Africa’s Green Transition

In 2015, the 24th Ordinary Assembly of the Heads of State and Governments of the African Union adopted Agenda 2063, a transformational plan aimed at advancing economic, social and environmental development in Africa by the year 2063. ¹ One of the key goals of the Agenda is to achieve ‘environmentally sustainable and climate resilient economies and communities across Africa. ² Agenda 2063 builds upon other strategic plans adopted at the African regional and sub-regional levels aimed at elaborating a common pan-African response to ongoing global efforts to transition to sustainable, resource efficient and green economies. 

The ongoing global green transition raises complex economic, social, and environmental questions for Africa, arguably, more so than any other continent in the world, which requires tailored and realistic responses. Although Africa is not one homogeneous geographical unit, African countries have similarities in terms of historical dependence on abundant natural resources, and their contributions, and deep vulnerabilities, to the climate change emergency. Africa is home to some of the world’s highest exporters of oil, natural gas and solid minerals, with these commodities accounting for more than 60 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in many African countries. ³ Thus, despite Africa’s comparatively lower historical contributions to the emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs) that cause climate change, the fossil fuel-dependent nature of the economies of several African countries, and a rapidly growing population, means that the continent currently has one of the fastest growth rate in GHG emission. ⁴  

Efforts to tackle the climate change emergency through drastic cuts to GHG emissions in Africa however face other competing emergencies. Despite its abundant natural resources, Africa faces a complex energy poverty emergency (defined as ‘the inability of households to access electricity and modern energy services at an affordable cost’). ⁵ For example, Africa has the lowest electrification rate globally, with more than 600 million Africans still lacking access to electricity, an additional 30 per cent suffer from prolonged power outages and undersupply, while 900 million Africans lack access to clean cooking facilities. ⁶ The African Union has therefore announced the African Common Position on Energy Access and Just Transition, which aims to use all of the continent’s natural resources, including natural gas, to tackle Africa’s energy poverty emergency, consistent with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 7 on clean, stable, and affordable energy for all by the year 2030. ⁷ The African Common Position also recognises the need to harmonize the green transition with investment in capacity development, technology and infrastructure to reduce the socio-economic impacts of such a transition, especially on workers leaving the fossil fuel sector. ⁸ Furthermore, with many African countries still racing to respond to the economic impacts of Corona Virus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the Ukraine crisis and its impact on food security, escalating water scarcity, as well as the rise in insurgency and natural resource theft by terrorist groups, the urgent need for disaster risk response and resilience has become a top priority for many African states.  ⁹

Thus, while the narrative about green transition in Global North countries has been framed mainly in terms of decarbonization and a transition to a net zero economy, for many African countries, the green transition is about resilience. In the face of competing water, energy, food, climate and disaster emergencies, green transition in Africa is about utilizing environmental protection, conservation, resource efficiency and decarbonization as pathways for promoting economic diversification, social inclusion and resilience to disaster and climate risks. Africa is therefore not just seeking a green transition, the continent is desperately in search of a just, equitable and inclusive green transition, that is Africa-led and Africa-owned, and leaves no one behind. ¹⁰  

Yet, while the aim of Africa’s green transition is clear, ten years after the adoption of the African Union’s Agenda 2063, the path to Africa’s green transition objectives remains uncertain. In the analysis below, I examine the progress made, and challenges that remain, in terms of advancing the energy and economic diversification, social inclusion and disaster risk resilience objectives of Africa’s green transition agenda. A confluence of financing gaps, technology limitations, capacity constraints and weak legal and institutional frameworks on the green transition, that must be carefully addressed to effectively translate Agenda 2063 from vision to reality are unpacked.

