What would success look like at Africa Climate Summit 2?

Africa’s largest climate-focused gathering of the year will begin on 8 September in Addis Ababa. Coming just two months before the COP30 UN climate negotiations in Brazil, the stakes are unusually high for the Second Africa Climate Summit. The meeting will test whether Africa can transform its position from a victim of climate change into a provider of solutions that reorder global finance, trade and diplomacy.

The summit, dubbed ACS2, is designed to set Africa’s agenda across three priorities: climate finance, adaptation and green industrialisation.

Likely to conclude with the adoption of an Addis Ababa Declaration, the meeting aims to turn Africa’s abundant renewable energy, critical minerals and youthful population into assets for the world’s transition away from fossil fuels. Co-hosts the Ethiopian government and the African Union Commission have pitched the event as Africa’s defining political moment of 2025.

“ACS2 serves as a pivotal platform for African nations to harmonise their political stances, unify their voices on climate change, bolster Africa’s leadership in global climate governance, and mark a significant milestone on the path to COP30,” Saliem Fakir, executive director of the African Climate Foundation, told Dialogue Earth.

“With a focus on topics including energy, green infrastructure, climate finance and adaptation, the summit is expected to advance Africa-led solutions and unlock new development opportunities.”

But what exactly will be delivered in Addis? And what would success look like?

From Nairobi to Addis

At the inaugural Africa Climate Summit in Nairobi in 2023, discussions of debt and finance overshadowed nearly every issue, as Dialogue Earth reported. That meeting was also big on spectacle with President William Ruto of Kenya arriving in a tiny yellow electric vehicle. Yet there was some substance too with Ruto securing more than USD 20 billion in climate-finance pledges. The Nairobi Declaration that emerged from the summit proposed new global taxes to fund climate action, as well as measures to help indebted countries avoid default. However, it is still awaiting meaningful implementation.

For some observers, the summit’s shortcomings cast a long shadow. Njenga Hakeenah, climate editor at the China Global South Project, recalls the fanfare and subsequent disappointment. “Apart from the show, everything else was synonymous with the outcomes of several COPs.” He added: “I hope Ethiopia will be different by getting tangible results.”

Hakeenah pointed to a possible outcome worth watching: a commitment to adopt a Global Climate Finance Charter by 2025, which was one of the key proposals contained in the Nairobi Declaration, though is not currently on the formal agenda for ACS2A.

“Suppose the meet gets an endorsement for the charter by a majority of African countries,” he said. “It’ll be a win, on paper.” Even then, for it to really matter, the policies within the charter must also be implemented, he added, so they benefit “the everyday African citizen who needs clean water, reliable food sources, good healthcare, and mitigation against climate change effects.”

Providing solutions, calling for reform

For Ethiopian officials, hosting the summit is a chance to pivot Africa’s story.

“Africa is not only a victim of climate change. It is a provider of global climate solutions to the world,” said Mensur Dessie Nuri, a senior advisor in Ethiopia’s Ministry of Planning and Development.

“ACS2 will strongly call for the reform of the global financial systems that will match the commitment of African-led climate solutions, while securing investment commitments for Africa’s climate solutions.”

The Addis Ababa declaration is expected to formalise that shift. According to interviews with organisers and stakeholders, as well as public statements, if adopted the declaration will assert that Africa is asking not for handouts but for fair investment. Investment that recognises its renewable-energy potential, its critical role in global carbon sequestration, and its mineral wealth essential for the world’s energy transition.

Iskander Erzini Vernoit, director of the Imal Initiative for Climate and Development, a non-profit thinktank based in Morocco, says: “Africa’s message to the world should be clear: Africa will continue to lead the global push for a fairer international financial architecture, notably for UN processes on tax cooperation and sovereign debt.”

President Ruto, who will co-chair several sessions in Addis, is betting that Africa’s economic future lies in “climate-positive growth”, his envoy for climate change, Ali Mohamed, told Dialogue Earth. The Addis summit must build on the Nairobi narrative, added Mohamed.

