97 skills and knowledge, and financial mechanisms on climate change and green growth. This advisory role of the Bank, as a knowledge generator and knowledge broker, fosters policy dialogues and strengthens African countries’ internal policy, strategy, regulatory, planning, and budgeting capacities. This role as a trusted advisor to African countries on policy is fundamental in the context of resourceconstrained and under-capacitated African nations, and is key to the Bank’s achievement of Paris alignment in relation to Building Block 4 of the MDBs’ joint framework for alignment with the Paris Agreement. For the Bank to continue to support countries adequately and effectively with their enabling environment and governance, especially in the face of ever-growing advisory needs during the ‘Decade of Action’ urged by the Paris Agreement, it must also cement its own internal institutional capacities, for example, by regularly reviewing the breadth and depth of expertise within the PECG and ensuring this be made commensurate with the need for Bankwide action. Recommended strategic actions, which the Bank will work actively to achieve, are as follows: u i. To augment the Bank’s staffing capacity to keep pace with the demands for enhanced climate change and green growth mainstreaming across its projects and strategies, increased climate finance resource mobilization, and the heightened need for advisory services to African countries, the Bank will conduct a staffing assessment and review, with the intent to: a. Reinforce climate change and climate finance staffing within the institution by expanding staff headcount within the PECG, with a provision for greater supplementary expertise particularly given the commitment to strong and visible progress to align new operations to the goals of the Paris Agreement by December 2023. b. Create dedicated green growth capacity within the PECG through a Green Growth Investment Officer, who would help implement the recommendations of the 2021 independent evaluation on green growth, and support the identification and pipeline development for green growth investments. c. Appoint a Sustainable Livelihoods Officer in the PECG, who will play an advisory role across the Bank by identifying and integrating opportunities for climate-compatible green jobs into investments and projects being prepared. d. Identify an officer in the PECG to be a liaison to the TSF. The officer will have the responsibility of mainstreaming climate change and green growth into the TSF’s initiatives. e. Identify an officer in the PECG with experience in green recovery. This officer will be a liaison to regional offices and have the responsibility of mainstreaming climate change and green growth into initiatives in the regions related to crisis management, emergency response, and post-disaster recovery. This will include post-COVID ‘build back better’ programs and those that link finance for disaster management to delivery mechanisms or channels that promote socioeconomic resilience. u ii. To strengthen the Bank’s technical capacity and to ensure that its human capital is well equipped to contribute to the success of its climate change and green growth priorities, the Bank will: a. Mandate the mainstreaming of climate change and green growth (including biodiversity, and land degradation neutrality) into all other Bank’s corporate, institutional, and sectoral strategies to maintain policy alignment between the Climate Change and Green Growth Strategic Framework and other instruments guiding Bank operations. b. ‘Domesticate’ Paris alignment guidance developed on the six Building Blocks of the MDBs’ joint framework for alignment with the Paris Agreement issued by the MDBs’ joint working groups, by preparing institutional guidelines (including manuals, checklists, and other directional instruments) that translate the working groups’ decisions into the Bank’s institutional and operational context for implementation by Bank staff. c. Develop actionable guidance on the integration of climate change risks (including transition-related risks) into the Bank’s balance sheet, and conduct training at six-monthly intervals for staff who are tasked with maintaining such records. d. Update the Bank’s Climate Safeguards System and other climate change-related decision support tools to enable Paris alignment, and conduct training at six-monthly intervals for staff on the optimal utilization of such tools. e. Conduct training every six months on climate finance resource mobilization for relevant staff in other Bank departments. f. Provide annual training to regional offices on the integration of climate change and green growth into programs, projects, and initiatives in their region related to fragility in order to better understand the climate change–fragility nexus and to integrate climate change and green growth into fragility prevention, monitoring, management, and response. Green growth in Africa — current initiatives and future developments
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