I – Pillars of Africa’s Green Transition 

Since the adoption of the Agenda 2063, a flurry of instruments have emerged at regional, subregional and national levels which emphasise three central pillars of Africa’s green transition agenda. First is climate resilience and natural disaster preparedness and prevention. Climate change poses existential threats to Africa, arguably more than to any other continent. Many African countries have dual vulnerabilities to climate change, both as arid countries and developing states. For low-lying African countries such as Seychelles, Comoros, Madagascar, and Mauritius, climate change is already resulting in rising sea levels and increased patterns of extreme weather events such as cyclones and floods. ¹¹ Furthermore, arid countries such as Sudan, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger, are already facing climate-induced droughts, water scarcity, land conflicts and climate induced displacements. For Africa, climate change is therefore not just a planetary emergency, it is also a key driver of national insecurity and disaster risk. ¹² The green transition is therefore an urgent necessity for African countries to accelerate climate-smart infrastructure and disaster response systems needed to mitigate and adapt to the impacts of climate change, consistent with the Paris Agreement and SDG 13. ¹³ In line with Agenda 2063, African Union’s Climate Change and Resilient Development Strategy and Action Plan (2022-2032) outlines priorities and action areas aimed at accelerating low-emission and climate-resilient growth as central aspects of Africa’s green transition. ¹⁴ The focus is not just on GHG reduction, but also on boosting agricultural production, transforming water systems and enhancing early warning and response systems to promote resilience to natural disasters and risks. 

A second pillar of Africa’s green transition is energy and economic diversification. In the face of reduced demand for fossil fuels that have for many years remained the bedrock of several African economies, the need for a green transition agenda that ensures reduced reliance on fossil fuel exports, particularly coal and oil, is no longer an option but a necessity for Africa. For example, some of the central objectives of the Agreement on the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) include to ‘promote industrial development through diversification and regional value chain development, agricultural development and food security’ and to ‘promote and attain sustainable and inclusive socio-economic development.’ ¹⁵ By streamlining the flow of environmental goods across the continent, AfCFTA aims to transform African countries from resource dependent and hydrocarbon-based economies to innovation and manufacturing powerhouse, contributing to long-term green transition. 

Endowed with abundant solar and wind energy resources, Africa has huge potential to become the next global hub for solar, wind, and green hydrogen investments offering a path to both energy and economic diversification. ¹⁶ Also, as global demand increases for energy transition minerals (ETMs), such as cobalt, copper, graphite, lithium, nickel, manganese, phosphate rock, zinc and rare earth metals, needed to power renewable energy technologies and infrastructure, Africa has enormous potential to leverage its abundant supply of these minerals to unlock economic diversification. Several African countries have already released national visions and strategies aimed at promoting investment in renewable energy, clean technology and minerals as pathways to open up other economic sectors. ¹⁷ For example, a central aspect of Nigeria’s Energy Transition Plan is to create jobs and ‘lift 100 million Nigerians out of poverty and driving economic growth’. ¹⁸ Similarly, economic diversification a key priority area in South Africa’s Just Energy Transition Investment Plan (JET IP) for 2023-2027. The Plan aims to create ‘quality jobs in new sectors like electric vehicles, green hydrogen, renewable energy, and manufacturing.’ ¹⁹ Similar framing of the green transition as an economic opportunity, and not just a climate imperative, is found in policy visions in Morocco, Ghana, Malawi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda some of which have already made progress in promoting homegrown solutions that deliver clean and reliable energy to underserved communities, while unlocking green economic opportunities. ²⁰

