OPERATIONAL BRIEF Blue Solutions for Africa Key Messages BLUE ECONOMY FOR RESILIENT AFRICA PROGRAM © 2022 The World Bank Group 1818 H Street NW, Washington DC 20433 Telephone: 202-473-1000 | Internet: www.worldbank.org Acknowledgments This work is a product of the staff of The World Bank Group with external contributions. “The World Bank Group” The series of briefs was prepared by a team led by Lia Carol In addition, the team received incisive and helpful advice, refers to the legally separate organizations of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), Sieghart (Practice Manager), Christian Albert Peter (Practice comments and input from World Bank colleagues, including the International Development Association (IDA), the International Finance Corporation (IFC), and the Multilateral Manager), Sanjay Srivastava (Practice Manager), Maria Syed Adeel Abbas (Senior Climate Change Specialist), Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA). 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BLUE ECONOMY FOR RESILIENT AFRICA PROGRAM | 1 Introduction The Blue Economy holds great promise for accelerating the economic and sustainable development of Africa’s coastal states—provided coastal activities are conducted within a management framework that protects and enhances coastal and marine ecosystems and biodiversity. KEY MESSAGE 1 © Freepik Africa’s coastal communities rely on healthy marine ecosystems for their food security and livelihoods. Blue Economy activities such as coastal tourism and fisheries also depend on healthy marine ecosystems, which also improve climate resilience by enhancing biodiversity and protecting A robust Blue Economy could low-lying urban areas from sea-level rise. protect Africa from the worst Despite this dependence and the many other gifts that the sea offers humanity, Africa’s coastal areas currently face a wide range of challenges—chief among them pollution and fisheries overexploitation— and risks such as coastal erosion and biodiversity loss. Climate change is amplifying and accelerating effects of climate change. At the same the effects of these challenges and risks. time, the effects of climate change are already Integrated, participatory, and capacitated transboundary marine resource management is needed to ensure that Africa’s coastal and marine areas are healthy enough to support current economic preventing the continent from achieving the full activities while allowing for the sustainable exploration of future opportunities such as blue energy, ocean mining, and blue carbon. benefits of a vibrant Blue Economy. The World Bank’s Blue Economy for Resilient Africa Program, announced at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change’s annual Conference of the Parties (COP27), will provide Changing temperatures, rainfall patterns, The population inhabiting low-level, coastal and climate extremes are already impacting areas in Africa is rising at an annual rate multisectoral analytical, financial, and policy support to Africa’s coastal countries and island biodiversity with far-ranging consequences of 3.3 percent per year, more than double states to help them leverage the opportunities—and manage the risks—inherent in scaling up their for species range, plant, and animal the global average. This is partly driven by Blue Economies. reproductive and/or migration cycles.  repetitive drought in Mediterranean areas. By 2050, between 72 million and 94 million About this series of briefs people are expected to inhabit several of Temperature increases are already driving West Africa’s low-lying urban centers. fish from tropical areas toward the poles. The fisheries most at risk are those along the Gulf of Guinea, from Gabon to Guinea-Bissau, With World Bank Group support, various and along Africa’s east coast, from Eritrea to African countries are taking ambitious climate The Blue Solutions for Africa series of operational briefs Mozambique. action, with a strong focus on increasing captures how a thriving Blue Economy can help African adaptation and resilience, leveraging private countries better manage the development challenges sector finance, and supporting increased they face while supporting economic growth, sustainable In 2019, the African continent experienced systemic climate action at the country level. livelihoods, and the health of these precious ecosystems. above-average sea-level rise of five millimeters. Sea levels will almost certainly climb by half a meter by the end of the THE BRIEFS COVER THE FOLLOWING THEMATIC AREAS century, with regional variations on the continent. • Climate change • Data management and Find out more in our brief on knowledge creation • Coastal and marine The Blue Economy and biodiversity and habitats • Innovative financing instruments Climate Change • Sustainable fisheries • Developing and incentivizing • Marine pollution institutions © Shutterstock • Jobs and livelihoods • New frontiers of innovation • Participatory marine spatial planning © Freepik BLUE ECONOMY FOR RESILIENT AFRICA PROGRAM | 3 © Freepik KEY MESSAGE 2 KEY MESSAGE 3 To develop a resilient A resilient Blue Blue Economy, the Economy relies on African continent needs healthy, pollution-free to better protect and marine and coastal manage its biodiversity ecosystems. and habitat to enhance A coordinated set of actions is needed to ecosystem services. achieve required systemic change for a circular economy. These actions need to take place upstream and downstream of the value chains.  © Freepik Better monitoring of the ocean’s physical and biological changes will be key. Improved coastal and marine data and knowledge will The solutions include promoting a circular inform co-created management decisions. economy approach, improving solid waste infrastructure and services, and strong monitoring of plastic pollution for proactive Governance also plays an important role. action and removal. For wastewater, the use Coastal areas and territorial waters are of practical low-cost technologies, with an under the jurisdiction of several agencies that emphasis on circular economy approaches, lack sufficient coordination and incentives Find out more in our brief on is gaining attention.   to improve the management of natural Marine Pollution resources. Marine spatial planning is an important tool to improve such governance. A broad range of innovative finance options will be needed to implement    these solutions. On-the-ground enforcement and monitoring also need to be improved. Countries along the African coastline desperately need to Better oil spill detection and monitoring are regain control over their exclusive economic needed to better manage oil spills. A clear zones through at-sea patrolling of their open regulatory framework and national response waters.  systems (with regional coordination and cooperation), along with contingency plans and training, are needed to improve the response when such spills are detected. Find out more in our brief on Coastal and Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystems 4 I BLUE SOLUTIONS FOR AFRICA: KEY MESSAGES BLUE ECONOMY FOR RESILIENT AFRICA PROGRAM | 5 KEY MESSAGE 4 KEY MESSAGE 5 Africa’s coastal economies need to put in place Marine spatial planning is a powerful tool for effective measures to protect their marine and effective, participatory coastal and marine coastal resources, especially their fisheries. management. These measures include putting in place Implementing these measures will build Given the centrality of climate change as an amplifier of current risks strong and effective policy and regulatory resilience to climate change, enhance food and pressures on coastal environments, climate-informed marine frameworks, which could include forming new security, support the sustainable livelihoods spatial planning (MSP) considers current and future climate risks marine protected areas and/or no-take zones. of vulnerable fishing communities, and and opportunities during the design, planning, and implementation facilitate the creation of more and better of programs.   Stronger capacity for sustainable fisheries jobs within the fishery value chain.   management could involve working with MSP can help design coordinated coastal resilience fish farming communities to adopt climate- Through regional cooperation and programs at scale and identify possible low-carbon resilient aquaculture or mariculture, and coordination are needed to limit the negative development and growth pathways. This type implementing climate adaptation programs and enhance the positive externalities of spatial planning can integrate measures to strengthen the fisheries value chain.   generated by national actions.  articulated in nationally determined contributions and other instruments, budget for those measures, and monitor their progress.  Climate-informed MSP can help the private Find out more in our brief on sector better understand climate risk and Sustainable Fisheries invest in mitigation and adaptation measures to reduce it and improve profitability, while respecting the space required to maintain a healthy and productive coastal environment. Find out more in our brief on Marine Spatial Planning © Freepik 6 I BLUE SOLUTIONS FOR AFRICA: KEY MESSAGES © Freepik BLUE ECONOMY FOR RESILIENT AFRICA PROGRAM | 7 © Adobe Stock KEY MESSAGE 6 KEY MESSAGE 7 To develop a resilient Africa’s coastal countries and regional entities Blue Economy, the need greater investment into technologies that African continent needs streamline the collection, management, and coordinated institutions analysis of data to improve marine knowledge with the necessary skills and and better track of the state of marine and capacity, backed by clear mandates.  coastal resources. Horizontal coordination can be improved by A sustainable Blue Economy requires Many new technologies are revolutionizing Beyond data technologies, it will be important developing adequate institutional frameworks spatial coordination of coastal territories to the way data is collected, processed, and to move up in the data value chain to produce to guide planning and activities across avoid compounding risks and to leverage visualized for decision support. A new range accessible knowledge products that support various sectors, levels, and jurisdictional development opportunities across sectors of satellite and air-based Earth observation informed decision-making.  