IN THIS EDITION

Welcome

News
COP27 in review: climate talks delivered big gains for Africa, but also several challenges
COP15: Historic agreement to bring protection to a third of Earth’s wildlife by 2030
Mayor Launches “Keep Cape Town Clean” Campaign
Stellenbosch-made agriculture satellite is expected to generate R1.7bn in revenue
2022 Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards are a good laugh
 
To diarise
Doc Society Climate Story Fund- deadline 1 February 2023
National Film and Video Foundation call for funding applications is open
EJN’s Pathways to Net Zero in India and South Africa project
Film Impact Screening Facilitator Short Course  – deadline 15 March 2023
 
Interesting reads
Blue Mind: The Surprising Science That Shows How Being Near, In, On, or Under Water Can Make You Happier, Healthier, More Connected, and Better at What You Do
Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals
How African organisations can use AI to accelerate sustainability in 2023
If you win the popular imagination, you change the game’: why we need new stories on climate
From Day Zero to Ramsar City
 
We are loving …
Earth’s ozone layer is healing
Insect army winning war against invasive superweed
Ladles of Love’s “Feed the Soil” programme

Who are Mycelium?

WELCOME by Vanessa Farr

Happy new year to all our readers. As we enter 2023, I’ve been thinking a lot about what constitutes excellent leadership for the multiple environmental and social crises of our times. Many of us continue to ruminate on the quality of global and continental guidance shown last month at the COPs 27 and 15, whose implications for Africa are a focus of this newsletter. Then, it was dismaying to watch as former President Bolsonaro prompted his extremist supporters to refuse to accept the return to the Brazilian Presidency of Lula, whose re-election, including on a promise of far greater protections for the Amazon, was greeted with relief by regenerative thinkers across the globe. What a strong contrast between Bolsonaro’s departure and the surprise resignation of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern of New Zealand, who announced that she won’t run for a second term because she recognizes how exhausted she is after leading her country through the aftermath of a massacre and a pandemic. Now that is a high-quality leader!

At home in Cape Town, Africa’s most recently-recognised Ramsar City, as we struggle through a new wave of loadshedding that’s taking its toll across the country, I’m heartened by the proactive environmental management of the City’s Mayor. You can read more in this edition about Geordin Hill-Lewis’s hands-on approach to keeping our City clean over the festive season; and as we entered the New Year, he announced that he’s implemented measures to mitigate the impact of power cuts on sewage pump stations that have led, among other problems, to beach closures in our busy tourist season. Both these initiatives, and his continued reminders to Capetonians to use water carefully, are crucial signs of his serious commitment to conserving our treasured wetlands.

Read my blog post about the challenges and opportunities of our new Ramsar City designation in a landscape as marked by historic and contemporary inequalities as Cape Town. And let us know what actions you’re inspired to take this year to become a powerful local leader in your own right (even at household level!), in the conservation of our most precious resource.

NEWS
 

COP27 in review: climate talks delivered big gains for Africa, but also several challenges

Africa has contributed negligibly to the changing climate, with less than 4% of global emissions. Yet it stands out disproportionately as the most vulnerable region in the world.It was therefore fitting that the UN climate change conference last year, COP27, was hosted in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.

The African continent is facing some of the severest effects from climate change seen in a decade. In 2022 every part of Africa was affected by extreme weather events and slow-onset processes. These ranged from wildfires in Algeria to catastrophic flooding in South and West Africa. The Horn of Africa is witnessing the worst drought in 40 years; Mozambique has had a devastating cyclone season. There have been historic floods for a fourth consecutive year in South Sudan and Sudan.

These extreme events in the continent killed at least 4,000 people and affected a further 19 million in 2022 alone. For many, the COP27 hosted in Africa provided an excellent opportunity to draw the global community’s attention to the enormous issues the continent is already facing. And for the world to reach a consensus on how we are to avoid a climate catastrophe. The conference created history when it resulted in the establishment of a loss and damage fund to aid nations particularly vulnerable to the climate crisis, an agreement on a worldwide energy transition, e.g., the establishment of a work programme on just transition, and the implementation of Africa’s green infrastructure development. In spite of this, the discussion excluded the phasing out of fossil fuels. It also provided little indication that nations were serious about scaling up efforts to cut emissions. These disappointing outcomes serve as a wake-up call for African leaders to reassess the relevance of conference of the parties processes to the African people and take radical actions to strengthen Africa’s voice and participation in future events.