A third pillar of Africa’s green transition is localism and social inclusion. Due to reduced global fossil-fuel demand, the green transition risks exacerbating loss of employment and subsistence, defunding, and limited access to finance and training needed in the clean energy sector, especially for workers in Africa leaving the extractive sector. ²¹ Furthermore, the design and implementation of clean energy transition projects have been increasingly linked to  social exclusions, rising energy poverty levels, modern slavery, child labour, discrimination, environmental pollution, land grabs, forced displacements of Indigenous Peoples from their ancestral lands and and other human rights abuses, especially in the production of ETMs. ²² As far back as in 2010, the United Nations Security Council urged all stakeholders to exercise due diligence when exploring cobalt in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a nation that accounts for over half of the world’s cobalt production. ²³ The African Union has also increasingly underlined the need for states, business enterprises and other stakeholders to integrate human rights in the design, financing and implementation of their transition programs, including the production of ETMs. Building on its 2012 Resolution on a Human Rights-Based Approach to Natural Resources Governance, the African Commission in 2023 released its Resolution on Business and Human Rights in Africa which recognises the need to prevent and address business-related human rights abuse in all sectors, including resource development and energy transition. ²⁴ This includes advancing a low carbon economy, while reducing the socio-economic impacts of such a transition on workers and other typically marginalised groups such as youth, women and indigenous groups. ²⁵ The imperative for a just and right-based green transition is increasingly recognised at the domestic level. For example, one of the central priorities of Nigeria’s Energy Transition Plan is to ‘manage the expected long-term job loss in the oil sector due to the reduced global fossil-fuel demand.’ ²⁶ The need to address gender-based exclusions and vulnerabilities in green transition is also crucial for Africa. ²⁷ African countries can seize the momentum of the green transition to address preexisting human rights challenges and social exclusions in key economic sectors, especially the energy sector which several studies have described as male-dominated. ²⁸ The green transition also provides enormous opportunities to strengthen clean technology entrepreneurship, energy citizenship and local participation in the development of clean technology innovation that advance an inclusive transition agenda. ²⁹  

Despite the enormous potential of the green transition to unlock socio-economic transformation across Africa, several legal and institutional barriers will need to be addressed to maximize these potentials. 

II – Barriers and Challenges to a Just and Inclusive Green Transition in Africa 

A key barrier is the huge financing gap facing Africa’s green transition agenda. With the African Group of Negotiators (AGN) on climate change calling for $1.3 trillion per annum to finance climate-related development across the continent, it is crystal clear that Africa’s green transition agenda will require leveraging both public and private sector capital. ³⁰ Yet, the despite solar, wind and renewable energy potential of the continent, only 2% of new global green investments are going to Africa. ³¹ Furthermore due to economic slowdown and increased health spending associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, more than one- third of Sub- Saharan African countries are at increased risk of debt distress. ³² Thus, while there are a number of investment niche funds that support green transition in Africa, the huge financing gaps, coupled with the growing debt burdens of many African countries, show the need for more international solidarity and support for Africa’s green transition. 

A climate-ravaged Africa will heighten global insecurity, mass migration and water, energy and food poverty all of which will place pressure on the global community. The Paris Agreement therefore recognises the need for consistent finance flows from developed countries to developing countries to accelerate climate action. ³³ SDG17.4 also calls on developed countries to ‘assist developing countries in attaining long- term debt sustainability through coordinated policies aimed at fostering debt financing, debt relief and debt restructuring by 2030.’ ³⁴ The global campaign for the defunding of fossil fuel projects must be matched by a corresponding global campaign for increased and consistent flow of the required green financing for African countries. It will be unrealistic, and perhaps irresponsible, for resource rich African countries to leave resources under the ground, in the face of extreme poverty, hunger, and water, energy and food scarcities facing their population. An Africa-led and Africa-owned green transition must balance climate change imperatives with progress in all aspects of the SDGs. There is therefore a need for increased international ambition and commitment by developed and other Parties to scale up financing for Africa’s green transition agenda, as part of international solidarity needed under the Paris Agreement to advance global climate action. ³⁵ A central aspect of this is to provide debt for nature swaps, debt restructuring, and other concessional lending initiatives that can help reduce Africa’s debt burden, and free up financing for the green transition. 

