Africa’s Climate Diplomacy at COP31: Mobilising Investment for Sustainable Development, Regional Security, and Economic Resilience

Executive Summary

Africa’s engagement at COP31 must move beyond calls for climate finance towards shaping how investment is mobilised, allocated, and translated into development outcomes. The continent faces interconnected challenges of energy poverty, food insecurity, youth unemployment, environmental degradation, and climate-related disasters. These undermine livelihoods, strain public finances, and threaten human security. COP31 offers an opportunity to align climate diplomacy with economic transformation, regional cooperation and resilience-building. The Presidency’s Action Agenda identifies clean energy transition, food security, youth and education, oceans and seas, and zero waste among its ten priorities. These provide entry points for advancing Africa’s development interests. However, commitments must be matched by stronger project preparation, regulatory coordination, institutional capacity and accountability to ensure climate investments deliver measurable gains in productive capacity, livelihoods, resilience and regional stability.