The COPERNICEA, Regional Cooperation on New Indicators for Ecosystem Accounting in Africa, represents a fundamental paradigm shift in Africa. For the first time on the continent, national accounts will focus on green assets.
Developed by the Sahara and Sahel Observatory (OSS), with financial support from the French Development Agency (AFD), the method used by the Copernicea programme is that of CECN (Ecosystem Accounting for Natural Capital). It involves drawing up environmental accounts in terms of vegetation cover, biocarbon, fresh water, ecological infrastructure, resilience index or ecosystem health.
Through a better assessment of countries’ natural capital, the programme helps, among other things, to inform agricultural, infrastructure and tourism investment choices in terms of their impacts on ecosystems, water resources, changes in carbon stock and land use. Ultimately, the aim is to establish a national and regional network for sharing and exchanging information and data useful and necessary for Ecosystem Accounting for Natural Capital (CECN). COPERNICEA is also intended as a continental reference system, which will enable all African countries to join the biodiversity agenda of the Convention of the Parties on Biological Diversity, which will hold its 15th conference in August 2020 in Kunming, China.