Related to financing gaps are technology gaps that escalate the cost, and slow the pace, of the green transition in Africa. Much of the environmentally sustainable technologies (ESTs) needed to accelerate the green transition are simply not available locally.  For example, estimates indicate that in 2023 alone, Nigeria imported over four million solar panels, at the cost of more than $200 million. ³⁶  Import-related costs hikes the prices of solar panels making it less affordable to businesses and households, especially in poor and underserved communities. Furthermore, solar panels designed for other countries and climates may not meet local specification and requirements, especially weather conditions, which may result in their sub-optimal performance and quality control challenges in local contexts. ³⁷ Advancing Africa’s green transition will require a transformational shift from a one-track focus on technology importation, to technology absorption, that is ‘the process of learning to understand, utilise and replicate technology, including the capacity to choose it and adapt it to local conditions and to integrate it with indigenous technologies.’ ³⁸ It is ‘the ability of the technology-importing country to understand, utilise, manage and learn from the acquired technology so that it can develop its own domestic capabilities.’ ³⁹ In addition to lack of sustained investments in clean technology entrepreneurship to promote home grown developemnt of green technologies, legal barriers to technology absorption must also be carefully addressed to ‘give confidence to inventors that transferred technology will be protected from arbitrary confiscation or abuse.’ ⁴⁰ First is the weak legal protection for intellectual property rights (IPRs) in many African countries which serves as a barrier to technology deployment and absorption. ⁴¹ A UN study documents how lack of high quality patent and IPR systems continues to hinder clean technology innovation in Africa. ⁴² Similarly, prohibitive cost of patent registration continues to serve as barriers to patent registration and innovation resulting in almost total dependence on technology importation. ⁴³ Without comprehensive legal reforms on innovation and technology absorption, the promise of the green transition in Africa may remain stifled by technology gaps. ⁴⁴  

Third, and in addition to addressing legal gaps relating to innovation and IPR, supportive legal frameworks are required to incentivize investment in Africa’s green transition. Green investments, like any other foreign direct investments (FDIs), will flow to regions with conducive investment climate, as well as comprehensive and supportive laws that streamline green investment process. It will be difficult, if not impossible, to attract the sustained green financing and investment flows needed to achieve the green transition agenda without addressing regulatory barriers that green entrepreneurs face in Africa. In many African countries, the process of business formalisation and registration remain characterised by delays, lack of comprehensive laws on clean technology entrepreneurship, inadequate protection of intellectual property rights and unclear frameworks on public-private partnerships. ⁴⁵ To translate Africa’s green transition agenda to reality, a starting point is for African countries to address legal barriers that stifle green investments. 

Fourth are capacity gaps that limit the coherent and coordinated implementation of the green transition agenda in Africa. Accelerating the green transition cuts across different sectors and institutions ranging from environment, energy, finance, and development planning. However, studies have highlighted how due to a lack of training, equipment and tools, regulators are unable to coherently monitor compliance with sustainability standards. ⁴⁶ In many cases ‘regulators are often under-resourced, limiting their ability to develop and adapt regulatory frameworks for new technologies and solutions.’ ⁴⁷ Furthermore, the lack of statistical and data-gathering technologies and tools often means that regulators in a number of African countries simply lack the capabilities to transparently collate, evaluate and process data relating to the green transition in a manner that can instil public confidence on its overall contributions and effectiveness. ⁴⁸ Tailored capacity development programs on the green transition will be crucial in unlocking African solutions that accelerate the continent’s green transition agenda. 

III – Accelerating African solutions to Africa’s green transition challenges: Opportunities and Ways Forward

A mix of international solidarity, regional knowledge exhange and domestic legal and governance reforms are required to address the foregoing complex obstacles that currently stifle the path to Africa’s green transition. 

First, accelerating African solutions to Africa’s green transition challenges will require international solidarity and support in terms of providing a consistent flow of technology, financial support and capacity development, in line with the Paris Agreement.  Though not legally binding, Article 6 of the UNESCO Declaration of Ethical Principles in relation to Climate Change also emphasises the need for solidarity, noting that ‘human beings collectively and individually should assist people and groups that are most vulnerable to climate change and natural disasters, especially when catastrophic events occur.’ It calls on developed States and other States, to strengthen ‘information and knowledge, capacity-building, and means and financial resources to developing countries.’ A mix of increased green financing, debt forgiveness, and other concessional lending initiatives that can help reduce Africa’s debt burden, and free up financing for the green transition are urgently required.

