African Climes

  Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) is a term used to refer to the removal or absorption of carbon from the air and storing it away safely. Climate change mitigation is the reduction, avoidance or removal of greenhouse gas emissions. CDR therefore encompasses forestry and the climate services of all green plants as well as the use of negative emission technologies. When done mechanically, CDR is carried out through artificial (manmade) means. In a more in-depth way, these methods are known as negative emission technologies (NETS), because they absorb carbon from the air without re-releasing it. Thus they are “negative”. The goal of the Paris Agreement is to keep warming below 2 degrees above preindustrial levels this century and better still 1.5. To attain 1.5 degrees, emissions will have to reach “net zero” to mean that the amounts released into the atmosphere equal the amounts likewise removed. This should happen by 2050. From then on, in the second half of the 21 st century, the...

  Nature based solutions to climate change are exactly what they sound like. It is simply using nature to fight against climate change. This is done through both mitigation and adaptation, that is, in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and in protecting against the harshest impacts of climate change. It includes using the naturally existing solutions to climate change, such as those used in the carbon cycle as carbon sinks. In this it envelops oceans, forests, grasslands, peatlands, wetlands, croplands and in general all marine and terrestrial ecosystems to combat the phenomenon. Nature based solutions means the safeguarding (protection), restoration and sustainable management of these systems. According to the IPCC, we need to be carbon neutral by the half century mark, if at all we are going to keep warming this century below 1.5 degrees above preindustrial levels, which is one of the goals of the Paris Agreement. Carbon neutrality, otherwise known as net zero, is a term used ...

  Agriculture refers to all the activities done in the process of raising livestock, planting crops and other types of farming. It refers to everything involved from start to finish, when the food is finally presented at the table. Agriculture has been a part of human life for millennia, for both domestic consumption and as an economic activity. Agriculture in all its forms takes up a third of the emissions that cause climate change. But unlike fossil fuels that can be done away with completely and substituted with renewables, agriculture is essential for human life and survival in terms of both food security and the economy. So, it can only be restructured to be less climate hazardous while still maintaining its purpose. Food security is both the ability to provide enough food, and food that is of satisfactory nutritional content. The current way of doing agriculture is resource intensive, and is one of the reasons why a third of global soils are degraded. Agriculture both...