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Benin has significantly increased the ambition of its NDCs between 2015 and 2021, targeting a 20.15% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 across the energy, agricultural, forestry, and waste sectors. While these goals align with national priorities like food security and electricity access, the paper finds a lack of integration between the NDCs and the government's COVID-19 macroeconomic recovery response. The author recommends aligning monetary policy and credit expansion with climate goals to leverage private sector investment and ensure long-term sustainable growth.

The document finds that most African countries failed to maximize the opportunity for a green recovery following COVID-19, primarily due to a massive financing gap and a lack of mainstreaming climate action into national economic planning. While South Africa and Nigeria adopted recovery plans with green components, others like Senegal, Uganda, and Benin showed little overlap between their pandemic responses and NDCs. The author argues for reforming global development finance, implementing carbon taxes, and creating green sovereign wealth funds to bridge the gap between climate ambitions and available resources.

The document analyzes Nigeria's economic contraction and subsequent recovery during the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting the role of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and fiscal stimulus. It identifies critical gaps in social protection, gender-responsive policy, and fiscal buffers, while advocating for central bank independence and digital economy integration for long-term stability.

The report evaluates the fiscal responses of six African nations to the COVID-19 pandemic through a climate lens, categorising policies as green, red (unfriendly), or grey (neutral). It finds that most stimulus packages were climate neutral, with Nigeria being the only country to implement an overall green package. In contrast, Uganda's response was deemed 'red' due to investments in carbon-intensive industrial parks, and South Africa's package was neutral despite its high emissions profile. The author argues that green spending is more effective for job creation than fossil fuel investments and recommends that African governments utilise Pigouvian taxes and green financing to achieve a sustainable economic recovery.

The document examines South Africa's use of monetary and macroprudential tools to maintain financial stability during COVID-19, while highlighting the constraints imposed by pre-existing fiscal weakness and junk-status debt. It argues that while the South African Reserve Bank's (SARB) adherence to international standards like Basel III provided critical shock absorbers, long-term growth requires structural reforms and credible fiscal consolidation.

The report examines macroeconomic resilience in 12 sub-Saharan African countries, focusing on the use of monetary and fiscal instruments to stabilise production and inflation cycles. It identifies commodity price downcycles as the most consistent trigger for economic crises and argues that currency regimes significantly influence a nation's ability to absorb shocks. The author develops the CoMPRA-MERI index to track resilience across seven dimensions: fiscal, monetary, external debt, trade, investment, governance, and human capital. Findings suggest that most countries exhibit procyclical outcomes due to structural constraints, though Uganda is noted as a successful exception in applying countercyclical tools. The report recommends trade diversification and a shift toward more flexible exchange rate regimes to enhance structural resilience.

The research introduces a multidimensional index to measure socioeconomic vulnerability to COVID-19, incorporating macroeconomic exposure, healthcare coverage, financial inclusion, social protection, and gender inclusivity. Using data from 83 countries, the study finds that African nations are among the most vulnerable, with gender inequality acting as a primary driver. Regression analysis confirms that higher vulnerability scores and more stringent containment measures were associated with more significant per capita income losses in 2020. The author argues that pandemic response strategies must move away from 'one-size-fits-all' containment measures and instead prioritize gender inclusion, social protection, and financial inclusion to build resilience.

The briefing compares the macroeconomic resilience of Benin and Togo from 2000 to 2020, finding that Benin's economy is more volatile due to greater global integration, while Togo's performance has been shielded by phosphate exports. It examines the impact of national crises—such as political instability in Togo and trade disputes in Benin—and regional shocks like COVID-19 and Ebola, evaluating the fiscal and monetary policy responses of both nations.

The document serves as a career manual for students and young professionals entering the sustainable energy sector. It outlines various professional pathways—including engineering, policy, finance, and data science—and provides a detailed breakdown of the internal and external teams at SEforALL. The guide emphasizes the need for both technical STEM qualifications and soft skills like adaptability and communication to support the achievement of SDG7 and the Paris Agreement. It also details SEforALL's inclusive, remote recruitment process and its commitment to increasing the participation of women and youth in the green economy.

The document analyzes how Fiji, Ghana, and Benin are mainstreaming climate adaptation into their health systems through policy development, pilot projects, and political leadership. It identifies key barriers such as limited funding and poor data access, while recommending 'no-regrets' actions like staff training and the establishment of cross-sectoral collaboration mechanisms to build resilience against climate-related health risks and other shocks.

This World Resources Institute working paper reports on three workshops held in Asia, Africa, and Latin America to identify challenges developing countries face in monitoring and tracking climate finance. It details nine primary technical, political, and capacity barriers, ranging from inconsistent definitions and lack of institutional coordination to the limited transparency of development partners and the difficulty of tracking private financial data.

The document examines the purpose, elements, and implementation of long-term climate strategies, emphasizing the need to align near-term actions (NDCs) with mid-century goals. It covers the role of modeling, the integration of adaptation and sustainable development, the necessity of climate-aligned finance, and the importance of a 'just transition' for workers in carbon-intensive industries.

The report attributes the 2022 West African floods to a combination of anthropogenic climate change, which significantly increased the likelihood and intensity of rainfall in the Lake Chad and Lower Niger basins, and systemic vulnerabilities including poor water management, rapid unplanned urbanization, and socioeconomic instability. In the Lake Chad region, climate change made the seasonal rainfall event approximately 80 times more likely and 20% more intense. In the Lower Niger basin, the 7-day maximum rainfall event became about twice as likely and 5% more intense. The human toll was exacerbated by the release of the Lagdo Dam in Cameroon and the proximity of settlements to floodplains.