Second, African countries themselves must undertake comprehensive assessments of legal and institutional barriers that weaken broad-based inclusion in green transition programs, especially private sector participation. Private sector investment is key to unlock Africa’s green transition agenda. It is therefore pertinent for African countries to put in place supportive commercial and investment laws that simplify the process of business formalisation, registration and participation in transition programs. In addition to legal reforms, African countries will need to provide financial incentives for entrepreneurs to unlock African energy solutions. Such incentives can be in the form of direct grants, concessional or low interest loans, investment tax credits or reversed taxes, or in the form of de-risking instruments including insurance, geared towards supporting the upfront capital investment needed to develop clean technology initiatives. A good example is the European Union’s Innovation Fund which provides fiscal incentives and support for low-carbon technologies and infrastructure projects. ⁴⁹ Furthermore, with Kenya recently announcing its Climate Change (Carbon Markets) Regulations, 2024, the potential for carbon financing at national and regional levels, as a tool for increasing resource availability should be explored by other African countries. ⁵⁰ In the design and implementation of such green transition frameworks, it is important to integrate human rights safeguards to ensure inclusive and rights-based implementation of such programs, particularly the rights of marginalized and disadvantaged groups, such as women, Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLCs), children and youth, and persons with disabilities. ⁵¹

Third, is the need for capacity development to enhance the coherent implementation of the green transition agenda. To bridge capacity gaps, higher education institutions have key roles to play in designing innovative training and research programs that provide skills and knowledge acquisition opportunities for innovators, financial institutions, regulators and other stakeholders involved in green transition programs. Capacity development programs on the green transition must also emphasise the importance of interoperability and coordination by all ministries, agencies and entities in the green transition value chain in order to ensure coherent implementation.

Fourth, regional bodies such as the African Union, African Commission, the AfCTA Secretariat, and the African Development Bank have key roles to play in further elaborating guidelines for the integration of the green transition agenda in all aspects of trade, investment and financing. The limited reference to the green transition in the the AfCTA and its protocols is a gap that should be addressed through more comprehensive protocol or modalities that provides guidance on how the pillars of the Africa’s green transition could be integrated in trade activities. Regional and sub-regional trade platforms such as the Arab-Africa Trade Bridges (AATB), also have key roles to play in integrating the green transition into their trade, financing and capacity development programs. ⁵²

Conclusion 

For Africa, the green transition is both an urgent necessity and a profound opportunity. It is an urgent necessity if the continent is to avoid the direct and indirect impacts of climate change. The green transition also provides opportunities for African countries to leverage climate and environmental sustainability programs as levers of socio-economic transformation, clean technology entrepreneurship and climate-resilient growth. However, prepacked and imported solutions on green transition, framed solely from climate and environmental perspectives that neglect the complex socio-economic realities of many African countries, are bound to fail and may not address all the dimensions of a green transition in African context. Africa’s green transition must ultimately be designed by Africa, implemented and led by Africa, with the continued solidarity of international stakeholders interested in unlocking new green investment opportunities on the continent. African countries must also evolve inclusive and rights-based legislation and polices that unlock the active participation of all stakeholders including the private sector, youth, women, and marginalised groups, in homegrown clean technology innovation and green entrepreneurship. 

