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Angela Compagnone / Unsplash
At the 18th meeting of the African Ministerial Conference on the Environment (AMCEN), African environment ministers pledged to end plastic pollution, stop open dumping and burning of waste, and fight antimicrobial resistance. The conference was held in Dakar, Senegal, from 12 to 16 September 2022. Mohamed Atani and David Ombisi from the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) summarise the main outcomes of the conference.
“The President of AMCEN and Minister of Environment and Sustainable Development of Senegal, H.E Abdou Karim Sall, emphasised that the session comes in the wake of a regional health, food, energy and financial crisis that particularly impacts Africa, denoting urgency to the conference’s theme of “securing people’s well-being and ensuring environmental sustainability in Africa.””
“On pollution, ministers committed to:
- eliminate open dumping and burning of waste in Africa and to promote use of waste as a resource for value and job creation. They called on development partners to support African countries to better monitor and reduce methane and black carbon emissions associated with waste.
- improve awareness on the risks that antimicrobial resistance poses to human health and sustainable development in Africa. They also called for urgent and collective action to prevent and minimise adverse impacts of antimicrobial resistance.”
This article was first published by Mohamed Atani and David Ombisi in the UN Environment Programme (UNEP).
