The G20 is significant in its influence, representing 80% of global GDP, 75% of global exports and 60% of the global population. (File photo)
South Africa has a significant opportunity to influence international economic arrangements when it assumes leadership of the G20 in December.
This will be the first African G20 presidency and the African Union’s second year with a permanent seat, making this the third back-to-back G20 Global South presidency after India and Brazil.
You might be asking why this is relevant to South Africans. The Group of 20, or G20, is a forum for global cooperation with 19 member states, plus the EU and AU. It convenes at least once a year and is attended by a country’s head of government, finance minister or foreign minister, and other high-ranking officials.
The G20 is significant in its influence, representing 80% of global GDP, 75% of global exports and 60% of the global population. It is well-placed to introduce and drive new economic arrangements which require uptake and implementation at global level.
But how can the G20, made up of mostly nature-rich countries, rechart global development? It can do this by resetting the way we value nature — which we are all inherently dependent on and which our global economy relies on, both directly and indirectly.
It can do this by ensuring social and economic development is tied into the intrinsic and monetary value of nature and by selectively tilting the balance of support to African and Global South needs.
The G20 Initiative on the bioeconomy was launched during the Brazilian G20 presidency this year and South Africa will advance it during its presidency in the next.
It is an opportunity to demonstrate how the world’s bioeconomy can, and should, be developed, how — from a Global South perspective — the social and economic dimensions are every bit as important as the environmental dimension and why this forms a transformative and sustainable way to bring together capacity and socio-economic development.
This is about advancing bioeconomy principles, ways whereby biomass replaces fossil fuel, deriving value from waste through better recycling, more circular economic models and, ultimately, true sustainable development.
A bioeconomy can encompass a wide range of activities, ranging from eco-tourism to processing natural materials, from seaweed to sisal, to develop higher-value products such as fertiliser, bioplastics and pharmaceutical products.
A bioeconomy approach offers important cross-sectoral leapfrogging and adaptation opportunities, from food security, to health and medical innovations and supporting sustainable livelihoods through nature-based solutions. Many countries, including major economies, such as Brazil, China, the EU, India, Namibia, South Africa and the US, have ambitious bioeconomy plans, many with specific growth targets.
The bioeconomy is already large and rapidly growing. Today’s global bioeconomy is estimated to be worth $4 trillion to $5 trillion, with growth potential to $30 trillion, but this will require government commitments, public-private partnerships, international cooperation, governance and financing.
The African continent, with the world’s largest intact natural ecosystems, supporting a quarter of global biodiversity and wild megafauna, is well positioned to chart and leverage a new nature-based economic development model which is the bioeconomy, with an exceptionally young, and growing, population.
The continent is also home to 65% of the world’s arable land and 20% of the global tropical rainforest area. This substantial untapped biomass resource is not yet valued in the global economic and financial operating system. It should be.
At the Biodiversity Economy and Investment Indaba in Johannesburg earlier this year, President Cyril Ramaphosa summed up this missed opportunity as “local communities sitting on dead capital”. Emerging nature finance instruments, such as nature credits and economic frameworks and practices such as the bioeconomy, present ways to serve nature and those who depend on and steward it.
South Africa developed and published its national bioeconomy strategy more than a decade ago and is well-placed to lead this charge in Africa and on behalf of the Global South.
We already have an impressive set of bioeconomy enterprises across biopackaging; fertilisers; cosmeceuticals; improved agricultural products; biorefineries; medicines, biologics and vaccines; environmental remediation technologies and a growing cohort of skills which are aligned towards the bioeconomy and ready for scaled commercialisation.
Alongside this, the biodiversity economy is quickly developing in collaboration with public, conservation and financial institutions. Imagine if natural assets were to be valued on a country’s balance sheets? This would be a promising way for nature-rich economies to realise their growth potential and speaks directly to the South African G20 themes of equality and sustainable development.
We and our African partners are well-placed to show the world how nature can drive sustainable development with equity at its heart. This is what the G20 presidency hopes to inspire and leave as a lasting legacy of its uniquely African, and nature-rich developing presidency.
Monique Atouguia is the nature markets programme manager at NatureFinance and Ben Durham is the chief director of bio-Innovation at the Department of Science and Innovation.