ECA welcomes election of Jim Skea as Chair of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

Addis Ababa, August 3, 2023 (FBC) – The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) welcomes the election of Jim Skea, of the of the United Kingdom, as the new Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

In a statement issued this afternoon, ECA congratulated Prof. Skea and all the new members of the IPCC Bureau on their election.

The ECA acting Executive Secretary, Mr. Antonio Pedro, noted that the African region is well represented in the new leadership team, and looks forward to partnering with IPCC on regional climate science and research issues in the context of the 7th Assessment Report.

“ECA notes that in their approval of the sixth cycle IPCC assessment synthesis report, many governments emphasized the need for alignment of the IPCC assessment cycle with the UNFCCC global stocktake. We therefore anticipate that the seventh assessment cycle scheduled for the next five to seven years starting July 2023, will focus on improving the implementation of the Paris Agreement to ensure achievement of the 1.5 degrees target of global climate policy, and that the seventh assessment report will feed into the second GST in 2028,” the statement said.

ECA also called upon the incoming Chair of the IPCC to work with his bureau to advance the scientific basis of climate change policy, building upon the key findings of the 6th Assessment Report, specifically that: the pace and scale of climate action are insufficient to tackle climate change; multiple, feasible, and effective options are available to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to human-caused climate change; and enabling conditions include finance, technology, capacity building, and international cooperation.