The Mozambican President, Filipe Nyusi, revealed on Monday 23 September in New York, in the United States of America (USA) that more than 500 million dollars (31.6 billion meticals) have been raised for the protection and conservation of the Miombo, a forest that covers 11 countries in southern Africa.
Speaking at a press conference to take stock of his working visit to that American country, the Head of State explained that the money was raised during a high-level dialogue on the Miombo Forest, which was attended by various international partners and African leaders, in particular the Presidents of Botswana, Mokgweetsi Masisi and Malawi, Lazarus Chakwera.
‘We managed to convince the world that we need to protect the Miombo, but it’s important that there are resources and that they are managed with maximum transparency, because the forest belongs to several countries. At the meeting, it became clear that more funding will be made available,’ he emphasised.
He emphasised that the conservation project ‘cannot be seen as something political, but as a sustainable and universal initiative’.
The Miombo Forest covers two million square kilometres and provides a livelihood for more than 300 million inhabitants of 11 southern African countries, including tropical and subtropical grasslands, bushlands and savannahs. It is the largest tropical dry forest ecosystem in the world and is currently facing deforestation problems, among others.
According to the Mozambican government, which developed the project’s action plan, the planned initiatives are based above all on mapping and restoring the areas most affected by deforestation, but also on monitoring and developing alternative income-generating programmes to forest exploitation.
At a conference in Washington on 17 April, the 11 countries covered by the natural area adopted the Miombo Forest Commitment Charter, which provides for a fund to be set up in Mozambique.
The document includes, in its introduction, ‘the assumptions for its adoption, recognition of the impact of deforestation, low funding, the need for funding at scale and collaboration between the parties’ within the framework of the so-called Miombo initiative. The second part of this letter refers to the commitment of the parties, emphasising ‘support for public-private initiatives that stimulate sustainable development’.
“We managed to convince the world that we need to protect the Miombo and that in order to do so we need to have resources and manage them with maximum transparency, because the forest belongs to several countries.At the meeting, it was made clear that more funding will be made available”
The third and final part of the document presents the financing mechanism for the Miombo Initiative, which discusses the need to create a fund to implement the 2022 ‘Maputo Declaration’.
The Maputo Declaration on the Miombo Forest, signed by Mozambique, Angola, Botswana, Malawi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Republic of Congo, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe, establishes 2022 priorities for the sustainable management and governance of the natural resources of the Miombo ecosystems.
