 Today, so a few days ago, we made a presentation on one of the groups that support as part of research in Nigeria, a youth organization. And we also have, and I missed, one of the leading documentary filmmakers and photographers and activists on the Amazon. George Baransky was sitting right there at the back and perhaps one of the most important filmmakers from Brazil and he presented his own work first at the cup and it's presented here on Minamata, which is a cautionary tale based on illegal mining in Brazilian Amazon using Mercury and the impact of that and he references the disaster that happened in Japan a while ago, 50 years ago. But George is actually a compendium of different film traditions and heavily studied and written about by some of our colleagues as well. But today we have this rare opportunity as a continuation of what's been going on. I must also add that we just had an amazing workshops on the climate and the law, right? Which is really a very animated conversation as well. But today we have the rare exception of welcoming His Excellency Professor Yemi Osimbanjo, who was the immediate vice president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. But more than that, he's also one of us as a scholar as a leading, one of Nigeria's leading legal scholars who has played a transformative role as head of department of public law, dean of the School of Law, attorney general of Lagos State and whose models were so exemplary that other state governments in Nigeria began to mimic the strategies of that state, but subsequently he became vice president of Nigeria. So he was attorney general and commissioner for justice in Lagos State from 1999 to 2007, and some of the far-reaching significant judicial reforms will become the models for other states of the Federation. But before his political career, Professor Osimbanjo excelled as a lawyer and earned what in Nigeria is the prestigious and the most senior form of advocacy for the law, the senior advocate of Nigeria. He was also a founding partner of Siemens Cooper as a prominent commercial law firm in Nigeria and contributed to the academic community as a professor, head of department and dean at the University of Lagos. Throughout his time in public service, Professor Osimbanjo played a key role in implementing various government initiatives and policies, most notably in the areas of economic reform, social intervention programs, and addressing issues related to justice and energy security in African nations. He chaired the Interministerial Energy Transition Implementation Committee, which was responsible for the development and execution of the Nigerian Energy Translation Plan. Furthermore, he's led a successful implementation of Nigeria's economic sustainability plan, which included the deployment of five million off-grid solar connections to rural communities in Nigeria. Beyond his tenure in office, he remains dedicated to advocating for climate action both within Nigeria across the African continent, as well as globally. In 2023, recently, he was appointed as the first global advisor to the Global Energy Alliance for People's and Planet. He's also the board chair of the Climate Action Platform for Africa. We've had numerous conversations, but it's actually both his theoretical, acumen, and practical experience in governance and in creating instruments of realizing strategies on energy transitions that we really felt were very attractive. And I think he had a brief conversation with this conference earlier today. And today, he will give you his own presentation so you hear from him. After that, we'll have a short conversation together with two of our colleagues who were also developing the same trajectory of conversations. We'll introduce them later after Professor Sibarajah's presentation. Thank you very much everyone and good evening. I'd first like to thank the NYU Abu Dhabi campus for the very kind invitation to speak to you today. And I must say that the NYU has proved itself to be an important thought leader and generational convener on the conversations on climate change and climate action, especially as the NYU here is a key academic partner to a co-presidency. And I'm told also the inaugural chair of the University's Climate Network, which I'm also told brings together about 20 universities in the UAE and that number is still growing and is aimed at encouraging youth engagement. And I think youth engagement in these conversations on climate change is the eminently sensible way of acknowledging that the subject is of greater relevance to the generation that will leave through the consequences of action or inaction. I'll be speaking for a few minutes on the topic climate positive growth, Africa as a climate action partner for the UAE and for the world. We are, as I'm sure everyone will agree, at a crucial moment in the energy transition journey. And it's evident that at the rate that we're going in that journey to net zero, we have absolutely no chance of meeting the target. Yet we miss the target at the peril of our world as we know it if science is to be believed. Not far from here, yeah, in Dubai as we speak, many of the world's political, private sector and civil society leaders are assembled to discuss and negotiate these same questions at the annual UN Climate Conference, COP 28. 28, and I want you to let that number sink, the 28th UN annual climate conference. For many years, the science has been crystal clear. If we do not curb emissions and get to net zero by 2050 and some say even earlier, we risk the apocalyptic consequences for life on earth. 