The topic of funding mechanisms for loss and damage was added to the negotiations agenda at the eleventh hour. Yet it became COP27’s most significant legacy. Wealthy nations agreed to assist developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change in responding to loss and damage from extreme weather events and slow onset events. This achievement is significant for Africa: seven out of the 10 world’s most climate-vulnerable countries are in Africa, according to the ND-Gain vulnerability index.

Relatedly, COP27 also saw the Group of Seven (G7) and Vulnerable 20 Group of Finance Ministers (V20) launching a new insurance system to provide financial aid to vulnerable nations hit by the effects of climate change, called the Global Shield. It will receive an initial €200m of funding. Early recipients of this financing include Ghana, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. Another key outcome of COP27 was agreement on the need to ensure that Africa’s role in the global energy transition could not be at the expense of the region’s industrialisation goals.

The region’s leaders are adopting strategies to enhance energy generation and adaptation targets while delivering on respective national environmental protection priorities, sustainable growth, and job creation. COP27 also witnessed the launch of the Alliance for Green Infrastructure in Africa by the African Development Bank, African Union and Africa50 Infrastructure Investment platform, alongside other global partners.

The alliance aims to generate a robust pipeline of bankable transformational projects and catalyse financing at scale for Africa’s infrastructure development. Finally, the African Group of Negotiators on Climate Change played a very active role in the operationalisation of the Global Goal on Adaptation, a task due since the Paris Agreement in 2015.

The conference of parties failed on a number of fronts. It failed to promote the climate action required to maintain the possibility of limiting climate change within the parameters of the Paris Agreement. The Paris Agreement is a legally binding international treaty on climate change to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees, preferably to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Secondly, despite the notable achievements made on loss and damage, there was no consensus on the size of the loss and damage fund stream, who pays – and, most importantly, who controls and manages the fund.

Similarly, significant collective progress is yet to be made on the phasing out of all fossil fuels. It is important to stress that loss and damage cannot be adequately addressed without tackling the root causes of the climate crisis. Continued fossil fuel addiction will worsen the unprecedented impacts of climate change and lead to the continued devastation of vulnerable countries. Another weakness was that all of the agreements negotiated in Egypt are structured to be binding. But there are few mechanisms to enforce them. This raises the risk that the gathering, and others like it, translates into nothing more than good intentions.

The voices of local actors, who were present at COP27 side events, weren’t sufficiently incorporated into the international negotiations. This could be attributed to the existing structure of the conference, which only allows state members at the negotiation table. The growing frequency and persistence of climate-related disasters in Africa requires an annual average of $124bn to adapt. As of today, African countries are getting roughly $28bn a year. Developed countries and wealthier emerging economies must contribute to adaptation funds and a transparent and effective loss and damage fund. This idea will need to be at the heart of COP28 negotiations, as money will need to be put on the table for adaptation, loss and damage, and a rapid ramp-up of renewables with clear mechanisms for mobilising finance and implementation.

As we head towards COP28 in Dubai in November 2023, it is essential to start the negotiation now so that all countries are prepared to get to an explicit agreement in the end. The next COP must run an open and transparent process so that all countries understand what is being negotiated and trust can be repaired.

This article is republished from The Conversation


COP15: Historic agreement to bring protection to a third of Earth’s wildlife by 2030

A ground-breaking historic agreement was reached at the UN 15th Biodiversity Conference of the Parties which took place in Montreal, Canada from December 7-19, bringing together representatives. The newly minted Kunming-Montreal Agreement saw 196 countries give the nod to having a third of Earth’s wild spaces protected before the end of the decade. Nations signed the deal which pledges to look after the Earth’s ecosystems with at least 30% of our land, coastal areas and oceans coming under some level of binding environmental protection.

The agreement also aims to enforce targets to protect critically important ecosystems such as rainforests and wetlands, and the rights of indigenous peoples.Over the last few days of negotiations, several nations disagreed on who and how the proposed conservation efforts were going to be funded. Even after a last-minute objection from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Chinese delegates managed to seal the deal, eventually passing the agreement. EU commissioner for the environment, oceans and fisheries, Virginijus Sinkevicius, said: “Nature is our ship. We must ensure it stays afloat.”

