Egypt Shows Readiness to Host COP27

Egypt has organized several activities and events as part of the preparatory process for the next UN Climate Change Conference (COP 27), slated for November in Sharm El-Sheikh, the well-known Red Sea coastal city.

As the host of the upcoming summit, Egypt has been working to make the conference a radical turning point in international climate efforts in coordination with all parties, for the benefit of the region and the entire world.

Last week, Cairo hosted the Director of IFAD’s Sustainable Production, Markets, and Institutions Division Thouraya Triki, who affirmed during the AgriTech Meet Forum that IFAD alongside the Egyptian government is working on the COP27 conference in Egypt’s Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, noting that Egypt has already taken many important steps in the preparation for the summit.

Speaking to Sada El Balad English (SEE), the IFAD's official expressed its institution's trust in Egypt’s presidency of the COP27 conference as well as its keenness to push forward Egyptian- IFAD and UNDP's efforts to face climate change problems.

The recent activities and events like the AgriTech forum and SCALA workshop tackled opportunities for cooperation in the areas of climate and environment, including sustainable innovative ways, with the participation of representatives of international institutions and the country’s ministries of agriculture, and technology and economic development, international cooperation, trade, and industry.

Through these events, Egypt's held a series of fruitful consultations not only as a preparation process but as one that eventually influences how Egypt strategically uses nature, environment, and climate actions to promote inclusive sustainable development, strengthen cooperation and accelerate innovative action towards national development, whilst contributing to global commitments.

In addition to this, recent multilateral consultations at the level of heads of the foreign delegation have provided an opportunity for all stakeholders to engage informally on specific issues and make progress in preparation for Sharm el-Sheikh.

Egypt in this respect held several consultative meetings with representatives from Germany, the current chair of the G7 summit, and Sweden, which hosts the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the convening of the first UN conference on the environment under the title ‘Stockholm + 50’ in June.

In April, Executive Vice President of the European Commission Frans Timmermans who held talks during his visit to Egypt with a number of ministers and senior officials, expressed his appreciation of Egyptian efforts in preparation for hosting COP27.

Over the past two years, the government of President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has taken further steps to convert to renewables, seizing advantage of the country’s optimal solar and wind conditions for energy harvesting.

Following these steps, Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry indicated that Egypt will focus on meeting the obligations of the Paris Agreement and exploring how the private sector and NGOs can play a role in financing green investments during COP27.

Also in this regard, the Minister of Environment, Dr. Yasmine Fouad, affirmed Egypt’s commitment to work on building bridges of cooperation and finding common ground to forge agreements on critical issues, as well as helping developing and African countries to scale up their measures to confront climate change.

The Ministry of International Cooperation encourages massive public dialogues for all stakeholders regionally and globally to play a significant role in financing green investments during COP27.

In the same connection, Egyptians are acutely aware of these fruitful steps, and many of them are girding for action. They’ve harnessed the COP27 news hook to escalate campaigns in media and on their social media platforms to good effect in places. Generally more environment-focused journalists and more environmental news segments.

In addition to this, the Egyptian youths have launched an initiative under the theme “Youth of Climate Summit,” which is organized by the Ministry of Agriculture to shed light on raising awareness among visitors of the COP 27 summit in Sharm El-Sheikh.