ZAMBIA is seeking about US$50 billion to implement its ambitious initiative of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. The Ministry of National Development Planning has told delegates to the ongoing UN Climate Change Conference (COP25) in Madrid, Spain, that Zambia has developed an ambitious Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions. National Designated Authority (NDA) national coordinator Francis Mpampi said Zambia’s NDCs are aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions by at least 38000 GtCO2 (gigatonnes of carbon dioxide).

This is contained in a statement released yesterday by the ministry’s spokesperson, Chibabula Silwamba. Mr Mpampi said Zambia needs over US$50 billion over the next 10 years to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. He said out of the budget, about US$15 billion is expected to be sourced locally and about US$35 billion from external resources.

Mr Mpampi said this when he participated in a panel discussion organised by the governments of Denmark, The Netherlands, and South Korea in conjunction with the Partnering for Green Growth and the Global Goals 2030 (P4G) . He said the sectors covered in the NDC include agriculture, water, transport, health and energy.

“P4G partnerships are helping Zambia realise these ambitious targets through the support being given to Africa GreenCo, an intermediary that will be introduced in the electricity subsector,” Mr Mpampi said. “The partnerships, therefore, are important to help Zambia achieve climate-resilient and low carbon development trajectory,” he said.

At a side event themed, ‘Guide for Integrated National Planning in Africa to mainstream SDGs, Agenda 2063, NDCs, Disaster Risk Reduction and the New Deal Programme’, Mr Mpampi said Zambia has changed its planning approach from sectoral to cluster. “This new approach entails that different government institutions get together to contribute to a particular development outcome.

With this approach, it is easy to mainstream agendas such as SDGs, climate change, Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), and Agenda 2063 in our development plan,” Mr Mpampi said. He said the challenges Zambia experiences are inadequate capacity to develop the tools as well as the ability to incorporate Agenda 2063. And speaking at a side event co-organised by the Green Climate Fund (GCF) and Climate Investment Fund (CIF), Mr Mpampi said transformational change is important to achieving largescale impacts.

“GCF can continue to build on its strong foundation by way of getting good practices such as establishment of the Transformational Change Learning Partnership (TCLP) like CIF to facilitate a collaborative, evidencebased learning process on transformational change within the GCF context,” Mr Mpampi said. He said there is need to continue promoting countryled programmatic approaches of transformational change at the design phase supported by large-scale investments ranging from grants and other concessional financing tools to promote country ownership