Malawi reaffirms commitment to fight climate change

Minister of Natural Resources, Energy and Mining Bright Msaka says government remains committed to domesticating and localising the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

Msaka made the remarks in Lilongwe today during activities to mark commemoration of the 2017 World Environment Day/Cleaner Cooking Energy Open Day.

The day was held under the theme “connecting people to nature”.

Said the minister: “Malawi is committed to the UNFCCC. Malawi is also committed to the Paris Agreement, which President Peter Mutharika signed in September 2016, in New York in the United States of America.”

He further stated that Malawi will stand shoulder to shoulder with all like-minded member countries under the UN in the global effort to reduce carbon emissions, depletion of the ozone layer and slow down global warming.

“Our goal is to achieve two million clean cook stoves by 2020. Thus far, we have distributed 500 000 cook stoves. We have only three years remaining to meet our goal and this means we have to manufacture and distribute 500 000 cook stoves in each of the three remaining years,” he said.

Maeve Project head of department (Stove Division), Kinna Offen, reaffirmed his organisation’s commitment to distributing energy-efficient cooking stoves – Chitetezo Mbaula – to complement  efforts from government and other non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to fight environmental degradation.

Offen said with financial support from Energising Development (endev), the organisation is also running a monthly promotion aimed to motivate businesspersons and companies to start selling improved fuel briquettes alongside their other wares.

“Our cooking stoves are durable and are generally made faster and at a low cost both to the manufacturer or consumer. We have embarked on a nationwide campaign to raise awareness on the importance of adopting modern cooking technologies to reduce pressure on natural resources, especially forests,” he said.

Last week, Civil Society Network on Climate Change (Cisonecc) national coordinator, Julius Ng’oma, and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) programme analyst on climate change, Sothini Nyirenda, called upon government to domesticate international agreements and protocols if Malawi is to win the battle against climate change.