This policy brief is a supplement to ‘Bridges of Opportunity: Partnering for Africa–Europe Green Development’, a discussion paper prepared by the United Nations University Institute for Natural Resources in Africa (UNU-INRA) on Africa’s development options and the green transition in light of COVID-19 and the new European Green Deal.
The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed the heightened vulnerability of the world’s poorest and most marginalized. It has also underscored the disparities in development between the rich economies and the less developed ones, emphasizing the critical need to enhance Africa’s adaptive capacity. The combined impacts of climate change and Covid-19 call for urgent and radical solutions to future exogenous shocks. Disruption caused by Covid-19 has so far resulted in Africa’s economy contracting by some 2.6%, with a loss of gross domestic product (GDP) of US$120 billion (ECA, 2020).
