fundamental issues of all for peace and security - food production and environmental management. For this challenge Ethiopians are well qualified.

In the 1960s agronomists saw Ethiopia as a paradise that could feed the whole of Africa. They thought the Awash, one of the smallest of the country’s 12 major river basins, could feed the whole of Ethiopia. The result, as in the rest of Africa, was a disaster. By 1990 most of Ethiopia’s large-scale development concentrated in the Awash Valley was failing or had failed. The planning, technologies and economics of the post-colonial brown development model were “unbalanced, uncoordinated and unsustainable” in the very short term.

Twenty years later the tools, technologies, knowledge, skills and information networks have been sufficiently developed for Ethiopia to forge new development models and build a green economy from which we can all learn. In the wake of the successful World Economic Forum on Africa 2012 in Addis Ababa in May and the historic Rio+20 Summit in June, Ethiopia has never been in such an influential and advantageous position. It is hoped that under new leadership, with a careful balance of top-down and bottom-up management learned over the past two decades, Ethiopia’s legendary ‘great abundance’ can be fulfilled.  

In March 2009, when the third wave of the financial and economic crisis was hitting Africa and the threat of failed states loomed large, Mr Meles said that Africans would have to rethink all their development strategies and “learn to do well in a less permissive age.” The less permissive age looks likely to last for a while. Whoever leads Ethiopia in the 21^st century, this current challenge is a great opportunity to address the eternal Ethiopian paradox and redirect Mr Meles’s influence, energy and vision back to the greener, more democratic path on which he and Ethiopia embarked in 1992. If this is to be “Ethiopia’s moment”, the moment for a “rethink” of Ethiopia is now.

AFRICA, RIO+20 AND THE GREEN ROAD AHEAD

In many ways, the Rio Conference should not be interpreted as a single event that could be assessed in terms of success or failure - W.M. Adams, Green Development, 1995 - Chap 4. Sustainable development: the Rio machine

It is 7 weeks since the UN’s Rio+20 “Earth Summit” in Brazil and now that the dust kicked up by so much anger and disappointment has settled, it might be easier to see the way forward.

With so many conflicting interests and so much at stake, UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon was careful to point out in his opening address on June 20 that summits were not an “end” but a “process”. This echoes the words of Maurice Strong, UN secretary-general to the first Rio summit which, today’s critics of Rio+20 forget, was also a great disappointment at the time and only became a ‘milestone’ when looking back on what was achieved after the summit through hard work, cooperation and careful negotiation.

What is clear is that the “Rio Process” must be accelerated rapidly if we are to avoid creating the perfect storm of converging crises in water, food and energy estimated to hit the planet by the time of Rio+40. There are a number of reasons why Africa can and must play a central role in this process.

Of the world’s habitable continents Africa contains the greatest underdeveloped ecological, mineral and human resources. Africa is also rising, the new growth engine with the potential to add an estimated $3 trillion to the global economy over the next decade. How Africa’s resources are developed, what Africans produce and what they consume during their rise will greatly influence the rate at which the Rio Process accelerates.

In the 20 years since the first Rio Summit, Africa has been building green foundations on the wreckage of the unsustainable, post-colonial development model. In the past 5 years these foundations, based on environmental, social and institutional reforms, have not only enabled Africa’s economies to take off but with tremendous green growth potential.

Ethiopia’s prime minister, Meles Zenawi, calls Africa “a green field for investment because it is the least developed region on earth.” With the rest of the world on unsustainable growth paths and also slowing down, Africa’s lack of high carbon, resource-intensive, ecologically degrading and socially divisive ‘brown’ development can now be Africa’s advantage.  What has been called the greatest imbalance on earth now has a pivotal role in the great rebalancing.

Africa’s “Least Developed” status combined with its green credentials and huge growth prospects makes it easier to work on the main achievements, agreements and innovations of Rio+20: the green economy, green accounting, sustainable development goals, institutional reform, private sector involvement and public-private partnerships. At the summit Africa was also the only continent speaking with one voice.

Africa’s Consensus Statement to Rio+20, the culmination of 20 years’ work but virtually ignored by non-Africans, is the document which says what Africa needs and what Africa can provide to accelerate the Rio Process. Item 24, for instance, calls on the international community, “to put an international investment strategy into place to facilitate the transition towards a green economy.” This call highlights an opportunity for Africa.