2023 has already driven home this point by the very many record breaking weather devastations. So why has it taken 28 annual rounds of painful negotiations just to be where we are now? Which is of course very far from where we need to be. I would argue that one of the key reasons is that climate action has long been seen as too costly. It is generally believed that climate action and economic growth are incompatible. And to realize effective climate action, you have to sacrifice growth. And of course, that is a price that developed countries are generally not willing to pay. And emerging and developing economies are simply unable to pay. Why? Because one in every four human beings born by 2040 will be an Africa. An Africa today is the fastest warming region, which means that it's the most exposed to the devastations of climate change or the potential devastations. Africa is also aspiring to middle to high income status for its peoples. But if Africa were to develop by the same carbon intensive pathway employed by wealthier countries, then the world will never achieve net zero. Why? Because Africa will annually pump 9.4 gigatons of CO2E into the atmosphere. And Africa would go from being a mere rounding error in global emissions to representing as much as 75% of global emissions. So in many senses, Africa can be the nemesis of the world or an important partner in solving the problem. Now how will that work? Africa can develop without increasing carbon emissions and not even keeping it constant, but actually reducing emissions. So I'll argue that economic growth and effective climate action can actually work together. And that is possible by this notion of climate positive growth, climate positive growth. Now this is the ability to realize economic growth through climate action. And Africa has the potential to be a climate positive growth leader, helping the world arrest and reverse climate change while developing to middle to high income status and beyond. And my position is that this is a clear possibility with global collaboration. So what is the case for climate positive growth? The first is somewhat ironic and that is Africa's low industrial base and is low carbon footprint. And this can actually be an advantage enabling the continent to develop green-filled clean energy manufacturing, saving it the cost of abandoned legacy carbon intensive manufacturing projects and by pursuing an industrialization pathway that focuses on using renewable energy, of which Africa has the most potential. Africa is home to 60% of the world's best solar resources. And in addition, it has abundant wind, geothermal and hydropotential. Its untapped renewable energy potential is 50 times the anticipated global demand for electricity in 2040. And also Africa, of course, has the fastest, youngest growing workforce on the planet. And with it, of course, with the massive natural resources, including arable land and critical mineral assets, of which it has about 30%, it can actually become or develop the first green industrial civilization, greening global manufacturing and supply chains and even removing carbon from the air. In other words, Africa is perhaps the only region today, ironically on account of its low development base that can truly achieve green growth, economic growth without growing emissions or even keeping emissions constant, but actively addressing the reduction of emissions and the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. But what does this mean in practical terms? It means, for example, that if Africa processed the bauxite that it mines, which is 25% of global bauxite production to aluminum with renewable energy before exporting it, would actually save 335 million tons of CO2 per year. That's 1% of global emissions, create 280,000 jobs annually and generate about 37 billion US dollars of additional revenue for the continent. In fact, by aggressively deploying its renewable energy resources, Africa can actually provide energy to all Africans, 600 million of whom currently do not have access to energy and 150 million of whom have unreliable access unreliable access to energy at 30% lower costs and with over 90% lower emissions per kilowatt hour compared to the current stated policies. So Africa's renewable energy is not only abundant, but also has very low seasonality or intermittency which makes it possible to reliably provide renewable baseload to power continuous industrial production. Strikingly also, the lowest cost setup of solar, wind and battery storage to get reliable renewable baseload to power industry is twice as expensive in Germany as it is in Nigeria. So solar PVs in Nigeria and in Kenya, for instance, vastly outperforms Europe's industry center and even Europe's top PV sports. The same battery supported PV system in Nigeria would enable a baseload that is eight times as large as in Germany and in Spain, 1.8 times larger. A recent Bloomberg study done for the AFDB on the manufacturing of battery precursors found that manufacturing battery precursors in the Democratic Republic of the Congo DRC, which of course, as you know, has plenty of lithium and cobalt, is three times cheaper than manufacturing the same in the US, in the EU or even in China. And manufacturing in the DRC would also extend value chain opportunities to other African countries and they would need, of course, they would need manganese from Zambia, from Tanzania, from Gabon, and from South Africa to contribute to their capacity to produce these battery precursors. And interestingly, several African countries now have restrictions on raw exports of critical minerals. Indeed, over 42% of African countries, excluding North African countries, have these restrictions. So mining companies are now establishing local processing plants, and this is great. But to reap maximum rewards for climate action and development, then processing and mining must be done by the use of renewable energy. So the mining and processing must be done by renewable energy. Otherwise, the real advantages can never be obtained. And this makes perfect economic sense. The most recent IAA publication made clear that renewable energy is now not just the climate smart, but also the economically rational choice. So for the first time in history, going renewable first, even with storage, is the cheapest overall form of energy generation. And these costs are expected to fall further in the next few years. So as we allocate our global financial resources, we should make sure to get the greatest bang for buck, as they say, which means investing in places where those resources will have the highest and most consistent yield, where they can immediately be deployed towards new economic activity, as where there is less existing infrastructure that needs to be decarbonized. It's essential part of foreign funding that is today flowing into Africa's renewable energy projects is concessional and grant funding. And this is, of course, has to be the case because investing in generating capacity without secured demand is like trying to clap with one hand, it really wouldn't work. It