BY KENNETH NYANGANI
CLIMATE change effects have had a negative impact on the country’s economy, with infrastructure worth over US$2 billion lost in the past two years due to successive droughts and other natural disasters, economist Prosper Chitambara has said.
Chitambara, who is a senior researcher at Labour Economic Development Research Institute, made the remarks yesterday in Mutare during the launch of the green jobs campaign by the Zimbabwe Congress Trade Unions, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Zimbabwe Chamber of Informal Economy Association and European Union (EU).
The green jobs campaign is a strategy to conserve the environment and deal with the devastating effects of climate change.
Green jobs are those that are related to renewable energy, energy efficiency and environmental management, while excluding work related to social sustainability; that is, work that meets the needs and aspirations of the present population without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
Chitambara said the country lost US$2 billion due to the effects of Cyclone Idai in 2019, which caused massive infrastructural destruction in Manicaland province.
“We are here to promote trade unions so that they also promote green jobs. In Africa, we are the most affected because of climate change effects. Our economy declined in 2019 and 2020 because of droughts. We were affected by Cyclone Idai due to climatic change effects and we lost US$2 billion to infrastructural destruction in Chipinge, Chimanimani and some areas because of Cyclone Idai,” Chitambara said.
“We are trying to create a country that conserves the environment by creating green jobs because this world is going to be difficult to live in if we don’t conserve our environment,” he said.
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When Cyclone Idai hit the country in 2019, it left a trail of destruction, killing at least 185 people and leaving 270 000 in urgent need of humanitarian aid, according to the United Nations World Food Programme.
Chitambara said there was need for a campaign to promote green jobs, through jingles, flyers and marketing green jobs on social media.
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