Instead of waiting for the international community, preoccupied as it is with multiple crises, to deliver a meaningful green investment strategy on time, Africa is well qualified and in a strong position to propose strategies and plans of its own that would reveal a wide range of green investment opportunities in: existing green economic success stories; greening the existing brown economy; reinventing and greening abandoned and forgotten projects; formalising and greening informal markets; redirecting brown investments towards the green economy; greening aid, and exploring green investment opportunities for the future. The Rio+20 summit has prepared the way for Africa to take the lead.

Since 1992 the tools and technologies to fulfill the aspirations of Agenda 21 in Africa have been developed. The knowledge, information and skills are there. The multi-disciplines are already active. The frameworks are taking shape. Business is ready to make it happen and governments are preparing the way. There are trillions of global dollars sitting idle looking for balance and growth. Investors are saying, “Where can I invest?” 

Critics of Rio+20 were also critical of the concurrent G20 summit in Mexico (18-19 June). Yet the G20 produced a Leaders Declaration which has similar aspirations to Rio’s outcome document - The Future We Want. In many places it uses the same language and has the same goals. Ultimately it is the same process. What is needed is for G20 economists and Rio+20 ecologists to work with global multidisciplines from public-private sectors on new systems to accelerate the journey towards a green economy. With the right understanding Africa is the place where the journey can be easier, cheaper and faster.   

If the benefits of stimulating the Rio Process in Africa are not yet clear, the costs of not doing so become clearer by the day. Despite Africa’s great promise, the world’s most challenging continent remains the world’s most vulnerable to a lengthening list of ‘hidden costs’ associated with the still-dominant brown economy, or business-as-usual, including global economic volatility, climate change, environmental degradation, biodiversity loss, inequality and insecurity. The perfect storm of converging crises is already hitting millions in Africa and threatens millions more.

If the green field of Africa is to be a sustainable engine for global growth the challenge is to keep it green. With food insecurity mounting year by year a stimulus to accelerate the Rio Process in Africa is not only essential and urgent but is in the best interests of us all. In the last 20 years Africa has come far enough on a very rocky road for the late Wangari Maathai, one of Africa’s great, green pioneers to say with confidence, “We know what to do: why don’t we do it?”

GREEN EXPORERS IN AFRICA

In the future investors will need to be explorers - HSBC,  'In the future' advertising campaign, 2012.

This blog is the beginning of an exploration of Africa's 54 green economies. It starts with an Urgent Call to Green Action. It looks at Africa’s position at the forthcoming United Nation’s Rio+20 ‘Earth Summit’ on 20-22 June. In support of Africa’s voice at Rio it hopes to raise awareness of the continent’s green economic growth potential, to outline the tremendous opportunities and to generate interest in the global importance of investing in Africa’s green economies.

The material for this blog has been gathered over many years, but it has been assembled in this form in a very short time. Due to time and space constraints the blog does not include many statistics or references. Over the coming weeks these will be added as 'links'. In order to arrive at a simple understanding of such a complex subject, the blog is presented in several stages or 'posts' which will hopefully lead to green action.

First is an Urgent Call to Green Action: Rio+20+Africa. The Call tries to show how investing in Africa’s green economies is vital to the rebalancing of the global economy. It also includes proposals for a draft green investment plan focussed on Africa's river basins as natural designations for assessing green growth potential.  Hopefully ready for Rio+20, the draft plan would be made up of 54 green investment blogs covering one river basin for each country built by 'green explorers' in Africa through web-based research tools.

Next is An Immensely Rich Cosmos, an essay on the subject looking more widely at the current situation in Africa, the short and long-term challenges and the possible green solutions including an unofficial, draft green investment plan assembled in time for Rio.

For readers who want to go further into the enquiry, hopefully join the conversation and make positive contributions, the next stage of the blog comprises five ‘original posts’. These five posts are the blog’s first green footsteps into Africa and explain its purpose in more detail:

1.  Africa: first green frontier (or last brown)

2. Africa’s Voice at Rio+20  

3. A draft green investment plan
 

4. Institutional frameworks  

5. Africa’s 3^rd era of hope: globalisation on trial 

(At the end of post 5 I include a fuller personal profile which covers Africa's 3 eras of hope.)

Depending on the response to this call for green action, over the remaining days before Rio+20 the blog hopes to coordinate the green explorers’ findings. Post number 3, a draft green investment plan, outlines 7 green investment categories to explore. Ideas on how to begin the exploration will be provided to respondents and will be updated regularly. It begins with a green conversation....

