The 1st Regional Steering Committee Meeting on the RCRP has been conducted in Johannesburg Republic of South Africa.
The meeting took place from 8 to10 May 2024 which was organized by the WB RCRP Technical Team Leader and hosted by the Southern Africa Development Commission (SADC). The meeting is the first for the Regional Steering Committee for the RCRP, under the heading of “Enhancing Regional Collaboration And Climate Financing Capacity In Eastern And Southern Africa”. The Program is envisioned as a regional multi-phase engagement (Series of Projects, SOP) with the higher-level aim of strengthening the resilience of populations to climate-related shocks in Eastern and Southern Africa.
The RCRP is implemented by 5 countries namely Madagascar, Malawi, Comoros, Mozambique, South Sudan and 2 River Basin organizations (RBOs): SADC and (ENTRO + NELSAP) representing the Nile Basin.
During the meetings the following topics were presented and discussed,
• Overview of the RCRP in all countries as well as the RBOs and the challenges of implementation.
• Climate Finance, improving enabling environment for accessing Carbon markets, Country Policy Frameworks, and roadmap for accessing Voluntary Carbon Markets.
• Considerations on Carbon Credit Pricing and Approaches for Monetization.
• RCRP Donor perspectives.
The meeting was attended by the Representatives of the two RBOs (From ENTRO: ED, SRPC & RCRP LS), Representatives of the 5 RCRP implementing Countries including the National RCRP Coordinators, Representatives from the African Union, AMCOW, RCRP TTL Ms Laura Bonzanigo and many WB experts in Climate Financing who gave presentations in the issue. The upcoming RCRP RSC Meeting is scheduled to take place in Mozambique.