Exclusive interview with Mchenge Nyoka, National Project Coordinator at the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) in South Africa.
Tell us more about your role at UNIDO.
I’m a national project coordinator at the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) in South Africa, responsible for coordinating resources and activities to ensure that UNIDO projects in the sustainable energy field, climate change and industrial parks are effectively implemented and that their objectives are met when it comes to achieving the success that they were meant to achieve.
Tell us about the projects you are responsible for.
We’ve got a number of active programmes and projects in South Africa. One that I would like to share is the South African Industry Adaptation Project (SAIA), which is funded by the Government of Flanders. The project is aimed at accelerating the transition to a decarbonised economy by strengthening the climate change adaptation capacity of the agro-processing sector. In this project we have a number of activities that are aimed at strengthening climate change adaptation capacity of the industrial sector, looking at the development and support of pilot projects that are showcasing the water and energy nexus approach to climate resilience. We support industries with water and energy audits and we also foster innovation.
One of the things that we’re looking at is the sustainability of the projects. So we try to build as many partnerships as possible to scale up the work, and these partnerships that we are fostering are between Flemish institutions and South African-based institutions, from researchers of research institutions to even technology providers. We’ve got an active pilot currently that has been funded through the project, TaylorMade Water Solutions, they are using a water treatment system. They’re basically growing spinach in wastewater, which is quite an exciting opportunity and a project implemented by TaylorMade Water Solutions at the Ibhayi Brewery in Port Elizabeth. We’ve got a partnership there with Waterleau, which is the Flemish technology provider and AB InBev is also involved in that, and then this company that was founded by Dr. Richard Taylor, TaylorMade Water Solutions, which is responsible for the overall project implementation.
We are executing the project with two partners in South Africa, the National Cleanup Production Centre of South Africa and the Technology Innovation Agency.
Tell us about your regional projects.
We’ve got one active project that I can speak on. It’s the Energy Efficient Lighting and Appliance (EELA) project, which is currently being implemented in the Eastern and Southern African region focusing on 21 countries. The overall objective of the project is to support the development of vibrant energy markets for energy efficient lighting and appliances. In this project we perform a number of broad activities focusing on key areas. One is to look at regional integration, supporting policies and frameworks for regional integration and also looking at market incentives to promote uptake of energy efficient lighting and appliances.
Also on policy, we are looking at harmonised minimum energy performance specifications for selected products. In addition, we enhance government capacities, looking at testing capabilities or testing facilities located within governments, and do a lot of workshops and webinars to basically equip policymakers with the necessary skills to develop policies to speak to the adoption of energy efficient lighting and appliances.
Lastly, one of the biggest things that we see when it comes to energy efficiency is the awareness part of it. We do a lot of awareness-raising initiatives by participating in conferences and hosting a number of workshops where we try to raise as much awareness as possible when it comes to energy efficient lighting and appliances. The overall goal is to reduce electricity consumption and demand, which then leads to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.
What are the challenges faced when rolling out regional projects?
Well, regionally you’d find that countries are at different stages of development. You’ve got your more developed economies and your least developed economies. So you can imagine that that comes with different priorities, right? So you’d find that to basically promote regional integration, you still need to work out those priorities and get everyone in the same boat. What might work for South Africa might not necessarily work for another country, so you need to keep that in mind. Basically, promoting dialogue between countries and knowledge sharing are some of the things that we are trying to do through the EELA project.
The next edition of AGES will introduce the agri sector, what projects in this sector do you find exciting?
Yes, the project that I mentioned earlier, the South African Industry Adaptation Project, is looking specifically at the agro-processing sector, which you can stretch as far back as agriculture for primary products. So we do a lot of work there using the water and energy nexus approach to enhance climate resilience in the industry, looking at water efficiency, energy efficiency and application of renewable energy to improve the adaptation capacity of that sector. We also focus on the role that innovation has to play by looking at how we can minimise water and energy usage, and how we can also use renewable energy to decentralise our energy supplies to affected industries, especially in the case of South Africa, where you’re looking at load shedding. A lot of industries, including the agri industry, are very affected by that. So, the role of renewable energy then becomes very important to increase or enhance the resilience of that particular sector.
What sector of the green economy excites you most?
There’s a lot that I can think of right now. One of the things that I could mention is we do a lot of work around industrial parks. They host a number of industries and sectors, agro-processing being the most affected, and you’ve also got your steel and iron industry, in light of things like CBAM (the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism) coming into play, that will most likely be affected by climate change, carbon trading and taxes.
So that’s one of the focuses of UNIDO. We have a developing project around decarbonising the steel and iron industry, to help it respond to the carbon taxes that we see coming through, CBAM being one of them, and we are looking at transitioning that industry so that it becomes competitive. Certain studies have projected that Africa will be losing a lot of money due to the introduction of such mechanisms, so there is a need for us to really transition. So, our work as UNIDO is to really help with that in South Africa, and it’s a project that is in the pipeline, and we hope that we get to implement it to help the industry transition.
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