URGENT CALL TO GREEN ACTION: RIO+20+AFRICA

The fate of us all is bound up with Africa - Alexander Campbell, The Heart of Africa, 1954 

Man everywhere needs Africa - G.E.W. Wolstenholm, Man and Africa, 1965

Just as Africa needs the world, the world needs Africa - Gordon Brown, former UK prime minister, AU Summit, Kampala, July 2010. 

Contents

INTRODUCTION

IS AFRICA READY?

CALL TO GREEN ACTION - ONLY DAYS BEFORE 'THE FUTURE YOU WANT;

INTRODUCTION

With only days before the Rio+20 Summit, Africa and the world may miss a historic opportunity. The emerging key challenges of the Summit are how to ‘green’ the global economy to save the world from converging crises, and to get world leaders to agree on a set of Sustainable Development Goals. But as the Summit draws near there is scepticism about whether it will deliver the necessary breakthroughs. There are calls for more courage and vision. The WWF has warned that the Summit could collapse if ‘countries fail to agree on a draft text for sustainable development goals and definition of key objectives including green economy.’ This critical Summit coincides with the rise of Africa, last frontier for investment and a beacon of hope for sustainable growth.

Success at Rio matters most to Africa which has most to gain and most to lose. But there have been questions surrounding what Africa wants from the Summit and what the green economy means for Africa’s development. This matters greatly because Rio+20 is a unique opportunity for Africa, the greenest continent with the youngest populations and growing fast, to take the lead in the green economy. With the world in turmoil, Africa is the new engine of growth with the potential to play a pivotal role in expanding the global green economy. After 20 years’ sustainable development experience Africa is well qualified to provide the courage and vision needed at Rio.

Africa may never again be in such an advantageous position. But time is short with only days to go before the Summit. For this reason I have prepared the attached Urgent Call to Green Action: Rio+20+Africa to which I hope you can respond with positive feedback and suggestions.

Africa’s influence at Rio is a crucial story that is not being told. With your influence and networks that story can be told and can spread. Please forward the file attached to anyone who might be interested in exploring the green economy in Africa.

Ex Africa semper aliquid novi – Out of Africa always something new.

IS AFRICA READY?

As the Rio+20 Summit approaches there are calls for more courage and vision to avoid squandering a historic opportunity to plan for a sustainable future. Set against a backdrop of escalating global crises, the ‘greening’  of the global economy as the only viable route to sustainability is where courage and vision are needed most.

The Summit also coincides with the rise of Africa, the last frontier for investment, new engine of global growth, where the high-carbon, resource-intensive ‘brown’ economy is least developed, and where expanding the green economy can be easier, faster and cheaper than anywhere else.  However, there are signs that Africa could become the last frontier for brown investment when it can become the first frontier for green.

In 20 years since the first Rio Summit, Africa has been building green foundations for a green economy. Today, with its huge untapped resources and promising growth forecasts, Africa is well-positioned at Rio to present its green credentials, forge its green identity and take the lead in the global green economy.

But is Africa ready? There is a danger that this historic opportunity may be lost without more concrete strategies and plans, which Africa is well-qualified to propose. Using web-based research tools there is still time before Rio for ‘green explorers’ in Africa to assemble draft green investment plans that can demonstrate the continent’s huge green growth potential.

After 50 years of independence and industrial experience (green and brown) Africa can show how green investment in this vast continent of 1 billion people can play a pivotal role in rebalancing the global economy. Rio+20 is a unique opportunity for Africa, the greenest continent with the youngest populations and growing fast, to speak with one voice with the courage and vision needed to accelerate the journey towards a global green economy.

It is difficult to overstate the importance of investing in the green continent. If Africa continues to attract brown investment at the current rate the development clock could be turned back decades. The hidden costs of the brown economy in Africa are now well known, there are more of them and they are increasing as the planet heats up, populations soar and eco-systems break down. If the finance and energy of the brown economy in Africa is not directed onto greener paths, in a matter of decades the continent could be stripped bare of resources and totally deforested with vast areas uninhabitable for an estimated 2 billion people or more.   

CALL TO GREEN ACTION - ONLY DAYS BEFORE THE FUTURE YOU WANT

  
Africa’s growth story is remarkable in its timing to play a key role in rebalancing the global economy. In 50 years since independence, Africa has experienced hope followed by disillusion, decline, stagnation and finally in the last decade long-awaited growth. By 2008, just before the crash, the ‘forgotten continent’ had become the ‘last frontier for investment’. Africa’s rapid rebound from the Great Recession in 2010 was the first sign of economic independence from the western powers. Two years later, with the rest of the world in turmoil and worse case scenarios never far away, Africa stands out as beacon of hope. With the historic Rio+20 “Earth Summit” approaching fast, Africa as a green field for investment is in a unique position to promote itself as a driver of sustainable growth.

