AAS Priorities for climate change and development in Africa: outcome document of the AAS Climate Change Experts Consultative meeting

Climate change and the environment are key focus areas of the AAS 2018-2022 strategic plan. The consultative scientific process of the IPCC provides various opportunities for African scientists to contribute to the global process. Unfortunately, the contribution and involvement of African scientists both in terms of contributing peer-reviewed publications or commenting on draft IPCC reports has been very limited. In July 2019, the African Academy of Sciences (AAS) in coordination with IPCC Secretariat and the United Nations Institute for Natural Resource in Africa (UN-INRA) convened African scientists and key policy stakeholders to deliberate on these challenges and identify evidence-based actions to address the issues raised by IPCC SR1.5. The meeting identified priority areas for the AAS to explore opportunities for enhancing AAS strategic contribution to the regional climate change and development forums in line withmajor policy frameworks including the AU Agenda 2063, the AAS vision of transformed lives through science and other relevant regional and global frameworks. This document presents the outcome of the AAS-IPCC Consultative meeting which have been further reviewed and refined with inputs from the Climate and Environment Working Group of AAS.