1. African Union, Agenda 2063
2. It idenfies priority areas such as sustainable natural resource management and biodiversity conservation; sustainable consumption and production patterns; water security; climate resilience and natural disasters preparedness and prevention; and renewable energy. Ibid
3. For example, Nigeria, Algeria, Egypt, Libya are historical giants in oil and gas production. Similarly, Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia have attracted significant investment and income from mineral resources, ranging from bauxite, cobalt, diamond, gold, lithium, phosphate, potash, rhodium, silver, iron ore, zinc and to platinum-group metals, catalysing significant economic activity in these countries. D. Olawuyi, Extractives Industry Law in Africa (Springer, 2018) 1-15
4. While Africa is responsible for only 4% of global GHG emissions, studies indicate that between 2010 and 2019, Africa’s annual carbon emissions growth rate was 2.1%, exceeding the global average of 1.2%.  See also Hannah Ritchie,  ‘Sub-Saharan Africa emits a tiny fraction of the world’s CO₂
5. D. Olawuyi, ‘Energy Poverty in the Middle East and North African (MENA) Region: Divergent Tales and Future Prospects’, in I. Del Guayo, L. Godden, D.N. Zillman, M.F. Montoya, & J. J. Gonzalez (eds.), Energy Law and Energy Justice (Oxford University Press, 2020) pp. 254-272.
6. African Union, ‘Africa Speaks with Unified Voice as AU Executive Council Adopts African Common Position on Energy Access and Just Energy Transition’
7. Ibid
8. Ibid
9. D. Olawuyi, ‘Natural Resources and Environmental Security’ in E. Kleynhans and M. Wyss (eds), The Handbook of African Defence and Armed Forces (Oxford University Press, 2025) pp. 809–827
10. See African Union, African Union’s Climate Change and Resilient Development Strategy and Action Plan (2022-2032); also V. Songwe and J.-P. Adam, ‘Delivering Africa’s Great Green Transformation’ in Amar Bhattacharya et al (eds), Keys to Climate Action: How Developing Countries Could Drive Global Success and Local Prosperity (Brookings 2023) 233-258.
11. J. Doorga, et al, ‘Surging seas, rising sea levels, and sinking communities: The urgent need for climate adaptation in small island states (2024) 157 Environmental Science & Policy, 103788
12. D. Olawuyi, ‘Natural Resources and Environmental Security’ (n°9)
13. Ibid
14.  African Union’s Climate Change and Resilient Development Strategy and Action Plan (2022-2032) (n°10)
15. See Article 3 (e ) and (g), Agremeent on the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) (adopted March 21, 2018, in force on May 30, 2019)
16. D. Olawuyi, ‘Private Sector Investment Crucial for Just Energy Transition in Africa’
17. Ibid. Also D. Olawuyi (n°5).
18. Federal Government of Nigeria, Nigeria’s Energy Transition Plan
19. South Africa’s Just Energy Transition Investment Plan (JET IP)
20. D. Olawuyi (n°5).
21. United Nations Working Group on Business and Human Rights (UN WGBHR), ‘Extractive Sector, Just Transition and Human Rights’ (2023) UN General Assembly Report A/ 78/ 155; see also United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner, International Labour Organization, ‘Human Rights and a Just Transition’,
22. See D. Olawuyi, C. Bright, S. Goethals, Q. Hasan, ‘Beyond Just Transition: Advancing Responsible and Rights-Based Business Practices in the Energy and Extractives Sector’ (2025) 10 (1) Business and Human Rights Journal 1-10; Clean Energy Council, ‘Addressing Modern Slavery in the Clean Energy Sector’
23. UNWGBHR (n°21)
24. African Commission, Resolution on Business and Human Rights in Africa – ACHPR/Res.550 (LXXIV) 2023; Resolution on a Human Rights-Based Approach to Natural Resources Governance, African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, 51st Sess, (2012)
25. African Union (n°6)
26. Federal Government of Nigeria (n°18)
27. A. Akinsemolu and W. Nsoh, ‘Gender Justice and Net Zero Energy Transition: Perspectives from the United Kingdom and Sub-Saharan Africa’, in D. Olawuyi, and others (eds), Net Zero and Natural Resources Law: Sovereignty, Security, and Solidarity in the Clean Energy Transition (Oxford University Press, 2024)