Key themes of the United Nations Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development on 20-22 June are the green economy and the institutional frameworks for sustainable development and poverty eradication. During the Conference it is hoped that the international community will agree on a set of Sustainable Development Goals, appoint a global ‘high commissioner’ for the environment and elevate the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) to Organisation status equal to WTO or WHO. 

This once-in-a-generation event takes place against a backdrop of mounting economic, financial, environmental, social and security crises, including food, water and energy. This 21^st century Earth Summit is therefore critical. Exploring ways for ‘greening’ the global economy has emerged as the key challenge of the Summit.

The global green economy is one of the most controversial issues of the day. Some see it as a luxury in our economically troubled times. Others say it is an opportunistic manipulation by global capitalism to ‘monetise’ and control the planet’s dwindling resources to keep the poor down. Yet more and more see the evolving green economy as the planet’s last hope, the only viable route to a sustainable future.

Its opposite, the dominant, high-carbon, resource-intensive, ‘brown’ economy, with its escalating ‘hidden costs’ - from inequality to climate change - has reached a point of diminishing returns. With the world in turmoil it is becoming increasingly clear that a rapid and sustained expansion of the global green economy is essential if we are to avoid creating a ‘perfect storm’ of converging crises expected to strike by the time of Rio+40.

The historic Summit also coincides with the rise of Africa, the last frontier for investment and new engine for global growth, where the expansion of the green economy can be easier, quicker and cheaper than in the more developed brown economies of the industrial and emerging countries. However, there are strong signs that Africa risks becoming the last frontier for ‘brown’ investment, or business-as-usual, when it would be in everybody’s long-term interest if it became the first frontier for green. Africa’s hopes have been shattered before and the current boom is in danger of turning back the clock. The hidden costs of ‘brown’ development in Africa are now well known, there are more of them and they are increasing as the planet heats up, populations increase and eco-systems break down. Inequality, one of the most glaring hidden costs, is already causing huge swathes of unrest across the continent.

There is also scepticism about whether Rio+20 will deliver the necessary breakthroughs to make the event a success. Some say the Summit needs more courage and vision to avoid a historic opportunity being squandered. There also questions about what Africa wants from Rio and whether Africa’s interpretation of the green economy/growth concept is sufficiently well defined.

Yet even at this late hour such challenges offer Africa a unique opportunity to take the lead in the green economy. Rio+20 is a narrow window for Africa to forge its green identity, demonstrate its collective progress towards sustainability since 1992, present its green credentials and promote its potential for rapid green growth. This is a one-off chance for Africa to show the world how its Green Revolution launched 20 years ago has laid the foundations for a green growth engine that can help rebalance and stabilise the global economy. With the global brown economy facing a great contraction, Africa can provide a great expansion of the green.

Now is the time for Africa to provide the courage and vision for Rio. More than any other continent, Africa is speaking with one voice. If Africa is to fulfil its ambitions and play a meaningful and stabilising role in the 21st century this voice in negotiations at Rio is critical.

Africa’s Consensus Statement to Rio+20 (CS), the continent’s key negotiating document, makes a sound case why the rest of the world should invest in Africa’s green economies to meet the challenges ahead. But it could be strengthened by putting greater emphasis on the tremendous green investment opportunities that can give the global green economy the boost it urgently needs. It could be strengthened by proposing concrete green growth strategies and plans as well as the necessary institutional frameworks that could lead to Sustainable Development Goals. Africa’s negotiators could make a more positive case by showing how the continent’s vast untapped resources - mineral, ecological and human - if developed sustainably can act as a green growth buffer against the unsustainable brown economy which is expanding fast across the continent.

Item 24 of the CS calls on the international community “to put an international investment strategy into place to facilitate the transition towards a green economy.” This call highlights a specific opportunity for Africa. Instead of waiting for the international community, preoccupied as it is with multiple crises, to deliver a meaningful green investment strategy on time, Africa is in a strong position to propose strategies and plans of its own. Rio+20 is a historic forum for Africa to put forward strategies that would produce multi-win scenarios and plans that would appeal to others’ enlightened self-interest. The result could be a fair deal with Africa that would be a fair deal for all.