Key focuses of the agreement included maintaining and restoring ecosystems, halting species extinction, cutting global food waste by half, protecting 30% of the world’s lands, seas and coasts and making sure benefits of resources from nature, such as medicines that come from plants are split equally and fairly and that indigenous peoples rights are protected, all before 2030. The UN Development Programme said the “historic agreement” meant people around the world could hope for real progress to halt biodiversity loss.

However, the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) warned that the agreement’s goal of reversing biodiversity loss by 2030 could be undermined “if weak language in critical areas such as the protection of intact ecosystems and tackling unsustainable production and consumption is not addressed at the national level”. WWF director-general Marco Lambertini said that “agreeing to a shared global goal that will guide collective and immediate action to halt and reverse nature loss by 2030 is an exceptional feat for those that have been negotiating the Global Biodiversity Framework, and a win for people and planet”.

One of the most contentious issues in the negotiations was the finance package to support conservation efforts globally, particularly in developing countries. “The Kunming-Montreal Agreement adopted today gives nature a fighting chance at recovery in a world currently divided by geopolitics and inequality. WWF is particularly encouraged to see the language on species has improved substantially in the final agreement. “A commitment to halt the extinction of species by 2030 is the minimum level of ambition required in the face of past failures and an accelerating extinction crisis” said Lin Li, senior director of Global Policy and Advocacy at WWF.

It will now be essential that countries deliver on the Kunming-Montreal Agreement. This includes translating it into ambitious national plans and policies commensurate with the scale of the nature crisis. Countries must update national biodiversity strategies and action plans to align them with the global goal of reversing biodiversity loss by 2030.

This article is republished from IOL
 


Mayor Launches “Keep Cape Town Clean” Campaign

Cape Town Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis has called on all Capetonians to adopt the same new year’s resolution in 2023 – to pick up litter. The City’s Festive Season Cleansing Programme – which runs until April – continues to deliver a high-season top-up cleansing service targeting all beaches, scenic routes and central business districts. The R57,5 million programme has deployed 2,588 additional cleansing staff, with targeted areas benefitting from three cleansing shifts per day, seven days per week. All scenic routes, highways and byways are also swept using mechanical sweepers, and all adjacent fences, pavements, verges, channels, and centre islands will be cleaned on a regular basis.

“It is good to be back on the ground today for our first community clean-up of the year in Parkwood. We call on all Capetonians to adopt the same new year’s resolution in 2023 – to pick up litter. No one should ever litter. All of us can take a minute to pick up litter and encourage others to do the same. Together, Capetonians can be a powerful force for change in 2023 by taking pride in our city and acting in unison to keep it clean,” said Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis. “If you can’t bin your waste immediately, bag it and keep it with you until you get to the nearest bin. We all have a role to play in keeping our city clean this summer,” said Mayoral Committee Member for Urban Waste Management, Alderman Grant Twigg.


Stellenbosch-made agriculture satellite is expected to generate R1.7bn in revenue

Farmers across the world, and the Western Cape in particular, have a new reason to cast their eyes up to the sky after the successful launch of the world’s first agriculture-focused satellite on January 3. The launch of South African-manufactured satellite from Cape Canaveral in the US on Elon Musk’s SpaceX is the product of Stellenbosch’s Dragonfly Aerospace and is set to provide the agriculture and forestry industry with high quality data to support efficient and sustainable practices.

The Earth observation satellite EOS SAT-1 was part of the first space launch in 2023, the SpaceX Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket, which launched 114 small satellites into low Earth orbit at once. South African Council for Space Affairs chairperson, Pontsho Maruping, said the success of the satellite was expected to generate more than $100 million (R1.7 billion) in revenue. He said as it was the first commercial satellite licensed in South Africa after seven government-sponsored satellites, the launch was a historical milestone in the South African space regulatory regime.The satellite contains locally produced high-performance imagers that will gather satellite imagery related to agriculture. The entire imaging satellite system was designed and manufactured by Dragonfly Aeronautics.

This article is republished from IOL.


