The Local Climate Solutions for Africa (LoCS4Africa) congress will be this year’s only virtual climate change congress for African city leaders and innovators focused on unlocking financing for transformative and sustainable urban development.
The 5th LoCS4Africa Congress, ICLEI Africa’s flagship climate event, will take place online from 3 to 12 November 2020. This free-to-attend solution catalyst will contribute significantly to raising climate action momentum on the African continent, while dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic.
LoCS4Africa 2020 is presented in partnership with the Covenant of Mayors in Sub-Saharan Africa (CoM SSA). The congress is co-hosted by the Government of Rwanda, the City of Kigali and the Rwanda Association of Local Government Authorities. Institutional partners include: United Cities and Local Governments of Africa (UCLG Africa), C40 Cities and Climate Chance.
This year’s congress will have a strong focus on resilience, with one of the four sub-tracks focused on unlocking finance for managing risk and harnessing nature based solutions. Three sessions will be dedicated to exploring this important topic.
3 November at 13:00 CAT
Finance for nature-based climate change adaptation
This session will explore adaptation finance options that exist for nature-based solutions for climate resilience. It will unbundle the best practices for accessing these finance options as well as unpack recommended pathways for integrating nature into NDCs and local climate plans. This session aims to support developing countries mobilise investment for nature-based climate adaptation more effectively.
9 November at 10:30 CAT
Demystifying finance for Disaster Risk Reduction
This session will discuss innovative insurance products for improved risk (disaster and climate) in cities that must be embedded in a post-COVID economic recovery. It will provide the space for a balanced dialogue around the potential for insurance and recognition of some of the limits and the unknowns and share lessons from leading African DRR-finance projects
11 November at 13:00 CAT
When nature makes cents: The economic value of nature for climate
This session will try to understand why it is so difficult to see the economic value of nature. It will explore what indicators we need to adequately make the case for investing in nature for climate and to showcase the return in investment for scalability and replicability. It will unpack the financial mechanism that exist for nature for climate at the local level in Africa by looking at the current barriers and opportunities.
The LoCS4Africa 2020 virtual congress will bring together local, regional and national governments as well as the private sector, community-based organisations and researchers to progress the partnerships needed for climate resilient development, while keeping COVID-19 recovery, gender quality and multi-level governance high on the agenda.