may generate much needed energy access, but it will struggle to last and will struggle even more to scale. So green industrialization is the path to making sure that great scale investments in renewable energy in Africa generate the kind of return profile that will attract private capital and sovereign wealth funds into the mix. That is why the twin approach that uses industrialization to drive energy access is critical, is a way to get the anchor demand that will draw in the investments. So what will it take to realize climate positive growth? What will it take to get this developments that we're talking about and to truly create a green industrial region of the world? Four things are necessary. Two, that African countries can and should work on, and two that require global partnerships and engagement. African countries, one, need to, one, focus their economic growth and development plans on these green opportunities. In other words, they must devote the economic plans and development plans to these green opportunities. And it's interesting that several African countries are beginning to do so, you know. And especially after some of the developments culminating in the climate summit in Nairobi last September, where the Africa Union endorsed the paradigm of climate positive growth. A lot of work is being done by African countries to think in terms of using that development paradigm in budgets and in thinking through some of the issues around development. Two, they need to structure policy and regulations in ways that will support the green industrialization. We then need two pieces of global collaboration. The first is fair and equitable market access to meet the global demand for green products, services, and carbon credits. So for example, as the EU builds out its carbon border adjustment mechanism and other regions look at similar measures, these need to be designed in such a way that does not exclude the locations most suitable to rapidly and affordably decarbonizing global production. So the sea bombs must not exclude, must be operated in such a way that they don't block market access to places where the places that are most advantageous for green production. This includes not only demand for industrial products but also for carbon credits. Emerging economies and in particular African economies have suffered disproportionately low market share and they attract some of the lowest prices. So a lot of the carbon credits coming out of Africa of course attract very, very low prices. Admittedly, carbon markets are far from perfect and these days not a week goes by without an expose of one kind or the other about bad carbon credits and often African. And whilst these issues exist in the market, it's important not to lose sight of one of the core drivers of this problem. And that is the current price of carbon credits coming out of Africa. About 50 cents to a few dollars per ton in the voluntary carbon market. And now it's simply impossible to generate quality credits at that kind of price because that price needs to cover the costs of developing a project of generating and trading the credit of conducting proper monitoring and evaluation of paying taxes and generating viable returns for all stakeholders involved from local communities to project developers to the providers of risk capital. So when you find later that these projects do not consistently meet high quality and integrity standards, one, of course, cannot be very surprised. It's like buying the Rolex watch for $20 and being upset when it has to be counterfeit. I mean, really, you had no clue. So the second condition to make climate-positive growth a reality for which we need global collaboration is the right type and amount of investments and capital. Interestingly, the UAE, for instance, has shown a great deal of far-sightedness in its investment commitments to the development of renewable energy in Africa. At the Africa Climate Summit, the UAE gave a non-binding letter of intent for $4.5 billion of investments towards clean energy and $450 million for carbon credits. Master, the UAE's clean energy champion has also announced a partnership with Africa 50, the Pan-African Infrastructure Investment Platform to identify, fast-track, and scale clean energy projects across the continent. In March also, Master consummated perhaps the biggest green energy deal in Africa by acquiring South African renewable energy company, Lekela, in a joint venture with Egypt's Infinity Power. So clearly, there's quite a bit of engagement, especially from the UAE. Now on the question of accessing the right quantum of capital, is evident, of course, from everything, from all of what we've seen, that the cost of capital in Africa is integrally high. African governments pay five times as much interest in the bond market as they would if multilateral development banks were properly capitalized. It's not of that cost of borrowing for African countries, it's probably the highest of any region. Those seeking investments for private projects face high costs of capital and unhelpfully short tenets, driven largely by both real and perceived risk factors. So addressing this requires a range of interventions. I'm addressing this high cost of capital. It really requires a whole range of interventions. And I'll just very quickly structure them into three important categories, all of which need to be delivered upon. The first category is keeping past promises, including operationalizing the loss and damage fund, which was agreed last year at COP 27, and then of course the commitments to the 100 billion a year in climate finance for developing countries. So just keeping those promises is an important way of controlling the high cost of capital for African countries. The second is the reform of the international financial architecture. And these have been identified in the Bridgetown initiative and the capital adequacy framework amongst others. So it's very evident that there is a need for restructuring, a restructuring of the global financial architecture. And this has been accepted by even the IMF, the World Bank, the UN, everyone sort of accepts that the Bretton Woods institutions and several of the other framework developed after the World War was of course developed by industrialized countries, for industrialized countries, and are no longer