More than 1200 delegates from governments, research and policy institutions, civil society, the private sector and youth organizations attended the event, which was convened by the UNEP Regional Office for Africa (UNEP/ROA) and partner organizations.
The Conference was structured around plenary and parallel discussion sessions that aimed to contribute to seven core objectives: harnessing ecosystem-based adaptation (EBA) to protect and restore Africa’s ecosystems and contribute to a sustainable overall agricultural policy framework; building scalable and inclusive business models for EBA-driven agriculture that can create opportunities across the entire agricultural value chain; identifying scalable and innovative financing models for EBA-driven agriculture to stimulate growth, job creation and value chain partnerships in Africa; understanding the benefits of EBA in achieving the proposed Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); identifying enabling policies and legislation that will incentivize countries to invest in agriculture, soil conservation and EBA; gaining knowledge on key agents that can help transform the dominant agricultural development paradigms towards EBA-driven agriculture in Africa; and developing strategies to incentivize private sector involvement in EBA-driven agriculture for increased capital mobilization and competitiveness.