By Weyinmi Okotie, GAIA Africa, Clean Air Program Manager
This week, 13 – 16 July, policymakers, scientists, civil society organisations, development partners, and community leaders will gather in Pretoria for the 2026 Africa Clean Air Forum. The theme is “Investment Case for Clean Air and Healthy Cities.” Air pollution is becoming one of Africa’s most pressing public health challenges. The forum is a crucial opportunity to shape the continent’s clean air agenda.
Over the years, the forum has grown beyond an annual conference. It has become a platform for collaboration. This helps governments, researchers, and communities share evidence, strengthen partnerships, and accelerate action on air pollution. Most importantly, it has raised air quality from a largely ignored environmental issue to a critical public health and development priority in Africa.
Across Africa, awareness of air pollution is increasing as cities are investing in air quality monitoring. More cities are realising that clean air is essential for healthier communities, stronger economies, and climate resilience.
The growth of air quality monitoring networks across the continent is especially encouraging. Reliable data leads to better policies, stronger accountability, and more informed public decision-making.
But monitoring air pollution is only the beginning. The real measure of success lies in whether the investments that follow truly reduce pollution and improve people’s lives. As African governments seek solutions, we must ensure that the technologies promoted address the root cause of the problem rather than end-of-pipe solutions.
While discussions on air pollution often focus on transport, industrial activities, and power generation, waste is a major yet frequently overlooked source of pollution in African cities.
Open burning of waste is common in many communities due to poor collection systems, badly managed dumpsites, and limited waste infrastructure. Smoke from burning plastics, organic waste, and other mixed materials exposes nearby communities to harmful air pollutants and emits greenhouse gases.
Open burning of waste accounts for 29% of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) pollution in the air, and, together with other air pollutants, causes nearly 1.2 million premature deaths per year in Africa.
There is no doubt that Africa must stop open burning; the question is HOW do we achieve this?
Studies also highlight that around 70-80% of the municipal solid waste generated in African cities is recyclable – such as biodegradable waste, plastics and paper,and could be worth US$8 billion per year if kept in a circular economy. Hence, there is a need to support real solutions to waste management challenges in Africa, such as separation at source, waste reduction, reuse, recycling, and composting initiatives.
Increasingly, the industry is promoting waste-to-energy incineration as the solution to Africa’s municipal waste challenges. However, this is a false claim!
Incineration does not eliminate waste. It changes waste into emissions, toxic ash, and greenhouse gases. It also relies on a steady supply of combustible waste, creating long-term dependence on generating and burning materials that should be reduced, reused, recycled, or composted.
For many African countries reviewing their waste systems, this is a critical moment. Decisions made today will shape urban infrastructure for decades. Investing in costly combustion technologies risks locking cities into a waste-management mode that competes with recycling, undermines resource recovery, and diverts limited public resources from real environmental justice efforts.
The forum’s focus on increasing investment in clean air is both timely and necessary. Africa urgently needs more financial support to strengthen air quality monitoring, improve enforcement, build institutional capacity, and implement effective pollution control measures.
However, as we work to increase clean air finance, we must ensure that the funds are NEVER used to support false solutions in the waste management sector, which are already known to emit a cocktail of noxious substances into our environment.
Funding for the waste sector should not support false solutions such as waste-to-energy incineration under the guise of reducing pollution. Clean air finance should prioritise interventions that prevent pollution at its source—such as waste separation, composting, recycling, organic waste recovery, material recovery facilities, and the integration of informal waste workers into modern waste management systems.
These approaches do more than reduce emissions. They create jobs, improve public health, reduce methane emissions, strengthen local economies, and advance the transition toward circular economies. They address multiple environmental challenges simultaneously rather than shifting pollution from land to air.
I hope this forum continues to inspire strong leadership—not only in acknowledging the scale of Africa’s air pollution crisis, but also in choosing solutions grounded in science, public health, and environmental justice, especially in the waste management sector.
My desire for Africa is that we do not confuse costly technologies with meaningful progress. That we resist the temptation to fund projects simply because they seem modern or innovative. That communities most affected by pollution are put at the centre of decision-making. And that Africa has the courage to reject false solutions, even when they are proposed as shortcuts to municipal waste management.
The discussions at this year’s Clean Air Forum will not ultimately measure the forum’s success. It will be measured by the policies adopted, the investments made, and the quality of the air that millions of Africans breathe long after the conference has ended.
ENDS.