“The summit should highlight successful African initiatives, including green industrialisation powered by the abundant renewables on the continent, which could offer green jobs to the continent’s youthful population,” he said.

But Mohamed warned that diverse stakeholders must be heard and their views integrated into the summit outcomes. “The credibility of the summit will rest on how inclusive it is, and whether civil society, Indigenous peoples, youth, and grassroots innovators are recognised as equal partners alongside governments and international actors.

“A successful outcome would be one in which African priorities on adaptation, resilience, loss and damage, and community-driven solutions are not just acknowledged but embedded in the decisions, financing frameworks and diplomatic messages that leave Addis,” he said.

A unified African voice on adaptation

One constituency pressing for concrete outcomes is the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) group, chaired by Malawi’s Evans Njewa.

“At ACS-2, the Least Developed Countries expect Africa to rally behind a unified position on adaptation, particularly through the development and adoption of robust adaptation indicators that can guide global monitoring and accountability,” Njewa told Dialogue Earth.

“These indicators are crucial for ensuring that adaptation efforts are not sidelined but given equal weight as mitigation, with a clear focus on the needs of the most vulnerable communities.”

The LDCs also want Africa to stand firm in urging major emitters to submit more ambitious climate action plans, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).

“The credibility of these commitments is central to safeguarding the survival of frontline communities, who are already enduring worsening climate shocks despite contributing the least to the crisis,” Njewa added.

What success at ACS2 might look like

According to Mensur from Ethiopia’s Ministry of Planning and Development, the summit targets several deliverables: the adoption of the Addis declaration, the launch of a flagship report highlighting more than 70 African-led initiatives, multi-billion-dollar investment commitments, and momentum toward COP30.

Among the most closely watched announcements will be those relating to finance. African countries need an estimated USD 2.8 trillion between 2020 and 2030 to meet their climate pledges, including USD 579 billion for adaptation alone. However, they receive only 3-4% of global climate finance, much of it as loans. The Addis declaration is expected to call for faster disbursement, lower transaction costs, and climate finance solutions that centre women, youth and children.

Another test, according to Iskandar, will be whether Africa can move beyond raw resource exports and strengthen its “role in green industrial supply chains”. Home to 30% of the world’s mineral reserves, including vast deposits of cobalt, lithium and other critical minerals, Africa is uniquely positioned to shape global decarbonsiation via production of batteries, electric vehicles, solar panels and other products. At present, however, the majority of these “transition” minerals are directly exported rather than processed locally.

Miners work at a coltan quarry in Rubaya, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Coltan is used in many electronic products including electric vehicles (Image: Moses Sawasawa / Associated Press /Alamy)

Between rhetoric and reality

Still, scepticism abounds.

“There will be a sprinkle of philanthropy here and there, but there may be no substantive outcomes,” Hakeenah warned, citing the slow follow-up to the 2023 Nairobi summit. Others note that declarations alone will not close the continent’s USD 2.5 trillion financing gap.

But the political opportunity is real. The presence of the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, Barbados’s prime minister, Mia Mottley, and several African leaders cements the summit as a staging ground for COP30.

If Addis can deliver a unified African voice, framed around measurable adaptation indicators, concrete finance commitments and a commitment to green industrialisation, it could, in the words of the organisers, “position Africa as a unified force to influence COP30, G20 and UN General Assembly outcomes.”

Wanjira Mathai, managing director for Africa and global partnerships at the World Resources Institute, echoed that sentiment: “We want to see Africa speak with one voice, showcase homegrown solutions, and drive bold commitments that accelerate adaptation, green growth and community empowerment,” she told Dialogue Earth.

“If ACS2 unlocks new investment pathways and builds momentum toward the UN General Assembly, COP30 and the G20, it will position Africa not as a climate victim but as a global solutions powerhouse,” she added.