With its tremendous resources, 20 years’ sustainable development experience, huge demographic advantages, promising growth forecasts and the lightest footprint on the planet, Africa is well qualified and well positioned to take the lead in the global green economy. As a green growth engine, this vast continent of 1 billion could generate rapid and sustained demand for green technologies, goods and services, create millions of green jobs, provide ecological services, turn the challenges of climate change into opportunities as well as inspire the browner economies of the advanced and emerging countries to take greener paths.

In Africa the aspirations of Agenda 21 can now become a practical reality. Everything needed to expand the green economy is ready. Africa’s institutions are well established. The tools and technologies have been developed. The knowledge, information and skills are there. The multi-disciplines are already at work. New measurements and accounting systems are being explored. Governments, businesses and global institutions are sufficiently reformed and know it has to happen. There are trillions of global dollars sitting idle or spinning in global roulette wheels. Anyone with money is saying “Where can I invest?”

The urgency to move forward and fast is mounting. Africa has the world’s youth on its side for long-term, green plans and may never again be in such an advantageous position. Africa’s 2011 Green Economy Initiative followed by the successful 2012 World Economic Forum in Africa, are two of the many spring boards to Rio+20. As the late Wangari Maathai often said, “We know what to do: why don’t we do it?”  

With only days left before Rio there is still time to assemble informal draft green investment plans as part of an African green growth strategy. Such plans designed from the ‘earth-up’ could lead to ideas for green institutional frameworks and Sustainable Development Goals, both major themes of the Summit. Curiosity, collaboration, coordination, a sense of responsibility and web-based research tools are the only inputs needed for a draft plan.

With the vast amount of information on Africa literally at our fingertips it should now be possible for a group of ‘green explorers’, African or non-African, to put together a draft green investment plan in time for Rio+20 that would reveal a wide range of green investment opportunities across a wide range of rural and urban landscapes. Working Towards a Green Economy in Africa is a blog that hopes to encourage green explorers in Africa to create 54 draft plans. Africa’s advantage is that their green explorers have already been exploring for 20 years.

The first part of the blog is this Call to Green Action: Rio+20+Africa. It is an open forum and conversation that invites green explorers to put forward suggestions for green investment in Africa. In the final days before the Summit the blog hopes to assemble simple and informal draft green investment plans based on integrated river basin management - a holistic approach to sustainable development. 54 green investment blogs for 54 river basins in 54 African countries could be part of the rethinking and reframing of Africa needed for the 21^st century. The Rio+20 Summit is a narrow window of opportunity for Africa to take a big step forward on the journey towards a green economy that can lead to sustainability, resilience and economic independence.

Although time is short, this constraint can provide the focus needed to encourage and coordinate 54 green investment blogs that will give responsible investors a sample of the great, green opportunities waiting in Africa. This is the time for ‘joined-up thinking’ – something, perhaps, that Africans never lost.

The next step to take, when you have read this Call to Green Action, is to visit the blog Working Towards a Green Economy in Africa. At the end of each post is space for comments which will begin an on-going Africa conversation or journey, with Rio as the first goal. The comments at the end of each post which support this campaign will be compiled as ‘Green Supporters’. More specifically, at the end of the Call to Green Action, the comments space is also where ‘Green Explorers’ can put their name, nationality, chosen country, the river basin they wish to explore and why they have chosen it.

Many of Africa’s vast river basins, though rich in potential, are still remote and very challenging, so for the purposes of the draft plan in time for Rio, the green exploration will be easier if the chosen basin were reasonably accessible and connected, and including one large urban centre. In Ethiopia, for instance, the Awash River Basin in the north-east of the country has urban centres, is accessible, well studied, severely degraded by ‘brown’ development and in urgent need of green investment. The three ecological zones of the Awash Basin – upper, middle and lower -also have huge green growth potential.

The blog post, A Draft Green Investment Plan, outlines how the journey towards a green economy in an African river basin might begin. Keeping such a vast subject as simple as possible the plan proposes seven green investment categories, starting with green success stories of which there are countless examples in Africa’s thousands of river basins. In the past 20 years Africans have been exploring and developing their river basins with scientific eyes. Africa’s knowledge, information and communications economies have grown exponentially. Everything required for expanding the green economy in any given river basin in Africa is already known. Web-based research tools can uncover endless possibilities and opportunities as well as challenges that can be turned into opportunities in Africa’s green economy. Exploring, compiling and communicating even a fraction of the vast potential of 54 African river basins in time for Rio is the first challenge.

