NSIA, NCCC Sign MoU To Boost Nigeria’s Climate Action Agenda

The Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA), manager of Nigeria’s sovereign wealth fund and the National Council on Climate Change (NCCC), have signed a memorandum of understanding to develop Nigeria’s climate change framework, develop and implement a carbon emissions trading mechanism for the country among other mandates.

The MoU that was signed yesterday emphasises the urgency of immediate and ambitious action to address climate risks and enables the attainment of the shared objectives between the NSIA and NCCC.

It also serves to allow the signing parties to further explore potential areas of collaboration which include: the development of a climate change framework to provide guidelines for regulating emissions in Nigeria, the implementation of a carbon emissions trading mechanism in Nigeria, and management of a national carbon registry as well as a climate change fund.

As part of the agreement signing ceremony, the Authority released its Impact Report, which outlines the progress made toward the attainment of the Authority’s developmental and socio-economic impact as of 2021.

Speaking about the agreement, the MD & CEO of the NSIA, Mr. Aminu Umar-Sadiq said “A core pillar of our environmental, social and governance strategy is to actively build strategic partnerships with relevant organisations to support climate change actions and Nigeria’s energy transition ambitions of achieving net zero emissions by 2060.

The agreement with our partner, NCCC is one of the strategic steps we are taking to meet our social impact goals and sustainability commitments.”

He added that “NSIA’s maiden Impact Report highlights the Authority’s development agenda and impact over several years of operations as well as the Authority’s efforts to safeguard the environment and address relevant climate-related risks and opportunities in line best practice.”

In his remarks, director general of the NCCC, Dr. Salisu Dahiru said the partnership is a bold signal to the global audience that the Government of Nigeria is serious about its climate commitments. “By committing resources from its sovereign wealth fund to support climate action and an inclusive green economic growth, Nigeria is investing in its future, especially in a vastly decarbonising world. This partnership between two of Nigeria’s flagship institutions is expected to catalyse private finance to accelerate Nigeria’s ambitious climate and national development agenda,” the DG of Nigeria’s implementing entity for climate action said.

The DG commends the transformational leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari by demonstrating executive ownership of Nigeria’s climate policies through the climate change Act of 2021, the establishment of the National council on climate change and the commitment toward a net zero economy by 2060.

He called upon Nigerians to embrace the opportunities offered by climate change to build a resilient economy and improve the adaptive capacities of our communities to extreme weather events, now and in the future.

The maiden report that was released on Monday in Abuja showed that NSIA created created over 500,000 direct and indirect jobs through various initiatives and projects.

A detailed review of the impact report also disclosed that the Authority supported over 230,000 farmers through various agri-projects across the country with over 68% of the primary beneficiaries being women and recorded significant progress on 3 high-priority national road projects which have a combined road length of 515.4km.