Under the auspices of the African Union’s Specialized Technical Committee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Water and Environment, the African Union Commission is organised a special meeting of the African ministers responsible for environment and natural resources. This meeting took stock of the challenges and opportunities occasioned by the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic. The following sectors were covered during the meeting: environment, climate change, water and sanitation, biodiversity, sustainable land management, disaster risk reduction, meteorology, wildlife and forestry.

The meeting had two main objectives:

1. To enable the African Union Commission to report to the Ministers on the continental impacts of the pandemic and some of the key mitigative measures undertaken to overcome the challenges, and capitalize on the opportunities presented by the pandemic; and for

2. Ministers to review the continuing impacts of the pandemic, take stock of the challenges and opportunities and provide policy guidance on the way forward to ensure the full incorporation of the environment and natural resource sectors in the post COVID-19 recovery plans, to build back better at national levels.