If two or more green explorers come forward interested in exploring a particular river basin they can ‘join-up’ their thinking and research in their particular river basin blog. As the information comes in, various templates will be used to compile the information into a draft green investment plan.

The first aim of this blog is to add something to Africa’s voice at Rio and to promote Africa’s green economy as a key theme of the Summit. There is a historic opportunity on 20-22 June that cannot be ignored. The next aim of the draft plan is to discover ways for African countries to propose to the international community an investment strategy “to facilitate the transition towards a green economy” (CS 24). Such a strategy can lead to a final, workable and well-financed green investment plan for 54 river basins, backed by governments, businesses, international institutions and NGOs. The next stage, after Rio, is for a ‘green stimulus’ to put the plan into action and get Africa’s green growth engine up to speed. The urgency for this cannot be overstated because as African leaders often say, “We have to run just to stand still.”

For many years Africans and non-Africans have been calling for a 'Marshall Plan' for Africa. Such a plan for reconstruction might have been appropriate after the destruction of the post-colonial ‘lost decades’. Today, Africa does not need a plan for reconstruction but rather a 'green new deal' with the international community that recognises what has been achieved in the past two decades and builds on it to ensure Africa becomes a green engine for sustainable global growth instead of a brown growth engine which could soon break down or run out of fuel.

As of 6 June this Call to Action is being sent to Africa’s environmental ministries, authorities and agencies. It will also be sent to various institutions and individuals who might be interested in Working Towards a Green Economy in Africa.

AN IMMENSLY RICH COSMOS

"The continent is too large to describe. It is a veritable ocean, a separate planet, a varied and immensely rich cosmos. Only with the greatest simplification, for the sake of convenience, can we say ‘Africa.’ In reality, except as a geographical appellation, Africa does not exist” - Ryszard Kapuscinski, Shadow under the Sun, 1998.

When thinking about Africa it is impossible to avoid Kapuscinski’s greatest simplification. Africa is as large as the USA, China, India and Australia combined. Covering 30 million km², with one billion people speaking 2,000 languages in 54 nation states, Africa is the oldest, most diverse, most challenging and least understood region on earth.  During China’s 2006 ‘Year of Africa’, billboards in Beijing depicted Africa as the ‘Land of Myth, Mystery and Miracles’. Western ignorance surrounding this immensely rich cosmos  was thrown into focus in 2010 when Barack Obama, US president, had to remind fellow Americans, the most advanced people on the planet, that "Africa is a continent, not a country."

From 20-22 June the world will meet in Brazil for the United Nations Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development. The green economy and the institutional frameworks for sustainable development and poverty eradication are key themes of the summit. During the Conference it is hoped that the international community will agree on a set of Sustainable Development Goals, appoint a global ‘high commissioner’ for the environment and elevate the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) to Organisation status equal to WTO or WHO. This once-in-a-generation event takes place against a backdrop of mounting global economic, financial, environmental, social and security crises including food, water and energy.

At the heart of the complex web of factors causing the world’s multiple crises is the fundamental imbalance between the dominant, unsustainable, high carbon ‘brown’ economy with its escalating ‘hidden’ costs - environmental, social and economic - and the evolving, low carbon ‘green’ economy that strives to account for every cost and is the only known route to sustainability. UNEP’s 2011 report - Towards a Green Economy - demonstrates how a rapid and sustained expansion of the global green economy is essential if we are to avoid creating the ‘perfect storm’ of converging crises expected to strike by the time of Rio+40.

It will take decades, multi-trillions of dollars and possibly massive social upheavals to phase out the brown economy of the high carbon, resource-intensive industrial world. The emerging economies, led by China, are already well advanced along the brown path to growth and the further they go the more difficult it will become to go green. In Africa, where the brown economy is least developed, the expansion of the green economy can be easier, faster and cheaper.

The historic Rio+20 summit also coincides with the rise of Africa. The last frontier for investment and greatest store of untapped resources on earth – mineral, ecological and human - is open, connected and ready for business. Since the first Earth Summit, Africa’s sustainable development policies and focus on environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues have laid the foundations for a green economy. Economic growth figures and forecasts combined with progress on the ‘green’ MDGs show that Africa is ready to assume a new role. 

The tools, technologies and skills are now sufficiently developed in Africa to turn the aspirations of Agenda 21, the first summit’s defining document, into practical realities. The next stage is for green investors to understand the situation on the ground and to explore Africa’s enormous opportunities. Africa’s 2011 Green Economy Initiative followed by the successful 2012 World Economic Forum in Africa are natural spring boards to the next stage. 

