Vicky Ford, minister responsible for Africa within the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, was in SA last week as part of an international effort to reach an agreement on the country’s “green transition” and to explore funding options for Eskom, the country’s biggest emissions emitter and largest source of electricity. Her visit came just a month before the UK hosts the UN Climate Change Conference, known as COP26. She spoke to Business Day on Friday.
On the relationship between the UK and SA:
This is my second full week on the job and it’s been an absolute pleasure to come here and visit SA and neighbouring states. That’s because the relationship between SA and the UK is so important. We have strong ties, we have very deep shared values and [are] the largest country investing in SA. Trade between the UK and SA in 2020 was about £8bn.
Progress ahead of the COP26 conference:
The timing of this is very important too because we are just a month away from COP, which is so important for the future of our planet. We’ve been very glad that SA has not only announced its nationally determined contribution but also raised it and has been ambitious with it.
I don’t underestimate the challenge. Electricity at the moment is largely on coal and is also unstable and that’s why last night, the lights went out. That’s disruptive to the manufacturing industry and people’s lives. On the positive side, there are huge potential benefits living in a country that has so much ability to harness renewables, especially solar and wind power.
Specific discussions on Eskom:
I had a lengthy meeting with our COP envoy, they are working with other countries such as the French, the Germans, the IMF, the World Bank, looking at how you could stabilise Eskom to a position where you can start working on that transition to bring in those renewable alternatives. I’m very hopeful and excited for the next few weeks which will of course be critical as we move towards COP. There’s a partnership of different countries and funding partners working together to help SA achieve what SA has said they want to achieve. That funding package ... I can’t get ahead of the game here but just to say that there’s very serious discussions going on.
On whether there will be something to announce at COP:
President [Cyril] Ramaphosa is absolutely clear he wants to grasp that opportunity. Britain, of course, is playing a really important role. We are hosting the conference and can I just say that an enormously intense amount of work is being done. And the fact that we’ve had the COP envoy in SA with his team shows how important resolving this issue is, for the whole of the globe.
On policy uncertainty and mixed messages from SA:
The important thing is that the president has announced with the cabinet that NDC (nationally determined contribution). What we can do as friends and partners is help to bring other members of the international community together to say how do we help SA meet that? We know that the SA economy needs electricity, it needs stable electricity, and the SA people need that as well. The conversations that are happening through the COP envoy, and with other countries are happening at the highest possible level to make sure that everybody is focusing on helping SA deliver that contribution that you say you want to make.
On SA’s red listing by the UK:
Having been here listening to people, I really understand how important it is that we work to reopen that travel. It’s impacting on trade, it’s impacting on tourism but it’s also really impacting on people’s families, not being able to travel. We've been working really closely with your scientists and UK scientists to make sure that the best possible data and information is fed into the decision the next time it’s looked at in the UK.
I’m really glad to have been reassured by your scientists, who do fantastic genome sequencing that … the Beta variant hasn’t been present now for a number of weeks. So that takes one of the main concerns away. The other arm of that is looking at the recognition of vaccine certificates so that people will be able to come to the UK if they have a vaccination certificate that we know is robust.
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