GHG Inventory Expert Training Commences

By Shingirai Vambe

Kadoma – The Ministry of Environment, Climate, Tourism and Hospitality Industry, Climate Change management department has engaged with experts from various institutions including Government Research Institutions and Universities on a training workshop for measurement, reporting and verification of national greenhouse gas emissions.

A week long workshop has focused more on the agricultural sector, particularly the livestock and crop research institutes, where  experts were being trained how to calculate and measure the amount of gasses produced directly from livestock, manure management systems and agricultural soils.

Experts in the Agricultural sector; Prof Farai Mapanda, University of Zimbabwe (UZ) and   Marondera University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology (MUAST), lecturer made a remarkable presentations and training on the use of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Inventory software for GHG emissions.

Dr.Walter Svinurai from MUAST told Post On Sunday that data collection and calculation of green house gas emissions using the IPCC software is a system which most government institution should embrace and may assist in the tracking of long-term climate change mitigation ambitions.

“The IPCC Inventory Software calculates gas emissions from energy, industrial processes and product use, agriculture, forestry and other land use, and waste sector”. In his presentation, Dr Svinurai said a GHG inventory system should be used by all stakeholders within the categories of the IPCC software for GHG inventory compilation, citing the importance of consistent data capturing methods in areas such as veld fire- and manure management in the livestock and dairy industry to produce accurate measurements.

He highlighted on the participation of key stakeholders who were present at the training, from Department of Research and Specialist Services, Zimbabwe Statistics, Veterinary Services Department, Agritex, Zimbabwe National Water Authority (ZINWA) and Environmental Management Agency (EMA) among other stakeholders who are directly linked to climate change and anthropogenic emission of greenhouse gasses.

Through International engagement and submission by various countries around the world, using guidelines from the conference of parties in Brazil last year, made to be a requirement, it is United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) thrust to work with the climate management department on empowering institutions for capacity building on reducing greenhouse gases across all sectors.

However the subject of current climate change remains a human induced subject where in most cases are brought by human activities which needs robust capacity building within communities educating the society to be climate conscious.

With the same provisions the Climate Management department will facilitate for another training workshop of the same nature in the energy sector were it is likely to buttress more on greenhouse gas emissions and climate-smart ways of using and generating electricity while focusing on reducing apparatus which run using fossil fuels.