By Ally Jamah
On March 18,2020, Uganda achieved a significant milestone towards establishing a National Greenhouse Gas (GHG) inventory that will help the country to accurately track and report its GHG emissions and update its climate plans (Nationally Determined Contributions) in line with the enhanced transparency requirements of the Paris Agreement.
As part of the Capacity Building Initiative for Transparency (CBIT), that’s funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the Ministry of Water and Environment (MWE) signed 6 Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) and an Inter-ministerial Cooperation Framework with key emission sectors to streamline the collection, processing and sharing of quality GHG data to be fed into the national inventory.
The CBIT Uganda project is managed by Conservation International, a GEF Agency, through its Vital Signs program, and implemented by MWE’s Climate Change Department and the Africa Innovations Institute (Afrii).
MWE signed GHG data-sharing agreements with the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development, Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, Ministry of Works and Transport, National Environment Management Authority (NEMA), and the National Forestry Authority (NFA). It also signed an Inter-ministerial Cooperation Agreement with 10 government institutions to share GHG data. The MOUs also defined specific roles for the MWE and the NDC sectors. The signing of the MOUs establishes a national data sharing framework that would have otherwise taken the process of developing a national policy to achieve.
The signing ceremony at the Golf Course Hotel, Kampala was attended by key stakeholders from government, private sector and civil society including MWE's Commissioner for Wetlands Mr Collins Oloya, who was the Chief Guest, Mr. Victor Esendi (Sr. Technical Manager, Conservation International in Africa) and Prof. Otim-Nape (CEO, Afrii).
During the event, Conservation International and Afrii officially handed over equipment to MWE including state- of-the-art computers to support data processing and transmission in line with the goals of the MOUs and the Inter-ministerial Cooperation Framework.In addition, a new GHG training program was unveiled to build the capacity of technical personnel from key sectors in Uganda to develop their sectoral GHG emission inventories (2016-2019) and enhance Measurement, Reporting and Verification (MRV) systems for the inventory. The training is being conducted by consultants from Aether.
For more information, please contact Victor Esendi vesendi@conservation.org or visit CBIT Uganda