2022 Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards are a good laugh

Since its inception in 2015, submissions to the Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards (previously) have captured some of nature’s most hapless and humorous moments. In this year’s contest, the overall winner was Jennifer Hadley’s timely snap of a 3-month old lion cub tumbling down a tree, taken in the Serengeti, Tanzania. Hadley shared that she and her travel companions had been watching the cub in the tree for some time. “It didn’t even occur to me that he would make a go of getting down by himself in the most un-cat like fashion. I mean, how often do cats fall out of trees?” she says. In 2022’s juried contest, 5,000 entries from 85 countries amounted to fierce competition, showcasing “seriously funny” images in an effort to highlight the diversity of the world’s wildlife and raise awareness of the need for conservation. See a gallery of all winning images on the competition website, and if you would like to enter your own images for consideration in the 2023 contest, applications are now open.
 

DIARISE

Doc Society Climate Story Fund- deadline 1 February 2023

The Doc Society Climate Story Fund provides up to $100K grants to support completion of production of creative nonfiction projects, and to pilot impact campaigns for completed creative nonfiction and fiction projects that engage audiences who are not typically included in the climate conversation. The Climate Story Fund is now OPEN and will close on February 1st at 11:59 PM PST. https://docsociety.org/climate-story/
 

National Film and Video Foundation call for funding applications is open

The National Film and Video Foundation is pleased to announce that the call for Cycle 1 funding applications for the 2023/2024 financial year is now open for the following funding categories: Development,  Production, Post-Production and Archive. Individuals, companies and organisations may submit funding applications to the NFVF for any of the above funding categories. Specific conditions are applicable for each funding category, and it is important for applicants to take careful note of these conditions before submitting an application. Closing date for submissions: 17 February 2023 at 17h00.  Applications submitted before the 6th of February 2023 will receive a PRIORITY compliance assessment, this means if your application is non-compliant, you will be timeously informed and have an opportunity to make corrections before the official closing date.

EJN’s Pathways to Net Zero in India and South Africa project

Are you a journalist in South Africa? Earth Journalism Network are offering reporting grants and mentorship to support the production of in-depth stories on South Africa’s road to net zero greenhouse gas emissions. We’re looking for unique story ideas that focus on socio-economic challenges and opportunities; sectoral plans and policies in industries like transport, electricity, automotive, fuel, mining, agriculture and manufacturing; finance and capital investments; available and suitable technologies and infrastructure; and minorities most affected by potential disruption to local economies. Apply now for grants of up to EUR 1,000 / ZAR 18,242 before February 20, 2023: https://buff.ly/3w1rcE4
 

Film Impact Screening Facilitator Short Course – deadline 15 March 2023

The UCT Centre for Film & Media Studies Film Impact Screening Facilitator Short Course has been created in partnership with Sunshine Cinema to give a practical  toolkit for organising, marketing and hosting facilitated impact screenings. This innovative, 100% online, short course offers participants a 6-month deep dive into the theory and practice of engaging with audiences on social change issues using documentary and fiction film screenings, discussions and other interventions. The course was born out of the need to address the lack of training opportunities in the growing field of Impact Producing, and is driven by two leading practical and theoretical African partners. Applications close 15th March 2023, course runs June-November 2023.  Ten bursaries are available. More info here.

INTERESTING READS

Blue Mind: The Surprising Science That Shows How Being Near, In, On, or Under Water Can Make You Happier, Healthier, More Connected, and Better at What You Do

A landmark book by marine biologist Wallace J. Nichols on the remarkable effects of water on our health and well-being. Why are we drawn to the ocean each summer? Why does being near water set our minds and bodies at ease? In Blue Mind, Wallace J. Nichols revolutionizes how we think about these questions, revealing the remarkable truth about the benefits of being in, on, under, or simply near water.  Combining cutting-edge neuroscience with compelling personal stories from top athletes, leading scientists, military veterans, and gifted artists, he shows how proximity to water can improve performance, increase calm, diminish anxiety, and increase professional success. Blue Mind not only illustrates the crucial importance of our connection to water-it provides a paradigm shifting “blueprint” for a better life on this Blue Marble we call home.

Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals

Undrowned is a book-length meditation for the entire human species, based on the subversive and transformative lessons of marine mammals. Alexis Pauline Gumbs has spent hundreds of hours watching our aquatic cousins. She has found them to be queer, fierce, protective of each other, complex, shaped by conflict, and struggling to survive the extractive and militarized conditions humans have imposed on the ocean. Employing a brilliant mix of poetic sensibility, naturalist observation, and Black feminist insights, she translates their submerged wisdom to reveal what they might teach us. The result is a powerful work of creative nonfiction that produces not a specific agenda but an unfolding space for wonder and questioning.Part of the “Emergent Strategy” series, the book is divided into eighty short meditations, each grouped into “movements” with names like “Listen,” “Breath,” “Stay Black,” and “Go Deep.” A graceful use of metaphor and natural models in the service of social justice, it explores themes that range from the ways that echolocation might inform our understandings of visionary action to the similar ways that humans and marine mammals do—or might—adapt within our increasingly dire circumstances.

How African organisations can use AI to accelerate sustainability in 2023

Companies in Africa can no longer view sustainability goals as an option – it is a business imperative. In today’s interconnected world, business leaders on the continent face growing pressures for greater transparency around sustainability from boards, investors, customers, and employees. Recent data shows that sustainability is rising high on corporate agendas – almost half (48%) of global CEOs say increasing sustainability is one of their highest priorities – up 37% since 2021. Bizcommunity
 

If you win the popular imagination, you change the game’: why we need new stories on climate

In order to do what the climate crisis demands of us, we have to find stories of a livable future, stories of popular power, stories that motivate people to do what it takes to make the world we need. Perhaps we also need to become better critics and listeners, more careful about what we take in and who’s telling it, and what we believe and repeat, because stories can give power – or they can take it away. To change our relationship to the physical world – to end an era of profligate consumption by the few that has consequences for the many – means changing how we think about pretty much everything: wealth, power, joy, time, space, nature, value, what constitutes a good life, what matters, how change itself happens.  The Guardian
   

From Day Zero to Ramsar City

On November 11th, 2022, Cape Town received official designation as a Ramsar City – the first in South Africa, and only the second African city, after Ghar el Mehl in Tunisia, whose wetlands are recognised to be of international importance. Like Cape Town, Ghar el Mehl is a coastal wetlands city. It faces many of the same challenges as Cape Town – and indeed, many cities that have already received designation as wetlands of global importance. While its municipality has been recognised for its good efforts to protect the ecological diversity of its wetlands, our Ramsar City sibling in the north also struggles with inadequate wastewater treatment, agricultural runoff, unsustainable fishing, and poor or non-existent town planning that results in illegal construction and encroachment on features like sand dunes that could protect landscapes from some of the effects of climate change. Water Stories
 

WE ARE LOVING…

… these initiatives which support our aim of living in a more sustainable world.

Earth’s ozone layer is healing

Nasa scientists monitoring the ozone layer recently found that it is healing and may fully recovery within three decades. The ozone layer is part of the upper stratosphere which lies about 10 to 50 kilometres above the surface of the Earth. In the final quarter of 2022, scientists from Nasa and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported that the hole in the ozone layer was continuing to shrink. The hole lies above Antarctica, and between September 7 and October 13 2022, it spanned an average area of 23.2 million square kilometres. This is well below the average seen in 2006, when the hole size peaked at 27.5 million square kilometres. More at IOL
 

Insect army winning war against invasive superweed

If dynamite does come in small packages, then living proof can be found hopping on the expanse of Hartbeespoort Dam’s polluted waters. Since 2018, battalions of tiny bugs — biocontrol agents — have munched their way through the floating carpet of invasive water hyacinth that has clogged the dam for more than 50 years. This 350 000-strong insect army of water hyacinth plant hoppers (Megamelus scutellaris) is winning the war on the fast-growing superweeds, reducing the cover of the problematic green plague to less than 5%. More details at the Mail and Guardian.

Ladles of Love’s “Feed the Soil” programme

Healthy soil breeds healthy lives and this is being done by Ladles of Love’s “Feed the Soil” programme; they collect food waste which is turned into compost for gardens that supply soup kitchens and schools. Early last year the organisation launched its food waste kit. The Feed The Soil programme is an urban farming initiative to help farmers grow better produce. The programme aims to create healthy compost from food waste collected from the public. Ladles of Love supply a food waste kit that is then handed over once filled with organic scraps and waste. The food waste is converted into compost which is then used to nourish the soil of community and soup kitchen gardens. These gardens play a vital role in adding wholesome fresh ingredients back into the soup kitchens.