The National Council on Climate Change (NCCC) has trained a host of stakeholders on the concept of carbon market policy and manual procedure as part of efforts to help increase the nation’s capacity to execute its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) effectively.
Nigeria demonstrated that it was even more ready to reduce and explore the carbon market in 2024 when it proposed a draft of Articles 6.2 and 6.4 of the Voluntary Carbon Market (VCM) of the Paris Agreement.
Participants during the three-day workshop held by NCCC in Abuja to strengthen stakeholders’ capacity for NDCs implementation
The country’s long-term goal is to participate in the compliance market and carry out the required assessments on the various dynamics.This gesture provides Nigeria with a unique and twofold opportunity to achieve this goal.
The first involves the opportunity to create transactions and choose which nation to work with, and the second comprises a credit mechanism that encourages a marketplace for nations to exchange carbon credits.
Given the foregoing, the socialisation and knowledge-building programme that was held in Abuja from Wednesday, December 11, to Friday, December 13, 2024, brought to light a number of gaps that Nigeria must fill, including putting in place a suitable institutional framework, increasing the level of operations and bilateral agreements, and securing important private sector participation.
Speaking at the ceremony, NCCC director-general, Dr. Nkiruka Maduekwe, said Nigeria has shown conditional commitment and is executing a number of climate action projects.
She, however, expressed concern that the issue of tracking the results of these projects still exists.
She slammed the idea of asking countries to adopt lofty NDC targets without providing a clear roadmap for how to attain such objectives.
“How do we socialise and deconstruct the NDCs on where we want to be, looking at the past and how we get there?”
These are some of the questions the NCCC boss hopes to have answered in order to strengthen the formation and implementation of NDCs.
The workshop, according to her, was organised to create the platform for stakeholders to brainstorm on how to provide answers to the above-mentioned issues.
Dr. Maduekwe concluded her speech by hailing the attendees and drawing their attention to the fact that their participation in the exercise reveals their intentions and commitment to contribute to solving the country’s climate challenges.
In the same vein, Mrs. Lolalade Awogbade, the head of sustainability at the Development Bank of Nigeria (DBN), emphasised the importance of correcting misconceptions about access to climate and development finance.
According to her, it is only when commercially valued projects and concept notes are submitted and other processes followed by Nigerian entities are openly vetted by the Green Climate Fund (GCF) that such money will be released to the DBN for disbursement and implementation.
“So far, there’s no money that has been given by the GCF to DBN. It reads zero in the account,” Awogbade revealed.
By Nsikak Emmanuel Ekere, Abuja
