Mali became a CCAC partner in 2014, where it has participated in waste, household energy and cooling sector activities. The country also receives national planning support to enhance government capacity to develop and implement short-lived climate pollutant (SLCP) mitigation actions. Under the initiative, the National Meteorology Agency is developing integrated emission inventories to estimate the co-benefits of SLCP mitigation and inform emission reduction policies and strategies.
This work is especially important, as the West African nation of Mali is increasingly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, including food insecurity, droughts, and flooding. Levels of air pollution that exceed World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines, further threatening the health of the country’s almost 20 million people.
Since ratifying the Paris Agreement, Mali has set significant climate change mitigation and adaptation goals at the international level. Its first nationally determined contribution, submitted in 2016, outlines mitigation and adaptation measures for the forestry, agriculture, livestock and energy sectors that will reduce methane. These include water management through intermittent irrigation in rice production and replacing high nitrogen urea with organic manure in fertiliser management in the livestock sector. Mali’s updated nationally determined contribution recognizes the importance of reducing SLCPs. It includes waste as an additional mitigation priority and sets sectoral emission reduction targets of 31% for energy, 25% for agriculture, 39% for forests and land use as well as 31% for waste.
Mali’s NDC priorities are closely aligned with its national policy frameworks to address climate change and air pollution, such as the 2011 National Policy on Climate Change and the 2009 National Policy for the Protection of the Environment. The latter sets out to promote the use of renewable energy sources especially in rural areas, to reinforce human capabilities and to improve the means to fight desertification.
The National Energy Policy of 2006 maps out the way to enhance production and use of renewable energy sources as well as to improve energy efficiency. The policy seeks to improve wood burning systems and to reduce their use overall, an important step for reducing air pollution. Also, the 2008 National Strategy for Biofuel Development, Scaling up Renewable Energy Program (SREP) helps address climate chance and air pollution, examining options to scale up renewable energy sources. To enhance sustainable development objectives, the strategy proposes to foster technologies such as solar PV, hydro and biofuels. The target it to generate 10% of electricity from renewables by 2022 departing from a 3% baseline.
The agricultural sector is crucial to Mali’s development, accounting for 36% of the annual GDP in 2020. It is therefore a key sector for adaptation and mitigation strategies. The Agricultural Development Policy (Politique de Développement Agricole du Mali) of 2013 aims to promote a sustainable, modern and competitive agriculture in order to understand the sector as the primary engine of the national economy and as the key element for national food sovereignty. Taking into account the challenges of climate change, it proposes to manage natural resources and the environment rationally to lastly ensure food security. To eliminate hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition, also the National Policy for Food Security and Nutrition (Politque National de Sécurité Alimentaire et Nutritionnelle (PoINSAN) of 2016 proposes to improve livelihood resilience against threats and crises, amongst others linking to climate change.
