By Simon Jessop
Summary:
CIF board approves investment in Ethiopia plan
To help restore more than 320,000 hectares of land
World Bank, African Development Bank to co-invest
LONDON, Dec 4 (Reuters) – Multilateral lender Climate Investment Funds will back a $500 million plan to help drought-prone Ethiopia restore degraded land, protect its forests and bolster food security, it said on Wednesday.
CIF’s board said it had agreed a $37 million investment from its Nature, People, and Climate programme that it expects to mobilise $492 million in co-financing from other investors, including the World Bank and African Development Bank.
Most Ethiopians live in rural areas and rely on agriculture yet more than half of the country is experiencing some level of land degradation and around 11 million hectares are in danger of turning into desert, CIF said.
The funding is expected to help restore more than 320,000 hectares of wild Arabica coffee forests, farmlands, and rangelands in the Amhara, Oromia, South Ethiopia, and Somali regions and create an online registry of the country’s forests.
“This programme is really trying to get at how climate change and land degradation are undermining the livelihoods of millions of smallholder farmers and pastoralists in Ethiopia,” said Paul Hartman, the lead for CIF’s nature programmes.
Projects to receive funding will include those focused on afforestation and reforestation, regeneration of soil health and water conservation, and sustainable farming.
Source: Reuters
