African negotiators plan to block a global agreement on reducing global warming if the deal is too weak and fails to consider the implications of climate change for the continent’s wellbeing, reports SciDevNet. At a conference to agree a unified position for African countries ahead of the UN climate change summit in Paris, France, negotiators passed a joint strategy for the negotiations, saying that a future deal must recognise indigenous knowledge about the environment, and include technology support to help the continent adapt to changing temperatures.
“If the outcomes are not favourable for us, if [negotiators] think they will get a raw deal, they should threaten a walkout as the only way to change the balance of forces in Paris,” said Patrick Bond, a global governance researcher at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, who attended the meeting in Tanzania. In Arusha, African leaders also promised to incorporate more climate research into their decision-making, and raise public awareness of climate change.