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This policy brief argues that South Africa's 2025 G20 presidency provides a strategic opportunity to integrate subnational governments into the global climate and environmental agenda. It highlights the role of municipalities as frontline implementers of climate adaptation, mitigation, and biodiversity goals, while identifying systemic financial and capacity barriers that hinder their effectiveness in Africa and the Global South.

The Sierra Leone Healthcare Electrification Project, managed by SEforALL and funded by the UK, is deploying solar PV and battery storage to health facilities to replace polluting diesel generators. After successfully equipping six hospitals with over 0.6 MWp of capacity, the project has expanded to 26 additional health facilities. The initiative aims to improve health outcomes by providing reliable power for critical equipment and includes a training program for young women in the renewable energy sector.

This report summarizes the key insights from a 2024 London Climate Action Week Resilience Hub event. The event focused on a 'whole-of-society approach' to climate resilience, emphasizing the necessity of community-led adaptation, innovative financing, the democratization of technology, and the integration of cultural and creative approaches to engage diverse stakeholders.

This factsheet summarizes the IPCC's Sixth Assessment Report for West Africa, detailing how the region is warming faster than the global average. It highlights severe risks to food security, human health (specifically heat-related mortality and diarrhoeal diseases), and biodiversity. The report emphasizes that while adaptation options like ecosystem-based solutions exist, they are severely hindered by a lack of finance and critical data gaps in climate research.

This briefing by the International Institute for Sustainable Development argues that gender equality is a prerequisite for achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It highlights how systemic barriers, discriminatory laws, and the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on women hinder environmental and social progress, while demonstrating that women's leadership in natural resource governance and climate action leads to more effective and sustainable outcomes.

This case study describes Smiling Through Light, a social enterprise founded by Mariama Kamara to increase electricity access in Sierra Leone through a women-led business model that trains local women as solar technology entrepreneurs.

This policy brief by the Stockholm Environment Institute evaluates the Makeni Project in Sierra Leone, a €400 million agro-industrial investment by Addax Bioenergy Sierra Leone (ABSL). The project focuses on sugarcane production for ethanol export and electricity generation. While the investment has provided significant infrastructure, jobs, and agricultural training, the brief highlights risks regarding land access, local skill gaps, and a lack of government oversight that limits the project's potential for comprehensive rural transformation.

This 2012 report examines the state of conservation in Sierra Leone, highlighting that only 4% of its land is protected. It details how the 1991–2002 civil war devastated environmental management and how current pressures from mining, industrial agriculture, and population growth continue to threaten biodiversity. The authors argue that while conservation can support peacebuilding through job creation and benefit-sharing (e.g., the Gola Forest Programme), it can also trigger conflict if it limits resource access or fails to compensate communities for wildlife damage. The report recommends strengthening legislative frameworks, improving stakeholder coordination, and implementing conflict-sensitive management strategies.

This policy brief examines the crisis in the prison systems of Sierra Leone, Tanzania, and Zambia, highlighting how colonial-era infrastructure, chronic underfunding, and retributive sentencing policies lead to severe overcrowding and systemic human rights violations.

This policy brief by the Institute for Security Studies assesses the systemic failures of the criminal justice system in Sierra Leone following a decade-long civil war. It identifies critical weaknesses across policing, prosecution, prisons, and the judiciary, highlighting issues of corruption, underfunding, and outdated legislation. The document recommends comprehensive reforms, including budgetary increases, the modernization of legal acts, and the harmonization of the dual legal system to improve access to justice for marginalized groups.

This report chapter examines the state of the prison system in Sierra Leone as of 2008-2009, detailing systemic failures in human rights, infrastructure, and legal processes. It highlights severe overcrowding, poor medical care, and a lack of legal representation, while noting that the Prisons Service lacks the funding and human resources to comply with international standards despite government efforts to renovate facilities.

This report examines the judiciary of Sierra Leone, detailing its historical evolution from the colonial era through periods of authoritarianism and civil war to its current democratic transition. It analyzes the legal framework established by the 1991 Constitution, the structure of the court system, and the persistent challenges regarding judicial independence, institutional capacity, and access to justice for vulnerable populations.

This report chapter examines the state of access to justice in Sierra Leone as of 2008, detailing a bifurcated legal system where the majority of the population relies on customary law. It highlights systemic barriers including poverty, illiteracy, and corruption, while specifically addressing the vulnerabilities of women and children in the justice system. The document also outlines various institutional reforms and NGO-led paralegal initiatives aimed at improving legal reach in rural areas.

This introductory chapter of a 2009 report by the Institute for Security Studies reviews the state of crime and criminal justice in Sierra Leone. It details the systemic damage caused by authoritarian regimes and a decade-long civil war (1991–2002), the subsequent efforts toward security sector reform, the dual nature of the legal system (English and customary law), and persistent human rights challenges within the judiciary and prison systems.

This report evaluates the state of juvenile justice in Sierra Leone as of 2008, focusing on the alignment of national laws and institutional practices with international standards such as the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). It identifies significant gaps in legal definitions of childhood, a lack of specialized juvenile courts, and inadequate detention facilities, noting that children are frequently detained with adults or held arbitrarily due to systemic inefficiencies.

This executive summary of a 2008 country review by the Institute for Security Studies examines the state of crime and criminal justice in Sierra Leone. It details how a history of authoritarianism and a civil war (1991–2002) led to the collapse of state infrastructure and the justice system. While post-conflict reforms have focused on the police and armed forces, the report finds systemic failures across policing, prosecution, prisons, the judiciary, and juvenile justice, including outdated laws, severe underfunding, and corruption.

This report argues that gender equality is a fundamental prerequisite for achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. It examines the historical role of women in UN environmental policies, the economic costs of gender inequality, and the specific benefits of women's leadership in climate action, agriculture, and natural resource management.

This report provides development forecasts for Sierra Leone up to 2043, comparing a 'Current Path' trajectory based on existing policies with various sectoral improvement scenarios and a combined 'Agenda 2063' scenario. It analyzes demographics, economic growth, poverty levels, energy transition, and the potential impacts of targeted interventions in agriculture, education, and governance.

This report by the Institute for Security Studies analyzes the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) and its efforts to stabilize the country following a decade of civil war. It details the mission's transition from an initial period of failure and hostage-taking in May 2000 to a more successful phase of deployment and disarmament starting in May 2001. The document examines the military, political, and civilian challenges of the peace process, including the disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) of combatants, the restoration of government authority, the role of British military support, and the establishment of transitional justice mechanisms like the Special Court for Sierra Leone and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

This report evaluates the transition from peacekeeping to peace-building in Sierra Leone following the May 2002 national elections. It details the success of the disarmament and demobilisation (DD) process, the challenges of reintegrating over 70,000 ex-combatants, and the restructuring of the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces (RSLAF) and the Sierra Leone Police (SLP). The document also examines the role of the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL) in providing security and public information, the efforts to extend state authority to the interior, the management of the diamond industry, and the implementation of transitional justice through the Special Court and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.