National Climate Change Response - White Paper

Climate change is already a measurable reality and along with other developing countries, South Africa is especially vulnerable to its impacts. This White Paper presents the South African Government’s vision for an effective climate change response and the long-term, just transition to a climate-resilient and lower-carbon economy and society.
South Africa’s response to climate change has two objectives:
• Effectively manage inevitable climate change impacts through interventions that build and sustain South Africa’s social, economic and environmental resilience
and emergency response capacity.
• Make a fair contribution to the global effort to stabilise greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that avoids dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system within a timeframe that enables economic, social and environmental development to proceed in a sustainable manner.
This response is guided by principles set out in the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the National Environmental Management Act, the Millennium Declaration and the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. 

The overall strategic approach for South Africa’s climate change response is needs driven and customised; developmental; transformational, empowering and
participatory; dynamic and evidence-based; balanced and cost effective; and integrated and aligned.