Leapfrogging Possibilities For Sustainable Consumption and ...

the context-relevance of SCP to African countries, and promoting national and regional
networking on SCP. 32
ARSCP facilitates development of national and regional capacities for SCP and promotes
effective implementations of concepts and tools of SCP in African countries. It also
organizes regional expert meetings. It is established as a regional institution assuming a
not-for-profit NGO form with registered individual and institutional paying members.
ARSCP enjoys a close relationship with the African Ministerial Conference on
Environment (AMCEN).
In March 2005 ARSCP succeeded in developing and getting the African 10 Year
Framework Programme endorsed by AMCEN 33 . The second SCP regional status report
including the result of a study on awareness of SCP in the region was produced in 2006 34 .
During the Fourth African Roundtable on Sustainable Consumption and Production
(ARSCP-4) held in May 2006, five issues have been identified as regional priority areas
for action through concerted effort. The priority areas for which corresponding technical
teams are established are biofuel production and utilization; water services and sanitation;
ecolabeling of African products; solid waste management; and knowledge and
information sharing 35 .
ARSCP co-chairs the Task Force on Cooperation with Africa. On the basis of the
outcome of the regional meetings, ARSCP began to work with two pilot projects namely,
SCP for plastics as a demonstration of integrated solid waste management and a regional
training and awareness programme on lifecycle assessment as a planning and decisionmaking
tool.
Another relevant scheme at the African level is the new partnership for African
development (NEPAD). It is initiated by African head of states as a vision and strategic
framework for Africa’s renewal. NEPAD was adopted in 2001 by AU (then OAU) as an
integrated socio-economic development framework for Africa designed to address the
current challenges facing the African continent. NEPAD has three initiatives namely the
infrastructure initiative, environmental initiative and science and technology initiative
that are articulated in African level important documents.
3.3 Implications of SCP activity or system
With SCP in the planning mindset, different economic activities can be re-structured in
order to meet two principal objectives: provision of basic services and promotion of
sustained economic growth for sustainable development.
From the perspective of countries in the South including African countries, the lack of
access to basic services gives achievement of sustainable consumption a different set of
framework than is the case in the countries in the North. Among these strategically
32
UNEP (2004b)
33 UNEP (2006)
34
ARSCP and UNEP (2006a)
35 ARSCP and UNEP (2006b)
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