AFRICAN REGIONAL SYMPOSIUM ON LOSS AND DAMAGE

THEME: Consolidating Evidence and African voices to advance a Pan African Loss and Damage Agenda at all levels

Venue: Bingu Wa Mutharika International Conference Centre (BICC), Lilongwe, Malawi (and online)

Dates: April 3 -5, 2023

The African Regional Symposium on Loss and Damage was organised by thethe Civil Society Network on Climate Change (CISONECC) in collaboration with Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA), Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund (SCIAF), and Trociare Malawi. The symposium was aimed to provide a platform for African stakeholders and other global citizens to dialogue on and express their analysis on how to move Loss and Damage forward in the sphere of international solidarity.

The symposium was organized in three distinct segments including, (i) Scientific Segment will be focusing on evidence generation on loss and damages and  enhancing capacities of participants on methodologies that are appropriate in documenting loss and damages, (ii) the Political Segment will aim at consolidating our messaging and our influence approach towards ensuring Africa’s priorities are well incorporated in the proposed mechanisms for financing loss and damage, and (iii) the Technical Segment will detailing our technical inputs to the various thematic processes such as the transitional committee and the Santiago Network on Loss and Damage to  buttress the loss and damage agenda.

The African Regional Symposium on Loss and Damage drew participation from African Governments, the Africa Group of Negotiators, CSO representatives, the academia, Technical working group on loss and damage, representatives of African institutions, private sector and representatives of communities at the frontlines of climate crisis, amongst others.

Therefore the symposium was organized to achieve the following specific objectives;

• Strengthening our political approaches in influencing a stronger outcome on loss and damage at UNFCCC,
• To develop key proposals and messages to the transitional committee on Loss and Damage, the Santiago network and other platforms processing L&D, capturing the aspirations of Africans to be inform the work of the transitional committee
• Take stock of research done in the thematic area of loss and damage and assess their usefulness in driving our influence agenda
• Develop appropriate methods for quantitatively and non-quantitatively assessing Loss and Damage and propose measures to scale up assessments across the continent

Generate key recommendations for setting up and operationalizing the Loss and Damage Fund and the Santiago Network on Loss and Damage.

Achievements of the symposium:

• The Symposium was able to mobilize participants from climate and environmental enthusiast, advocates, political representatives and Victims from many parts of the African continent to share opinions and perspective through presentations of research finding and testimonies,
• Countries of the global south also defined and shared on strategies that have been used to address climate change adaptation and mitigation but with a relative effect on L&D and share from country level application,
• The symposium realized the need to recognize the humanitarian aspects that have been ignore in addressing Loss & Damage due to lack of evidence at the time of responding to calls for justice,
• The symposium also led to the realization of an African communique to collectively voice out to the development countries in the global west and parts of Asia about the need to generate an informed financial transition for Loss and Damage.

Lessons from the Symposium:

• As a point of engagement for documentation, it is important to for locals/victims should voice their stories no matter the language and background,
• Loss and damage is not farfetched (impact is known from action research)
• Dissemination of information should be from research based with evidence with community voices.
• Emissions are continuous so research should not be academic or hypothetical but reality based because the losses and damage are real.
• Carbon traders penetration in the new market is not people centered, it ought to benefit the victims and other vulnerable and endangered communities
• Need to minimize the impacts of CC to avoid the problem  by CSO to partnering with government (in info dissemination such as understanding the early warnings to minimize the dangers)
• All stakeholders should be engaged especially the influential stakeholders and less with the important stakeholders
• Recognition of the Scottish support fund towards Malawi recovery processes
• Need for continued collaboration with regional and Global partners
• Need to identify opportunities in the discussions around Loss and Damage