The Shift from Silicon Valley to Silicon Savannah: Why Climate Expert Patrick Verkooyen Calls This Century Africa’s Century | Global Development

aAfrica has the potential to tackle pressing climate challenges with innovative solutions, according to one of the world’s leading environmentalists. With vast natural capital and a young population, “this century is Africa’s century,” says Professor Patrick Verkooyen, chief executive of the environmental group. Global Centre on Adaptation (GCA), and the new Chancellor of the University of Nairobi.

But Verkooyen said 65 percent of the world’s uncultivated land is In Africa A continent with great demographic potential, it is expected to account for one in four of the world’s population by 2050.

He said that if the commitments made by the northern hemisphere countries COP30 Summit in Brazil November 2025.

Verkooyen said global funding for climate adaptation was supposed to double by 2025 but has instead fallen, putting at risk the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and threatening investments already made in climate action.

“If we don’t invest in climate adaptation, how can we take advantage of the opportunities for job creation, green growth and loss avoidance?” he says.

Headquartered in the Netherlands with offices in Côte d’Ivoire, China and Bangladesh, the GCA is an international organisation working on climate adaptation globally, describing itself as a “solutions broker” and providing analysis on climate resilience and food security.

“Any project that doesn’t take climate into account is a wasteful project,” Verkooyen said.

GCA partners with governments and organisations such as the World Bank to bring its climate adaptation expertise to projects and boasts $9bn (£7bn) of climate resilience projects in Africa alone.

Verkooyen says the GCA’s role is threefold: political mobilization, providing climate risk analysis and ensuring climate-resilient development. It is chaired by former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and its supervisory board includes former Senegalese President Macky Sall.

Members of the advisory board include Kenyan President William Ruto, Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, Tanzania’s President Samia Suluhu Hassan and African Development Bank President Akinwumi Adesina.

“We’re trying to mobilize national leaders to talk about adaptation,” Verkooyen says, “because if they don’t do it, no one else will and nothing will happen.”

“At the 2021 Climate Summit in Glasgow, climate adaptation was recognised for the first time as a central element of the discussion on the climate crisis.” But one of the GCA’s major obstacles remains funding, he says.

“Funding for climate change adaptation was supposed to double by 2025, but the numbers are falling,” Verkooyen said.

“The reality is that sub-Saharan African governments are doing their part: paying twice as much for adaptation as they receive in bilateral aid. The shameful reality is that they account for just 3 percent of greenhouse gas emissions yet suffer disproportionately from climate impacts.”

He noted that countries in the North have failed to meet their commitments to double adaptation finance, threatening to derail Africa’s Sustainable Development Goals due to a funding shortfall.