Sub-Saharan Africa today produces about the same amount of greenhouse gases from charcoal production and consumption as all of Europe’s transport combined.
If nothing changes, emissions are likely to triple by 2030.
Poverty
To meet MDGs, fight energy poverty, report says
The chief economist for the International Energy Agency says the international community must mobilize to target the 1.4 billion people worldwide without electricity, and to meet the UN Millennium Development Goals.
IEA: Cookstoves are great but energy poverty still looms large on the horizon
The IEA said in an excerpt of its 2010 World Energy Outlook that some 1.2 billion people, equivalent to China’s population, would still have no electricity by 2030 if governments made no change to existing policies, down from 1.4 billion currently. The $36 billion per year only represented 3 percent of global energy investments projected by the agency to 2030.
The big win: energy efficiency for the BoP
Will 3 billion people ever see this? …on this?… … or this? This week 150 heads of state and a Who’s Who of global celebrities will gather in New York to make a last push for the Millenium Development Goals (MDG), the UN’s flagship antipoverty campaign which aims to improve conditions by 2015 for more than half of the planet’s citizens mired in poverty, disease, and environmental degradation. Noticeably absent from the meeting will be the One Tool that can measurably and directly deliver results across all eight MDGs: better energy efficiency for the almost 3 billion people on Earth Continue reading
Struggle to agree UN summit kickstart for Millennium goals
By Tim Witcher (AFP) – 1 day ago UNITED NATIONS — World powers are moving slowly toward an accord on the strategy to be embraced at a looming United Nations summit aiming to get the lofty Millennium Development Goals back on track. Ten years after more than 150 leaders set eight ambitious targets for 2015 — ranging from cutting child mortality rates by two thirds, to halving the number of people living in absolute poverty and spreading access to the Internet — none are likely to be reached, experts say. Fallout from the financial crisis, a lack of will and Continue reading