Ethiopia’s Prime Minister, Meles Zenawi, calls Africa “a green field for investment because it is the least developed region on earth.” If Africa is to become a sustainable engine of global growth, adding an estimated $3 trillion (or more) to the global economy over the next decade, it is in everybody’s long-term interest that as much of this wealth as possible goes into the green economy rather than the brown. The challenge for Africa is to keep its green fields green.

There is an enthusiasm sweeping across Africa not seen since the 1960s. Some say the future will be African, that Africa’s time has come. However, such hopes have been dashed before and while ‘this time is different’ unfortunately so much in Africa and worldwide is still the same and in many respects worse than before.  African economies remain the world’s most vulnerable to an increasing number of outside and inside shocks. The perfect storm will hit Africa faster and harder than anywhere else. Rapid and sustained growth is therefore essential. African leaders have to run just to stand still. They realise that green growth is the only way forward. Africa’s Green Revolution is more important than ever.

The most immediate threat to Africa’s green growth is not climate change, nor even global economic volatility, both of which can act as catalysts for change, but the current expansion of the brown economy across the continent. From around 2003 the ‘big push’ into Africa by the emerging economies, led by China, coincided with the biggest global boom in history and gave Africa the economic boost it needed. But the emerging markets’ boom has not brought enough emerging ideas on how to develop Africa for the 21^st century. In fact, it looks like turning back the clock. Africa’s debts are rising again. Capital flight is higher than capital inflows. The old hidden costs are returning.

The surge in brown investment across Africa – the most potent symbols of which are mega-scale mines, dams, farms and sugar enterprises – runs the risk of undoing Africa’s Green Revolution and 20 years’ green progress. Inequality, one of the most glaring hidden costs of the brown economy, is already causing huge swathes of discontent across the continent and could easily jeopardise ambitions. Multi-billion dollar contracts in fragile economies are ripe for misallocation.  Headlines like Second Scramble for Africa, Sub-Saharan Gold Rush, Boom Time in Africa and the New Great Game are sufficient warning signs. Instead of becoming the first frontier for the green economy, Africa is in danger of becoming the last frontier for the brown.

The planning, technology, economics and finance, the assumptions and even many of the attitudes of the ‘China model’, the ‘India model’, the ‘Saudi model’ etc in Africa are little different to those of the ‘post-colonial model’ that failed so rapidly and dramatically, only this time investments are on mega scales with correspondingly mega hidden costs and risks. The hidden costs of these 20^th century, brown development models in Africa’s complex, harsh and unpredictable conditions are higher and felt sooner than anywhere else. These costs are now well known, there are more of them and they are increasing as the planet heats up, eco-systems break down, populations increase and the imbalances of the global brown economy spin out of control.

Security costs and opportunity costs must now be added to the lengthening list of 21^st century hidden costs of brown development. Security costs are increasing with the rising discontent across the continent. The so-called land grabs isolate thousands of potentially well-armed people. An African country pursuing brown development strategies also risks the opportunity costs of deterring green investors. Brown development attracts investors because the rules are slack whereas green development attracts them because the rules are strict.   

If the economic development strategies of the China model in China has produced an economy which, as China’s premier Wen Jiabao often reminds us, “is unbalanced, uncoordinated and unsustainable” these costs in Africa could be rapidly magnified. Using such an outdated (1980s) development model in Africa, as Einstein might have said, “is like trying to solve a problem by using the same thinking that caused the problem in the first place.” Top-down development without bottom-up participation has already been tried in Africa during the post colonial period and it failed dramatically.

A direct warning of this came from a senior Chinese official at the recent World Economic Forum meeting in Addis Ababa: “Do not necessarily do what we did”, warned the official of the China Investment Forum. Policies of “sheer economic growth” should be avoided, he said. “We now suffer pollution and an unequal distribution of wealth and opportunities… You have a clean sheet of paper here. Try to write something beautiful.”

The "something beautiful" could be African strategies to expand the green economy.

The Rio+20 Summit is a unique opportunity for Africa to forge its green identity, to demonstrate its collective progress towards sustainability since 1992 and to present its green growth potential to the world. More than any other continent, Africa is speaking with one voice. If Africa is to fulfil its ambitions and play a meaningful and stabilising role in the 21st century this voice in negotiations at Rio is critical.

