1. 12th Session of the Regional Coordination Mechanism
21 – 22 November 2011 Addis Ababa Ethiopia Theme `Capacity Building’ Cluster 4 Environment, Population and Urbanisation Annual Progress Report 2011

2. Presentation overview
Cluster objectives and membership
Guiding principles
Key accomplishments
Challenges, lessons learnt, opportunities & way forward

3. Cluster objectives and membership
To address the opportunities and challenges of population dynamics, rapid urbanization, environmental degradation, pollution and climate change to achieve Sustainable Development in Africa.
Members
AUC, NEPAD, UNECA, UNDP, UNISDR, IOM, IMO, WMO UNEP, UN-HABITAT, WHO, UNFPA, UNESCO, ILO,UNCCD, SADC, COMESA, ECOWAS, UNCTAD and AfDB.

4. GUIDING PRINCIPLES
Relevance and coherence with AU/NEPAD & RECs priorities.
Effective engagement with and ownership by AUC/NPCA and RECs.
Collaborative and complementary
efforts through joint programming.
Capitalizing on-going initiatives at regional, sub regional and national levels.
Building on the ownership and leadership from AU & RECs.

5. Main achievements
African common position on climate change for the negotiations of UNFCCC COP 17 updated.
Adequate support to Rio + 20 process leading to Africa consensus statement
Support to Clim Dev/ACPC now fully operational
Capacity building support for the implementation of the Africa Regional Strategy for disaster risk reduction
Guidance note providing practical support on mainstreaming climate change as a cross cutting issue in the activities of all clusters/sub clusters.
Training on climate change for clusters during the pre-session meetings.
Identification of key issues, gaps and needs concerning climate science, data and information, water agriculture, energy, low carbon .

6. Main Achievements Cont.
Preparation and launch of joint paper on `Harnessing the Potential of the African Youth for sustainable development’ during the AU Summit 2011.
Update of African Population report.
Capacity building of 10 countries to implement the convention for the prevention of maritime pollution
Health and environment programmes : public health adaptation to climate change in Africa; chemicals and public health.

7. Challenges, lessons learnt, opportunities & way forward
Ensuring effective results based approach in planning and delivery
Inadequate resources for implementation of joint activities.
Baselines and appropriate monitoring and evaluation framework
Synergies with other clusters
Ownership and leadership by main stakeholders
Lessons learnt.
Trainings can be combined (gender+ CC+DRR)
Succession plans when rotating the coordination
Documentation and dissemination of lessons learned
and possibility to establish community of practices
Opportunities & way forward
Building on Rio + 20 outcomes
Enhancing inter cluster planning and implementation.
Resource mobilization/leveraging with AUC and RECs.