boundaries.  for multiple economic and livelihood benefits. options are complementing traditional and modernized in-situ observations to provide more comprehensive, synoptic, and quasi- Improving the organization of—and Vertical coordination across national and Coordinated, integrated information real-time data.  strengthening access to—data and subnational blue sector institutions also systems will strengthen data and knowledge knowledge among governments, the private needs to be improved. creation and dissemination to support sector, academia, civil society organizations, decision-making. Data is increasingly processed using the financiers, and the public will help generate power of the cloud, moving away from legacy multisectoral, spatial, and sustainable Thematic coordination involves identifying desktop systems to leverage the power of development insights and attract more common development challenges that machine learning and artificial intelligence financing, including from the private sector require coordinated action across agencies tools.   and other development partners. at the national and local level. Climate change adaptation, jobs, and livelihoods are important examples of such shared challenges. Find out more in our brief on Developing and Incentivizing Institutions Find out more in our brief on Knowledge, Data and Information 8 I BLUE SOLUTIONS FOR AFRICA: KEY MESSAGES © Freepik BLUE ECONOMY FOR RESILIENT AFRICA PROGRAM | 9 KEY MESSAGE 8 KEY MESSAGE 9 © Dominic Chavez / World Bank The Blue Economy has the potential Fully implementing a to create jobs for Africa’s growing Blue Economy approach in Africa population while contributing to climate requires scaling up the financial adaptation and mitigation action. resources available. Adopting new technologies and innovative Aquaculture is projected to continue to grow African nations need to spend as effectively The private sector has an important role to partnerships will drive the creation of such rapidly, and if done sustainably, can serve as as possible the limited resources available play in developing Africa’s Blue Economy. jobs in various emerging sectors. a major source of food and a cornerstone of to them by leveraging coordination and Several financial instruments can encourage the Blue Economy.   sustainability.   partnership with the private sector, each of which have a different purpose with different Marine renewable energy is particularly requirements.  attractive because it is scalable, has Traditional sectors like fisheries and coastal Many African countries would also benefit high political and public acceptance, and tourism will continue to play a key role in jobs from accessing the World Bank’s full range presents strong potential for job creation, creation. of finance instruments, which spans grant The World Bank is available to help countries direct investment, and local economic financing, debt, and equity financing. with mobilizing capital for investments. It development.   Technical assistance or grant financing is also provides technical support and learning often required to undertake the analytics from its portfolio of more than US$7 billion of and diagnostics needed to identify policy ongoing investments in oceanic and ocean- The blue bioeconomy—which turns improvements.  related sectors. microorganisms, algae, and invertebrates into food, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, Find out more in our brief on energy, textiles, and more—also holds Jobs and Livelihoods in promise.   the Blue Economy Find out more in our brief on Financing Options and Instruments 10 I BLUE SOLUTIONS FOR AFRICA: KEY MESSAGES © Vincent Tremeau / World Bank BLUE ECONOMY FOR RESILIENT AFRICA PROGRAM | 11 KEY MESSAGE 10 Changing the growth trajectory of the Blue Economy in Africa toward a sustainable and resilient path will require ongoing innovation in several areas. Technological innovations—from satellite monitoring and early warning systems to artificial intelligence and quantum computing—need to be at the core of Africa’s future Blue Economy.  Innovative scientific and research partnerships are needed to understand the current and future state © Freepik and trends of the coastal and marine environment, and the projected impacts of climate change. Academic scientific understanding needs to be translated into solutions at a faster pace. New methods to engage meaningfully with communities, businesses, and governments to co-create sustainable local solutions will need to be explored.  A larger flow of financial resources from development partners and transfers from central governments will be required to achieve sustainable development in coastal and marine areas. However, this will not be enough. Financial instruments that mobilize additional resources from the private sector, blended finance instruments that leverage limited government resources and donor funds, and a supportive regulatory framework to reach global climate and carbon funds will all be needed to achieve success. Find out more in our brief on New Frontiers of Innovation © Freepik