For information only - not an official document
UNIS/OUS/227
13 December 2013
VIENNA, 13 December 2013 (United Nations Industrial Development Organization) - The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the Austrian Development Agency (ADA), the operational unit of the Austrian Development Cooperation, today signed agreements to support an existing renewable energy and energy efficiency centre in West Africa and to set up three more centres in East and Southern African and in the Caribbean region. The four project agreements will receive a total of approximately EUR 3.5 million in funding from the ADA.
"The regional renewable energy and energy efficiency centres are another good example of our fruitful partnership with Austria. Local companies and industry will benefit from the growing sustainable energy market opportunities, as well as from regional cooperation and South-South and North-South technology and knowledge transfer," said LI Yong, the Director General of UNIDO.
"We consider the regional centres to be a powerful way to simultaneously address the challenges of energy access, energy security and climate change mitigation in our partner countries. We are pleased to see that our initial contributions have already leveraged major funding commitments from international donors and generated tangible results and impacts. In this context, we would like to thank the Energy and Climate Change Branch of UNIDO for the excellent cooperation in previous years," said Martin Ledolter, Managing Director of the ADA.
The ECOWAS Centre for Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency (ECREEE), based in Praia, Cabo Verde, was established in 2010 to create favourable framework conditions for renewable energy and energy efficiency markets in the 15 member states of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). The new project will strengthen the ECREEE's capacity to deal with a rapidly growing project portfolio and expanding external demands for its services.
The two new centres in sub-Saharan Africa will seek to replicate the success of the ECREEE model. One will be established, together with the East African Community (EAC), to serve partner States, Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda; and the other will serve the 15 Members States of the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC). It is expected that both centres will be fully operational in 2014.
The third centre will be set up to meet the energy challenges faced by islands in the Caribbean region. Recently, UNIDO was requested by the Sustainable Energy Island Initiative (SIDS DOCK) of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) to assist the island nations in the Caribbean and Pacific in the creation of similar centres. A final agreement on the centres is expected in 2014, which has been declared the International Year of Small Island Developing States.
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For more information on UNIDO, please contact:
Mikhail
Evstafyev
UNIDO Advocacy and External Relations Group Coordinator
Telephone: (+43-1) -26026-5021
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