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Since the establishment of the Climate Convention and its recent Paris Agreement, capacity building has been considered as a fundamental prerequisite for achieving the goals of the climate regime. Various institutional architectures have been explored, while the 2015 Paris Climate Conference (COP21) established the Paris Committee on Capacity-Building aiming to address needs and gaps, along with promoting current, emerging, and further capacity-building efforts. Efforts to build capacity have been underway for decades but have largely failed in their objectives as they were not designed from, and rooted in, the local context. Drawing from the author's more than 40 years of personal experience in capacity building in Africa, this paper sheds light on the systemic challenges involved in building capacities. Arrangements that do not entail working on, or being led by, an agenda set by those in capacity needs are not, by definition, capacity mobilization or capacity building efforts. It is argued that capacity is tied to self-reliance and self-determination and thus ability to set and pursue the recipient's own agenda must be at the core of development narratives. Key policy insights Self-reliance and self-determination are at the core of capacity development. Therefore, countries need to set and pursue their own agenda by creating and following a bottom-up and inclusive development narrative. Intellectual, financial, and other important resources need to fall under the control of local leadership. Partnerships and networks of research centres think tanks and similar institutions in the South should be created and maintained to build capacities. Climate change, while a global issue, must be addressed based on a deep understanding of the local and national contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite three decades of political efforts and a wealth of research on the causes and catastrophic impacts of climate change, global carbon dioxide emissions have continued to rise and are 60% higher today than they were in 1990. Exploring this rise through nine thematic lenses—covering issues of climate governance, the fossil fuel industry, geopolitics, economics, mitigation modeling, energy systems, inequity, lifestyles, and social imaginaries—draws out multifaceted reasons for our collective failure to bend the global emissions curve. However, a common thread that emerges across the reviewed literature is the central role of power, manifest in many forms, from a dogmatic political-economic hegemony and influential vested interests to narrow techno-economic mindsets and ideologies of control. Synthesizing the various impediments to mitigation reveals how delivering on the commitments enshrined in the Paris Agreement now requires an urgent and unprecedented transformation away from today's carbon- and energy-intensive development paradigm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change, Biodiversity, Population growth, Risk interaction Forum, 1 October 2021 Keywords: Climate change; Biodiversity; Population growth; Risk interaction EN Climate change Biodiversity Population growth Risk interaction 5 7 3 01/24/22 20220101 NES 220101 More details of the RACC and its International Advisory Committee are set out at https://www.stsforum.org/racc/iac.php. [Extracted from the article]

An introduction is presented in which the editors discuss various reports within the issue related to the United Nations' sustainable development goals (SDGs) including the knowledge action networks, the Social Innovation Laboratory and sustainable food systems.

Letter to the Editor [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – This paper aims to understand the impacts of climate changes on groundwater resources in the African continent in which groundwater components constitute one of the most indispensable resources for development. Design/methodology/approach – Observed data are used for the first time to illustrate the manifested impacts of climate changes on the groundwater resources either directly or indirectly, this includes the comparison between isoheytal maps as well as water level data versus time. Findings – The results of the analysis suggest that climate change is likely to impact groundwater resources, either directly, e.g. via changing precipitation patterns, or indirectly, e.g. through the interaction of changing precipitation patterns via changing land-use practices and water demand. These changes may concern both groundwater quantity and quality. Climate change will affect groundwater recharge rates, i.e. the renewable groundwater resource, and groundwater levels. Any decrease in groundwater recharge will exacerbate the effect of sea-level rise. In inland aquifers, a decrease in groundwater recharge can lead to saltwater intrusion of neighbouring saline aquifers, and increased evapotranspiration in semi-arid and arid regions may lead to the salinisation of shallow aquifers. Originality/value – In Africa, climate change and variability have the potential to impose additional pressures on water availability, water accessibility and water demands which will directly be impacted on eradicating poverty as a direct consequence of climate changes on sustainable development in Africa. A more refined understanding from specialists should be addressed to raise public and stakeholder awareness in this respect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change does not yet feature prominently within the environmental or economic policy agendas of developing countries. Yet evidence shows that some of the most adverse effects of climate change will be in developing countries, where populations are most vulnerable and least likely to easily adapt to climate change, and that climate change will affect the potential for development in these countries. Some synergies already exist between climate change policies and the sustainable development agenda in developing countries, such as energy efficiency, renewable energy, transport and sustainable land-use policies. Despite limited attention from policy-makers to date, climate change policies could have significant ancillary benefits for the local environment. The reverse is also true as local and national policies to address congestion, air quality, access to energy services and energy diversity may also limit GHG emissions. Nevertheless there could be significant trade-offs associated with deeper levels of mitigation in some countries, for example where developing countries are dependent on indigenous coal and may be required to switch to cleaner yet more expensive fuels to limit emissions. The distributional impacts of such policies are an important determinant of their feasibility and need to be considered up-front. It follows that future agreements on mitigation and adaptation under the convention will need to recognise the diverse situations of developing countries with respect to their level of economic development, their vulnerability to climate change and their ability to adapt or mitigate. Recognition of how climate change is likely to influence other development priorities may be a first step toward building cost-effective strategies and integrated, institutional capacity in developing countries to respond to climate change. Opportunities may also exist in developing countries to use regional economic organisations to assist in the design of integrated responses and to exploit synergies between climate change and other policies such as those designed to combat desertification and preserve biodiversity. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]