LAGCAW: As Lagos Joins the Global Community of Climate Action Week

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Edited by Oke Epia, E-mail: sostainability01@gmail.com  | WhatsApp: +234 8034000706

Trends and Threads

By Ugo Uzuegbu

For decades, global climate governance has been driven primarily by national governments through multilateral negotiations. Yet as climate impacts intensify, the gap between commitments and implementation has become more apparent. With nearly 200 countries pursuing different economic interests, political priorities, and development needs, consensus has become increasingly difficult to achieve. The result is a growing pattern of stalemate across the multilateral institutions responsible for negotiating global environmental agreements.

A review of major UN environmental and climate negotiations since 2024 shows that at least six have been deadlocked: negotiations on the Global Plastics Treaty have stalled twice, the UN Biodiversity Conference in Cali was suspended without agreement on finance, the International Seabed Authority has failed across successive sessions to conclude a Mining Code, COP29’s climate finance outcome was rejected by many developing countries as inadequate, COP30 failed to include fossil fuel phase-out language in its final decision, and the June 2026 Bonn climate talks ended without progress on emissions reductions and adaptation finance.

As confidence in multilateral negotiations has waned, governments, cities, businesses, and civil society are now turning to complementary platforms that prioritise collaboration and implementation over consensus.

Arguably, the most influential model in recent years has been set by London Climate Action Week (LCAW). The brainchild of Nick Mabey, co-founder & CEO of E3G, and Malini Mehra, CEO of GLOBE Legislators, both veterans of international climate and environmental movements, the LCAW model was established in 2019 to provide a platform for climate action, going beyond discussion fora such as the annual New York Climate Week at the United Nations.

Mehra says, “we put the word ‘action’ deliberately. It is not London Climate Week; it is London Climate Action Week. The emphasis on ACTION, whole-of-society mobilisation, and being grounded in the reality of place, are what make the LCAW model distinctive and why it has caught on around the world. After COP30 in Belém, we are now in a new era: one of implementation. This is what makes the Climate Action Weeks so powerful and relevant. The Climate Action Weeks have now spread around the world to include Sydney, Baku, Rio de Janeiro, and Bangkok. We are proud to be working with the Governor of Lagos State to bring the first CAW to Africa’s most dynamic and fastest-growing metropolis soon.”

Lagos Climate Action Week (LAGCAW) was conceived as an official outcome of the inaugural Nigeria Climate Investment Summit (NCIS), a flagship EVENT of London Climate Action Week, the first and most influential citywide climate action week, held from 20 to 28 June 2026.

Organised by GLOBE Legislators, in partnership with SOStainability, and supported by a range of London, Commonwealth, and international bodies, the Nigeria Climate Investment Summit is the latest LCAW innovation to link London’s financial capital and global markets with Africa’s burgeoning climate investment needs to match national ambitions.

Recognising the barriers that often limit the meaningful participation of stakeholders from developing countries in large international climate conferences, NCIS connected Nigeria to a model that is particularly valuable for countries on the frontlines of climate change. For developing countries, where the greatest challenge is often not ambition but access to capital, capacity, and collaboration, this model provides a faster and more effective pathway from commitments to concrete development outcomes. The NCIS demonstrated the value of an implementation-focused platform where partnerships could be forged, investment mobilised, and ideas translated into action.

With Lagos Climate Action Week designed as a key outcome of the Nigeria summit, it was a proud moment when the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, announced the inaugural Lagos Climate Action Week (LAGCAW), set to take place in Lagos—Nigeria’s economic hub and sub—Saharan Africa’s most populous city— in September/ October 2026.

If Climate Action Weeks are to accelerate implementation, they must be rooted in cities where climate risk, economic influence, and political leadership intersect. Lagos, with its over 20 million residents and status as one of the world’s most vulnerable coastal cities to sea-level rise, is an ideal location for Africa’s climate implementation agenda.

As Nigeria’s commercial capital and one of Africa’s leading financial centres, Lagos sits at the intersection of economic influence and acute climate vulnerability, making it uniquely positioned to demonstrate how cities can translate climate ambition into implementation.

The LCAW model has shown the success of carefully designed, independent city-level climate convenings, which work in partnership with the UN’s COP Presidencies but operate outside the formal UN system, bringing together stakeholders in ways traditional multilateral negotiations often cannot.

Nick Mabey, Chair and co-founder of London Climate Action Week (LCAW) has noted how the climate action weeks offer platforms to advance climate action free from the tensions of negotiations that characterise UN conferences. Cities are where climate policies are implemented, infrastructure is built, investment decisions are made, and citizens experience the impacts of climate change most directly. Rather than being constrained by the need for universal consensus, these platforms create opportunities for state and non-state actors to move from negotiation to implementation.

