By Anthony Mukwita,
When you read the newspaper or switch on radio and TV, our biggest sources of news today, the weather report is not good.
You read stories like “100 kilometre per hour winds bring down trees, kill four in Berlin, Chzeck and Poland,” or “Hurricane Jane displaces thousands in Hawaii,” and the bad news continues.
In Africa, “South Africa has experienced the worst weather with temperatures to over 40 degrees,” while in, “Zambia low water levels have affected power generation at Lake Kariba and the power company is now been forced to ration power.”
It almost sounds like the end of the world as we have known it as the weather report is dished out.
‘Welcome’ as best-selling author Jonathan Tepperman aptly puts it in his book The Fix, to “the great unwinding.”
Climate Change
The bad weather is attributed to Climate Change that is affecting the earth adversely hence the reason for events such as the COP 23 that Zambia is a part of in Bonn, Germany now.
The basic definition of Climate Change is simply; a long-term change in the earth’s climate, especially due to an increase in the average atmospheric temperature.
The world is desperately looking for solutions to mitigate the adverse effects of Climate change that affected southern Africa and in 2015 and 2016 leaving animals dead in the wild as streams dried up and the corn crop devastated as rainfall dwindled.
Zambia was lucky during this period that was the worst in the history of southern Africa as far as agriculture was concerned because despite the low water levels, Zambia still managed to harvest just over 3 million metric tonnes of maize.
The rest of the southern region reeled in food shortfalls and looked to Zambia for corn imports because due to early planting and improved agriculture practices, Zambia managed to escape the wrath of harsh weather.
Electricity generation
The energy sector nevertheless did not entirely survive the harsh effects of climate change as water levels drastically dropped at Lake Kariba Dam, the largest man-made lake in Africa that provides water to generate 90 percent of Zambia’s power.
According to Zambezi River Authority studies, Lake Kariba was created to operate between 475.50m and 488.50m but the levels have presently dropped by 0.13m.
The drop in water levels led to power rationing in Zambia of unprecedented scores at a great economic cost that saw mining companies reduce copper generation in the Copperbelt.
Because the mining companies suffered huge losses, with a drop in copper production, they subsequently slashed some jobs and cut down some investment or postponed others.
The result of the adverse weather also meant at a domestic economic level, ordinary Zambians that operated small businesses daily such as Barber Shops and Hair saloons also were caught in the eye of the storm. They shut down business.
While the bad weather affected everything including the treasury as President Edgar Lungu in a bid to keep industry alive and Zambians in jobs nodded a treasury instruction to import power at a cost of tens of millions of dollars.
Water levels dilemma
Studies show that in Zambia and other sub Saharan African countries, water levels have dipped down this year and the flows will continue to decline annually due to global warming.
Sixty million people in the sub region (Zambia included) were directly adversely affected by the effects of El Nino in 2015-2016 as Lake Kariba dried up and slowed power generation.
There is no specific cost of the effects of the climate change in Zambia during the period under review, but experts say it runs into tens of millions of dollars.
Africa is expected to warm faster than the global average levels due to greenhouse gas emissions hence the need to step up efforts to plug the emissions and reduce them.
Historically, between 1960 and 2003, temperatures in Zambia rose by 1.3 degrees according to studies while conversely, rainfall temperatures have reduced by 2.3 percent in recent years.
“The rainfall season is shorter nowadays causing a further strain,” said Alex Simalabwi who heads Global Lead: Water Climate Development based in Pretoria.
Simalabwi reckons that the energy crisis of 2015 brought about by low water levels must be repeated urging Zambia to raise money to boost the energy sector and invest in the future.
But it was not all gloom and doom for Zambia as bad weather ravaged the country due to climate change because many Zambians took the initiative to invest in alternative sources of energy such as solar.
The government is now exploring possibilities of investing in nuclear energy
President Edgar Lungu response to energy shortfall
It is also around the same period that President Lungu bit the bullet and allowed the Energy Regulation Board to remove the subsidy on electricity that has existed since independence.
It is not a popular decision but President Lungu made the decision nevertheless to make the energy sector more attractive for foreign direct investment or FDI.
In the long run, more private investment is expected to enter the Zambian market and push prices of energy down.
Beyond Zambia in Climate Change
Beyond the borders of Zambia and the SADC region, Climate Change has continued to wreak havoc with hurricane prone zones recording double the number of hurricanes than recorded since they started keeping records more than 150 years ago or 1851 to be specific.
Infact studies show that in the hurricane zones especially of the United States, 2017 has been the most destructive year since records were kept costing the entire hurricane zone more than 316 billion US dollars.
It is for this reason that the UN Climate Change Conference being held in Bonn must come up with solutions of mitigating the adverse effects for the future as the earth warms up faster than ever before.
President Lungu has shown overt support for climate change solutions and initiatives by authorising his minister of Environment Hon. Jean Kapata to travel to Bonn to attend the crucial Indaba along with Permanent Secretaries Trevor Kaunda and Chola Chabala who are providing the necessary technical support.
The embassy of Zambia in Bonn is represented by Ambassador Anthony Mukwita and Press Attaché Kellys Kaunda while a dozen Zambian experts and NGO leaders are also represented here.
Zambia has continued to be a crucial cog in international initiatives under President Lungu.
The southern African country, a signatory to the climate change pact signed in France last December has widely been commended for embracing the scientific findings that state that the globe is warming up.
“Zambia believes like other global players that Climate Change is not a hoax. History is replete with the negative effects of the trend that goes beyond droughts and floods.”
The time to act is now.
The Author, Anthony Mukwita is the Ambassador of Zambia to the Federal Republic of Germany. He is a regular contributor in analysing various issues.
It is a pitty the auther does not connect climate change to the unparalleled chopping down to trees at this time in Zambia for malasha….
It must be stressed that during the energy shortages GRZ fell shamlessly short of encouraging domestic solar use with no coherent policies , some would argue to delibaratly protect ZESCO market share which is a PF cash cow, and with the removal of subsidies on electricity cutting down trees for malasha has reached unsustainable levels…
Although climate change is real, the reasons for our energy deficit is not insufficient rainfall.
Zambias load shedding is directly due to incompetence and mismanagement of our resources
The wasting of ONE WHOLE YEARS water by deliberately letting it out of Kariba in 2011 was the first mistake. Then the cancellation of Kafue Gorge Lower that has now been reinstated at DOUBLE THE COST was the other!
PF has set Zambias economy back by years and lost billions due to their ignorance and corruption.
Well-researched paper. However, a little more editing was needed before hitting the ‘publish’ button. For example, a dam is a wall and not a body of water. Lake Kariba is the largest man-made lake in the world; not just in Africa.
All in all, it is educative.
Well documented though will a number of issues have been left out.If I can remember very well,in the Auditor’s General Report there’s something relating to the same issues,which contribute to failure to mitigate and implement issues activities in with the climate change.I hope my fellow colleagues who came across that article will agree with me.Solutions are there to mitigate issues relating to climate change.
Despite many articles and speeches being presented patterning to climate change,we still have a long way to put things right in our country.I have been to Bonn and visited both state and private forests and have seen how things are managed in terms of forest management.If we can borrow ideas from our colleagues well and good,we will achieve our goals.The other thing I have observed is that,when an opportunity comes for such events wrong peoples are the ones that attend such.Give chances to people who can come and put things in real action.We have capacity to do more than what we did previous years.I appreciate you Sir to have people like to bring out issues of that nature.Thank you so much and good lucky.