Centre for Environmental Rights – Advancing Environmental Rights in South Africa

South Africa’s Low Emission Development Strategy 2050.

Through the Paris Agreement, Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) have agreed to limit “the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above preindustrial levels, and pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.”

Article 4 of the Agreement sets out Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) as the instrument countries must develop to present their part of the global effort to “reach global peaking of greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible… on the basis of equity and in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty.”

To help ensure that the Parties’ national contributions can jointly achieve the collective goal, the Article further states that “Parties should strive to formulate and communicate long-term low greenhouse gas emission development strategies, mindful of Article 2 taking into account their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in the light of different national circumstances.”

This document has been prepared in response to that Article, and presents South Africa’s first Low Emission Development Strategy (SA-LEDS). Through submitting this document to the UNFCCC our country reiterates its commitment to achieving the Paris goals. Implementation of the Strategy will also contribute directly and indirectly to the meeting of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).