Africa’s October 2011 Consensus Statement (CS) is the continent’s key negotiating document for Rio+20. While the CS makes a sound case for investing in Africa’s green economies it could be strengthened by putting greater emphasis on the continent’s tremendous green growth opportunities and by proposing concrete green investment plans. Africa’s negotiators could make a more positive case by saying more about Africa’s role in rebalancing the global economy and how the continent’s vast green fields can act as a buffer against the encroaching brown economy.

Item 24 of the CS calls on the international community “to put an international investment strategy into place to facilitate the transition towards a green economy.” This call is from the Old Africa, asking outsiders who do not understand their lands to devise green growth strategies for them. Instead, the New Africa is perfectly placed to propose African strategies based on the experience of the  past 20 years. Instead of waiting for the international community, preoccupied as it is with multiple crises, to deliver a meaningful green investment strategy on time, Africa is in a strong position to propose its own. Rio+20 is a historic forum for Africa to put forward plans that would appeal to other’s enlightened self-interest.

With its vast resources, 20 years’ sustainable development experience, demographic advantages, the lightest footprint on the planet and the promising growth forecasts, Africa is well qualified to take the lead in developing green growth strategies that could generate huge demand for green technologies, goods and services, create green jobs and inspire the browner economies to take a greener path.

A green growth strategy could begin with: (a) a green investment plan to release Africa’s green growth potential and (b) the institutional framework to design and build green economies including structures to roll back and redirect the unsustainable brown economy which is expanding fast across the continent. These two themes are consistent with the sustainability agenda of Rio+20 and could help in the development of Sustainable Development Goals. Africa’s advantage in developing green growth strategies and the institutional frameworks is in the achievements of the past 20 years.

In March 2009, with the threat of failed states looming over Africa, Meles Zenawi, Ethiopia’s prime minister and the continent’s leading spokesperson, said that Africa would have to “rethink” its “development strategies” and “learn to do well in a less permissive age.” Three years later, with the threat of austerity increasing worldwide, the less permissive age looks like it could be prolonged. The need for a rethink, of not only Africa’s but everybody’s development strategies, is more urgent than ever. Rio+20 is a unique opportunity for Africa to show that their rethink has begun.

With the global brown economy lurching from one crisis to the next and the distance between crises getting shorter there is no time to lose. The window of opportunity is narrowing and Africa may never again be in such an advantageous position. Rio+20 is a historic forum for Africa to show that it can lead in the green economy and why investors should take a closer look.

Working Towards a Green Economy in Africa is a blog that hopes to develop a conversation about Africa’s green potential. It is a green exploration of Africa. The blog hopes to generate enough interest and information on a wide range of green growth opportunities in Africa to form a simple, informal, draft green investment plan that would give investors and donors a sample of far greater opportunities in the last frontier.

A simple framework for understanding the green potential of Africa’s huge resources could begin with assessments on several levels: continental, trade bloc, country, river basin and eco-system level. Using 21^st century measurements, simple compilations of statistics on Africa’s ecological, human and mineral resources - for the whole continent, for 54 countries and 54 chosen river basins - would quickly demonstrate green growth potential. River basins are natural designations for green growth assessments.

Integrated river basin management, systems thinking and biosphere reserves embody the holistic approach to sustainable development and are key tools for unlocking Africa’s green economy. Instead of investing in mega-brown development strategies Africa has the resources and qualifications to lead the world in mega-green. Africa’s great advantage in expanding the green economy is that their ‘under-developed’ river basins are already mostly green. 

All it takes is for 54 ‘green explorers’ in Africa, one for each country, to study a chosen river basin for a green growth assessment. An exploration of a chosen river basin would soon reveal a wide range of investment opportunities across a wide range of categories, or ‘shades’ of green.

Curiosity, collaboration, coordination, a sense of responsibility and web-based research tools are the only inputs needed to assemble a draft green investment plan. With the vast amount of information on Africa literally at our fingertips it should now be possible for green explorers to put together a draft plan for Africa in time for Rio+20. Out of such a ground-level plan ideas would emerge ideas for the institutional frameworks required take the plans forward, including structures for redirecting the energy and finance of the brown economy into more sustainable development strategies. Another of Africa’s great advantages is that the green explorers have been exploring their river basins since 1992.

54 blogs for 54 river basins in 54 African countries could be a step on the journey towards a green economy in Africa that can lead to sustainability, resilience and economic independence. The result could be a fair deal with Africa that could be a fair deal for all. Now is the time for ‘joined-up thinking’, something perhaps that Africa never lost.