Opening remarks by the DDG for Climate Change and Air Quality in the Department, Mr Maesela Kekana, at the Transformations Community and the Earth System Governance Conference in Johannesburg

19 August 2025

Good day, distinguished guests,

Vice-Chancellor, esteemed academics, practitioners, members of society, colleagues, partners, and representatives from universities and research institutions across continents, the conference co-hosts: Transformations Community, the Earth System Governance Project (ESG), and the University of the Witwatersrand.

It is an honour to be here today to engage with you at this 7th biennial conference, which is hosted for the first time on African soil. As you will deliberate on the conference theme “Navigating Sustainability Transformations Towards Justice and Equity”, let us be reminded of the need for the scientific community to contribute to evidence-informed policy decisions and implementation that gears us towards a more inclusive and equitable global society.

My intention today is not to recite the science—your expertise already anchors this gathering. Rather, I wish to highlight some of the climate change policy knowledge gaps and priorities. And to encourage collaborative knowledge co-production. As a scientific community, you already have a knowledge base on key climate, biodiversity and sustainability science. It is important that you exchange scientific knowledge to inform policy and practical solutions. This conference is one of the ways for us to foster the science-policy-practice interface. In that regard, it is also about how you inclusively produce scientific knowledge. For example, the action research approach that this community utilises is valuable as it promotes the co-production of evidence and knowledge with the society and policy makers. In doing so, there is a better chance of producing policy-relevant, actionable solutions for sustainability transformations and transitions.

South Africa’s Climate Change Act of 2024 embodies this commitment. It envisions a just transition towards a low-carbon, climate-resilient, and ecologically sustainable economy and society—one that eradicates poverty, fosters social inclusion, and creates decent work. Crucially, the Act mandates that climate mitigation and adaptation measures be informed by evolving scientific evidence and best available knowledge.

Globally, the IPCC and IPBES remain essential platforms for knowledge exchange. African scientists are increasingly contributing to these assessments, and these scientists are actively engaging with policymakers and practitioners.

As we all know, the preparation for various IPCC global assessment reports in the Assessment Report 7 cycle is underway. It is vital that our science finds its way into these global reports to shape the knowledge base.

In South Africa, we already have successful national and global science-policy-practice interface initiatives, which we can build from. Through our collaboration with the University of Cape Town, we are working on updating South Africa’s Nationally Determined Contribution to fulfil the mandate under the Paris Agreement. We therefore look forward to the policy-relevant deliberations and research outputs you will have under the conference subtheme that will engage on issues of democracy and multilateralism.

Through our collaboration with researchers at Wits University’s Global Change Institute, we can engage with the crucial climate change science. This includes our understanding of the reality of the changing extreme weather patterns and vulnerabilities that South Africa and the continent at large are experiencing. We appreciate the GCI’s research on positioning Africa in terms of planetary futures.

Furthermore, scholars from Stellenbosch University’s Centre for Sustainability Transition are already utilising embedded research methods to address socio-ecological and socio-technical systems change, where researchers are placed in various institutions over a period of time, to promote the co-generation of knowledge in the real-world setting where change is needed. There are many other global science-policy partnerships that we look forward to hearing from over the next few days and beyond.

These examples illustrate the value of partnerships in advancing knowledge and practice. As a transdisciplinary community, your deliberations will contribute to bridging the understanding between sustainability transitions and sustainability transformations across multiple sectors.

For the scientific community, it matters conceptually whether the reference is made to sustainability transformation or sustainability transition. In practice, what matters is the bridge that helps us as policy makers to understand the interconnections between various systems that are undergoing change simultaneously and inform our policy responses that can accelerate these transformations and transitions towards sustainable economies and society. We need evidence to best understand the alignment between innovation, policy, politics, markets and the rules of the game.

Transitions and transformations are inherently disruptive and bring with them change away from unsustainable practices and systems. These systems are often interconnected, including on socio-ecological, socio-technical, socio-economic and socio-political dynamics that collectively informs our sustainable development path. Your deliberations through the conference subtheme on disruptive change should bring about our understanding of complementarities, contradictions and solutions around coevolutionary changes in these systems.

Climate change adaptation and mitigation cuts across multiple sectors. As we engage with sustainability transformations and transitions research, let us produce actionable knowledge that addresses the interconnected just transition challenges including in energy, transport, agriculture, industry, forestry, built environment, human settlements, water, biodiversity and oceans systems.

From an African perspective, research must also address sub-national implementation, adaptation scenarios, climate resilient society, urban resilient infrastructure, urban innovation, ecosystem-based climate resilience, climate finance, climate mitigation trajectory, as well as the industry greenhouse gas emissions mitigation.

The conference subthemes on bridging and bonding and on transformative culture and learning are important to promote transdisciplinary action research methods and processes. Some of the key areas we are interested in under these themes relate to addressing the decolonisation of research knowledge production and dissemination. In other words, how best to be inclusive of other forms of knowledge systems from members of society, practitioners and policy makers.

Furthermore, the world is faced with the increasing use of Artificial Intelligence. We need to find ways to better understand it and effectively work with it, in a way that improves our critical thinking, societal transformations and a just transition. It remains imperative to strengthen collaboration and knowledge sharing between government, academia and members of society, to achieve evidence-based solutions that will bring about practical and transformative solutions that embrace a just and inclusive approach.

Let us seize this moment to reaffirm our global commitment to knowledge co-production—knowledge that drives evidence-informed transformations and transitions towards just, low-carbon, climate-resilient, and ecologically sustainable futures.

I wish you well in these important science-policy-practice deliberations.

I Thank You.

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