28. Ibid. Also, E. Olarinde and H. Okoeguale, ‘Energy Transition and the Role of Women: Advancing Gender-Aware Transition in the Natural Gas Industry’ in D. Olawuyi, E.G. Pereira (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Natural Gas and Global Energy Transitions (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022).
29. D. Olawuyi, ‘From Energy Consumers to Energy Citizens: Legal Dimensions of Energy Citizenship’ in K Hunter et al (eds) Sustainable Energy Democracy and the Law (Netherlands: Brill, 2021) 101-123
30. D. Bodunde, ‘Adaptation is Africa’s lifeline’ — negotiators seek $1.3trn climate finance at COP29’ (The Cable News, November 22, 2024)
31. IRENA and AfDB (2022), Renewable Energy Market Analysis: Africa and Its Regions (International Renewable Energy Agency and African Development Bank, Abu Dhabi and Abidjan.
32. International Monetary Fund, ‘Opening Remarks at Mobilizing with Africa II High- Level Virtual Event’ (9 October 2020)
33. Article 9, 10 and 11 of the Paris Agreement.
34. United Nations,‘Transforming our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’ UNGA Res. 70/1 (25 September 2015) [2030 Sustainable Development Agenda].
35. D. Olawuyi et al, Net Zero and Natural Resources Law: Sovereignty, Security, and Solidarity in the Clean Energy Transition (Oxford University Press, 2024) pp. 1-15.
36. Premium Times ‘Reducing solar panel importation: A path towards sustainable energy in Nigeria’ (February 11, 2025)
37. Ibid.
38. See D. Olawuyi, ‘From Technology Transfer to Technology Absorption: Addressing Climate Technology Gaps in Africa’, 36:1 Journal of energy & natural resources law (2018), pp. 61-84, also IPCC, Methodological and Technological Issues in Technology Transfer: Summary for Policymakers (Special Report of Working Group III, IPCC 2000).
39. D. Olawuyi, Ibid
40. Ibid. See also I. Mgbeoji, ‘African patent offices not fit for purpose’, in Innovation & Intellectual Property: Collaborative Dynamics in Africa, J. DeBeer, C. Armstrong, C. Oguamanam and T. Schonwetter eds. (Claremont, University of Cape Town Press, 2014)
41. United Nations Environment Programme, Patents and Clean Energy Technologies in Africa (United Nations Environment Programme, Division of Environmental Law and Conventions 2013) pp. 7–8; also A Abdel-Latif,‘Intellectual Property Rights and the Transfer of Climate Change Technologies: Issues, Challenges, and Way Forward’ (2015) 15 Climate Policy 103
42. United Nations, The Role of Intellectual Property Rights in Promoting Africa’s Development: Overview of IPR in Africa
43. Ibid
44. H. Cao, Z. Y, Y. Li, K. Li, ‘Does legislation promote technological innovation in renewable energy enterprises? Evidence from China’ (2024) 188 Energy Policy, 114111.
45. D. Olawuyi, ‘From Energy Consumers to Energy Citizens: Legal Dimensions of Energy Citizenship’ in K Hunter et al (eds) Sustainable Energy Democracy and the Law (Netherlands: Brill, 2021) 101-123.
46. H. Carr, ‘Distributed Energy Resources: what we learned from regulators about managing the energy transition in Africa’ (24 October 2024); see also D. Olawuyi and Z. Tubondenyefa, ‘Review of the Environmental Guidelines and Standards for the Petroleum Industry in Nigeria (EGASPIN)’ Technical Report. Institute for Oil, Gas, Energy, Environment and Sustainable Development (OGEES Institute) (2019) 1-25.
47. H. Carr, Ibid
48. A. Babalola and D. Olawuyi, ‘Overcoming Regulatory Failure in the Design and Implementation of Gas Flaring Policies: The Potential and Promise of an Energy Justice Approach’ (2022) 14 (11) Sustainability
49. For a previous discussion of this, see D. Olawuyi (n.16)
50. Climate Change (Carbon Markets) Regulations, 2024, Legal Notice 84 of 2024.
51. D. Olawuyi, The Human Rights Based Approach to Carbon Finance (Cambridge University Press, 2016) pp. 1-15
52. Led by financial institutions, including the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), the International Islamic Trade Finance Corporation (ITFC), Islamic Corporation for Investment and Export Credit (ICIEC), Islamic for the Development of the Private Sector (ICD) and Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa (BADEA), the Arab- Africa Trade Bridges (AATB) Program aims to accelerate trade collaboration, finance, and capacity development between African and Arab countries. See <https://www.itfc-idb.org/what-we-offer/trade-development/flagship-programs/arab-africa-trade-bridges-program>