AFRICAN UNION: BOTSWANA FOCUSES ON SUSTAINABILITY
In an exclusive interview for Al Jazeera, Botswana reiterates what they have been saying for the past two days at the African Union committee: sustainability is the most important issue at hand.
This week the African Union’s 55 members came together to talk about the plan for African integration on the political and economic levels. As the debate progressed, more and more members emphasised the importance of environmental sustainability. But no other member regarded this issue as important as member state of Botswana.
In an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera, Botswana specifies which solutions they hope end up in the resolution and which goals they would like to achieve.
What is the focus of Botswana in this committee today? And are you satisfied with the way the debate is progressing?
As already mentioned before, we Botswana, find sustainability of uttermost importance. We want Africa to stay a green continent as it has been until now. We have a nonsignificant emission of Co2 and we would like it to stay that way. We also support the use of renewable energy which is surging in Africa. We thus commend Africa on their work around sustainability but would like to further implement sustainable policies when it comes to the economy, security, etc.
In regards to the debate, we feel that it is progressing quite smoothly, as a lot of fruitful solutions are being mentioned in the working papers. However, we are not yet sure if these solutions will be included in the draft resolutions nor whether they will be voted for in favour.
Are there policies or actions of fellow state members you would like to focus on resolving?
We have to mention the usage of fossil resources and pipelines by fellow member state Morocco. We feel that this is against everything we stand for and want to work on today. Moroccan fossil fuels accounted for more than 80% of Morocco's electricity generation mix, this is way too excessive and damaging for the environment.
How do you think security policies can play a role in making Africa more sustainable?
Well, first of all, we would like to stress the importance of ending war conflicts in Africa. Bringing peace to the whole continent is crucial for our continent. Wars harm the environment in a lot of different ways. It directly damages nature, leaves a lot of debris behind but most importantly because it damages the environment, war directly creates more war. Therefore we need to find solutions to these regional conflicts before we can continue to make our continent more sustainable.
The economy is an important part of reducing damage caused to the environment. Do you have any specific solutions to making the economy more sustainable?
Of course the economy needs to be as sustainable as our other systems. We are therefore looking to implement sustainable solutions such as cluster companies (geographic concentration of interconnected businesses, suppliers, and associated institutions in a particular field). These companies would be working closely together and use sustainable resources. Specifically, the double use of energy resources is extremely important.
You mentioned education as an important pillar of sustainability. Expand on that.
Education is indeed and important part of bettering the climate. It is that we need to develop. The more people we educate, the more heads work together to find sustainable solutions for the current unsustainable problems. One of the solutions to bringing more education to our region is digitally reaching people in rural areas to provide good education for them as well. A way to do this would be to closely work with NGO’s and the educational system.
Lastly, you have proposed a logo to represent a sustainable African Future. Please explain how the logo does this.
We have as you said created a logo to represent the African Future. Our logo’s center is a diamond. The diamond is a natural product and thus it points to the usage of natural resources. Furthermore it is clear, which points to the need for our systems to be as transparent as possible. The diamond’s head represents the environment, meaning it is the most important issue at hand in the world right now.
Reported by Timea Tia Ilič