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H-Metro Reporter
HARARE Mayor Jacob Mafume has called for the development of a comprehensive environmental and climate change policy aimed at engaging residents in shaping the city’s ecological future.
Mafume said the goal is to align the city’s climate management efforts with local needs and concerns. He said authorities need to up their game in getting a share of the various climate funds available globally.
“As a city, we are going to be applying for them to make sure that we are part and parcel of that,” Mafume said.
“Our city is going to join other cities that have associations relating to the climate so that we sign commitments as a city that relate to climate issues.
“We have current challenges that are affecting this sector.
“The current challenges are around water and sanitation, wetland invasion and degradation, water pollution, shelter and housing, illegal sand and gravel mining, air pollution, among other things and these are the things we need to be able to create.”
Mafume said discussions were underway with ZESA Holdings to explore the feasibility of re-establishing a renewable energy source in the city.
“We need to come up with a way to mitigate our energy demands in Harare and also create a new energy source.
“As you will recall, as the City Council, we used to have our own power station, 120 megawatts and that power station, it was taken by ZESA and it is not producing, but it was a coal-based power station.
“We need to move to renewable energy and we are in discussions with ZESA and other private actors if we can do solar, an accumulation of 10 megawatts there will be areas of collaboration that will come up in terms of this policy,” he said. Mafume also called for collaborations with the private, non-governmental organisation and government sectors on issues around the greening of the city.
“Our next budget is going to be centred on sustainable policies and one of the sustainable policies will be about greening the city,” he said.
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