From London to Baku and Bangkok to Rio de Janeiro, these Climate Action Weeks have proven the power of diverse stakeholder collaboration around shared objectives with a clear focus on implementation. This is not to suggest that international negotiations are not important. Global agreements on emissions reductions, technology transfer, and climate finance remain important. But Lagos—a city confronting recurrent flooding, coastal erosion, heat stress, and rapid urbanisation—has little time to wait for international consensus. More importantly, decisions made in Lagos have implications far beyond the city itself, shaping investment flows, business practices, and public policy across Nigeria and the wider region.

The climate crisis does not negotiate, wait for consensus, or respect diplomatic calendars or procedural objections. The only rational response is to build systems that can act with the same urgency that the crisis demands. Climate Action Weeks embody this approach. Lagos now joins this growing network of climate action weeks and will serve as a watershed moment for climate governance on the African continent.

. Ugo Uzuegbu, Program Officer INDUS Advisory, writes from Abuja

Flakes and Flaks

Lagos Flooding and the 50-Year Evidence

By Eugene Itua

As floodwaters continue to threaten the lives, livelihoods, and safety of more than 20 million Lagos residents, a new, comprehensive educational exposition is pushing back against emerging narratives that label the city’s flood history as a “convenient lie”.

Authored by Dr. Eugene Itua, Executive Director of the Africa Green Economy and Sustainability Institute (AGESI) and Chief Executive Officer of Natural Eco Capital, the newly released article, “Epistemology of Lagos Flood Occurrence, Studies, Adaptation, and Resilience,” meticulously bridges hydrology, history, philosophy, and policy to set the public record straight.

The publication arrives at a critical juncture, particularly amid public discourse surrounding major infrastructure developments like the Lagos–Calabar Coastal Highway (LCCH). Dr. Itua argues that dismissing decades of verified climate data as political fabrication is not just intellectually dishonest, but actively dangerous to the city’s future resilience.

The Historical Reality: 1968 to Present

A cornerstone of the exposition is the dismantling of the myth that Lagos flooding is a recent phenomenon. Drawing on a landmark 2024 study presented at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall Meeting by Ndimele et al., the historical record confirms a stark reality: flooding has occurred in Lagos every single year since 1968, with the sole exception of the 1973 Sahelian drought year.

While sceptics point out that modern districts like Lekki did not exist in 1968, the data confirms that older, low-lying communities—including Ikorodu, Lagos Island, Surulere, Ikeja, and Apapa—bore the brunt of these historical floods. Aerial photography from the pre-independence colonial era and the early 1980s further validates that areas like the Eti-Osa and Ibeju-Lekki LGAs were naturally flooded wetland environments and mangrove forests long before they were paved over for urban expansion.

The ‘Flood Machine’: A Compound Crisis

The report cautions against reducing the crisis to a single cause. Lagos is currently battling “compound flooding,” a deadly overlap of multiple drivers:

• Climate Change & Ocean Dynamics: Steady sea-level rise and intense rainfall interact with tidal influences that back up into the lagoon, impeding rainwater discharge.
• Subsidence: The land itself is sinking due to groundwater extraction.
• Infrastructural Hubris: Aggressive land reclamation often displaces floodwaters into previously safe neighbourhoods, overriding nature’s historical water pathways.
• Urbanization & Waste: Impermeable concrete surfaces block natural water absorption, while improper solid waste disposal chokes critical drainage channels.

The economic toll of ignoring this compound crisis is staggering. According to World Bank data cited in the exposition, floods, erosion, and pollution in Cross River, Delta, and Lagos States cost society an estimated USD 9.7 billion in 2018 alone, equating to 2.4 percent of Nigeria’s GDP. Furthermore, over 1.35 million people in Lagos are currently exposed to the 10-year flood hazard zone.

From Denial to Action: The Integrated Resilience Pathway

Dr. Itua’s publication pivots firmly from diagnosing the problem to demanding a solution. Acknowledging that “water never forgets its path,” the report outlines a multi-tiered resilience strategy for state and federal governments:

• Blue-Green Infrastructure: Beyond the 69 kilometres of constructed secondary stormwater drainage and shoreline protection works, Lagos must legally protect and restore natural wetland buffers, which act as the city’s natural sponges.
• Data and Early Warning: Leveraging the Nigeria Hydrological Services Agency (NIHSA) and the Lagos State Resilience Office (LASRO) to translate forecasts into immediate, community-level action.
• Financial Safety Nets: Addressing the critical absence of homeowner flood insurance, treating adaptation finance as a cost-avoidance investment rather than an unfunded mandate.
• Infrastructure Accountability: Ensuring that major projects, including the LCCH, integrate drainage and wetland-buffer designs from their inception, rather than treating flood risk as an afterthought.

The exposition concludes with a clear warning and a call to action: “Flooding in Lagos is not a myth, not a fabrication, and not a recent invention… Accepting this truth is not an admission of defeat; it is the first step toward resilience”.

Dr. Itua, MD of Natural Eco Capital, writes from Lagos