With a view to finding an appropriate response to sustainable environmental management in a post-COVID context, African environment ministers, on the occasion of the 8th extraordinary session of AMCEN (Conference of African Ministers of the Environment or AMCEN) held a working session on Friday 04 December 2020, by videoconference. Barbara Greecy, President of AMCEN, Inger Anderson, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme and Correa Leonel Josefa, African Union Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture hosted the opening ceremony. Several personalities from the United Nations system, African subregional structures, civil society, technical and financial partners and experts took part in the webinar.

Biodiversity as the foundation of Ivorian society and economy!
It was in the company of the members of his Cabinet that Professor Joseph Séka SEKA participated in the extraordinary session from the room of the Ministry of the Environment and Sustainable Development (MINEDD), located on the Tower D plateau, 10th floor. On this occasion, the tenant of MINEDD took the floor by reading an important statement that traces the strategy of natural resource management in Côte d'Ivoire. Indeed, before the outbreak of the pandemic, MINEDD in the implementation of the national environmental policy, has always ensured the follow-up and / or implementation of various projects and programs that fit well with the theme and objectives of the 8th session of AMCEN. " Integrating biodiversity and environmental issues at the heart of our country's recovery plans would place the whole of society and therefore our economy in a long-term vision, strengthening its resilience and adaptive capacities," the Ivorian minister told the participants. Joseph Séka SEKA shared the capital acquired by Côte d'Ivoire through three axes. Thus, we note (i) the consideration of environmental issues and the contribution to the fight against the loss of biodiversity, (ii) the management of medical and or domestic waste generated by this health crisis, (iii) the promotion of the role of environmental taxation.
On these points, MINEDD in collaboration with development partners, is engaged in the protection and restoration of parks and nature reserves (the Mabi-Yaya reserve, the restoration of the Goin-Débé forest in the west), in the management of waste including medical waste generated by COVID-19 in through the 3DE (management of Electrical and Electronic Waste) and UPOP-CI (management of unintentional Persistent Organic Pollutants contained in end-of-life vehicles, computers and televisions with cathode ray screens) projects. In a transversal way to all these projects, the MINEDD aims to establish environmental taxation. What the Minister defines as " all taxes, levies and charges whose base consists of an ecotax resulting from a pollutant or, more generally, a product or service that deteriorates the environment or that results in a levy on natural resources ".

An agenda with important challenges for Africa's post-COVID-19 recovery.

Under the theme " Strengthening environmental action for an effective recovery of post-COVID Africa", this virtual meeting aimed to develop initiatives to increase Africa's resilience to the current and future health crisis, to set the continent on a more sustainable path through efforts to rehabilitate environmental policies and actions. Considering that COVID-19 has slowed global growth, economies including those in Africa have experienced a temporal " low-carbon " transition due to lower consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. If the resumption of this growth begins, it would be essential to maintain the gains made and to foresee all the means to change the societal, economic and environmental paradigm. That is why AMCEN and the African Union are focusing on investing in innovative environmental solutions, including green financing.
Its meeting provided an opportunity to review Africa's participation in the fifteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity, to be held in 2021, in Kunming, China, to analyse the main issues on the agenda of the fifth session of the United Nations Assembly for the 'environment which will take place from 22 to 26 February 2021, to inform ministers about the preparations and main negotiating issues for the COP 26 to be held in 2021 in England.

The session concluded with the adoption of a ministerial declaration on the agenda items.