necessarily fit for purpose today. Now this includes a wide range of tools that increase and strengthen the balance sheet of multilateral development banks and ensure more of their deployment goes to emerging and frontier economies and drive more deployment towards climate-aligned investments. So there are some technical solutions that have been suggested, such as rechanneling of STRs, of special joint rights, smart capital blending and tailored risk mitigation interventions. All of this are supposed to be very, will be the components of this reform, but I don't want to get into too much detail there are so many components of that reform. The fourth is dealing with a huge burden of sovereign debt. A huge burden of sovereign debt, that's a very major problem. There was an article jointly authored very recently by three African leaders. The title of the article is if you want our countries to address climate change, first pause our debts. And the three authors were the president of Kenya, President William Ruto, the president of the AFDB, Dr. Akira Deshina, and Musafaki, the president of the AU Commission. And in that article they reiterated a call for a 10-year moratorium on interest payments on African debt to give the world's most vulnerable countries the space to invest in climate resilience and other pressing needs, such as health and education. They also argued for more climate targeted debt relief. For example, debt for nature swaps, debt for climate where as you know, a portion of the nation's foreign debt is forgiven in exchange for local investments in environmental conservation measures. And the fifth is identifying new additional sources of finance investment and capital through new levels, carbon pricing and taxation. Many tools and levels are being considered and the support for against them often follows a predictable pattern linked usually to short-term economic interests. I'll just spend the next couple of minutes on the role of gas in the energy transition. Now, the role of gas in energy transition has become divisive, especially since while actively banning new investments in fossil fuel projects in Africa, most global North countries, including Japan, China and large parts of Asia and the EU include gas as a major pillar of their multi-decade decarbonization plans. Now, but despite that they, you know, there's a ban by several of these countries and institutions associated with them on public investments in African fossil fuel projects, especially gas. Nevertheless, it is evident that for gas, which countries in particular, gas as a transition fuel makes perfect sense. But it's also evident that this can only be transitionary. Renewable energy is now becoming a cheaper source of energy anywhere as we've seen earlier. Now let's look at, you know, some of the economically smart deployment of gas, you know, because deploying gas today will depend, you know, on some of the distinctions that we can make broadly between the different types of use cases. The first type of use case is countries that are investing in new exploitation of unexploited resources, or those who are growing the production of existing resources. Such countries, I think, must look out first for standard assets, because these assets, of course, will become very difficult to insure and to refinance. And as the world moves towards, you know, in the energy transition journey towards decommissioning fossil fuel projects and gas projects, it's just gonna become increasingly more difficult to insure project like that or to finance or refinance such projects. So that's just the reality. And countries that are growing new, exploiting new sites, must simply watch out for that. Countries should also avoid creating or growing their dependency on gas. Unlike many other parts of the world, African countries do not need to use gas themselves given their abundance of renewable energy potential, not even for industrialization, as we've seen. Conversely, creating a domestic dependency makes countries vulnerable to price volatility. Using your own gas may, of course, create a sense of energy independence, where you may still incur opportunity costs from domestic consumption. So many experts, for example, praise Norway's development model. Norway, of course, as you know, has exploited its fossil fuel wealth, creating serving global demand and has used the proceeds to aggressively build renewable energy, as they say, never getting high on its own supply. The second use case looks at low income countries with existing gas infrastructure that have already incurred the sunk cost of building the fixed infrastructure. Now, ideally, these countries should deploy their domestic infrastructure towards future proof solutions, climate smart solutions. But then, today, gas-powered cooking results in much lower emissions and cleaner indoor air than using wood or charcoal, you know, and of course, gas can also be used for direct air capture, which removes atmospheric carbon dioxide. And gas can also be used for domestic fertilizer production, which is the case in many of these countries, to reduce import dependency. And coal phase out in heavy industry. So a lot of cement industries, for example, in Nigeria, of course, use a lot more gas now than coal and many are moving to, you know, attempting, of course, to reduce carbon emissions in this way. So these domestic gas use cases should be transitionary and should help accelerate a path towards long-term renewable first or renewable-only deployment. And I think that this is really the way to go. I mean, gas is transition fuel and should be seen as transition fuel. I don't think we should argue too much about that, but then it should be transitionary and we should see it as transitionary. So let me end by saying that we will not meet global net zero targets. If the global north in particular does not take the options that appear to be in the best interests of the global south today, because usually even those advantages are only short-term. Ultimately, preserving our civilization is in the best interest of all of us. And I think we need more climate statesmanship to have any chance of achieving our targets. The stewardship for our planet and the generations that will live in it calls for much more self-sacrifice from all of us than we are currently seeing. Thank you very much.