Speaking at the briefing, Momodou O. Njie, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Energy, said the Gambia is thinking globally and acting locally with regards to sustainable energy for all and that was why theythe international community joined them to validate the global documents.
The Gambia as a state has been contributing immensely and moving fast in implementing the SE4ALL global initiative as a member of the international communities, he said.
He added that the SE4ALL and its associated commitments is here to guide them with their policy in achieving their Energy MICS and they have an international obligation to increase their energy MICS at 35 per cent by 2020 which is not only a local goal but regional, as well as, global.
He disclosed that the Gambia is the first to develop the action agenda and also the investment prospectus, adding that achieving SE4ALL is ambitious but achievable and the Gambia is ready to be at the forefront.
The UNPD Resident representative and UN systems Resident coordinator in the Gambia, Mrs Ade Mamonyane Lekoetje, said peace, security and development are very important to the UN.
They see the element of energy as very critical to development that and was why in 2012, the UN Secretary General launched Sustainable Energy for all Initiative, she said.
She said the UN General Assembly declares 2014 to 2024 as the decade for sustainable for all.
NEPAD Head of Energy Prof. Mosad Elmissiry, said NEPAD is the implementing body of the African Union and their focused was to get things moving on the ground and how to achieve the objective of the initiative.
He said their focused on action on the ground to achieve the objective of the initiative and that was why NEPAD managed to get support from the European Union with funding from a project which took them 8 months to help Gambia to achieve the objectives of SE4ALL.
He added that once the documents are validated, they would mobilize resources to implement and select high priority projects as the Gambian people see it and they would take it up for implementation.
Karin Reiss, ECREEE SE4ALL Coordinator, said ECREEE is the ECOWAS Center for Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency.
The mandate of ECREEE is to support the entire 15 ECOWAS countries in the development of renewable energy and energy efficiency project which ranges from policy to capacity building, to knowledge sharing and moving away from soft measures to very concretive actions on the ground.
She added that one of the major achievements in the past years of ECOWAS is the adoption of policies on renewable energy and the other on energy efficiency.
