This Workshop is a follow-up to the Dakar Declaration of June 2001 to phase out leaded gasoline in the SSA region by the end of 2005. It was organized by the Clean Air Initiative in Sub-Saharan African Cities and brought together representatives of governments, the private sector and the civil society of Central and Western Africa.
The Clean Air Initiative in Sub-Saharan African Cities is the result of a close cooperation with its sponsors – such as the European Commission (EuropeAid Co-operation Office) and the Belgian Cooperation - as well as with its main partners – such as UNEP, WHO, USEPA, IPIECA, and AFRICACLEAN.
The general purpose of this meeting was to review the progress made thus far in the phase-out of leaded gasoline and to identify the actions needed to enable the Sub-Saharan African countries represented at this workshop to meet this objective before the end of 2005 deadline. The meeting also explored and discussed additional potential action programs for the upcoming years in terms of improvement of the quality of fuels and vehicles. Finally, this workshop provided an opportunity for reviewing overall urban air quality improvement strategies, by presenting specific case studies.
As shown in the agenda, technical sessions were conducted on the first day and focused on:
- Finalization of the Leaded Gasoline Phase-Out and on Fuels Quality
- Cleaner Vehicles - Urban Air Quality Improvement projects through the study of three cities ( Cotonou, Benin – Lagos, Nigeria - Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso).
The second day session focused on:
- Presenting the outcomes of the previous technical sessions describing the next steps recommended to achieve the leaded gasoline phase-out by the end of 2005
- The action plans to be implemented for the reduction of the air pollution in three cities ( Cotonou, Lagos and Ouagadougou) in order to obtain financial support from the Initiative.
Introduction <Français> - pdf
Status Report
The CAI's impressive lead phase-out momentum continues. The ambitious target set by the Dakar Declaration in June 2001 to phase out leaded gasoline in SSA by the end of 2005 should be achieved:
- the number of (confirmed) countries which have already switched to UNL as of March 2005 has risen from 8 to 13 with at least a further 8 expected by mid-2005.
- in 2004 unleaded gasoline accounted for an estimated 57% of SSA consumption of all gasolines as opposed to 53% in 2003; it should rise to 61% by July, 2005
- phase-out programs are much more advanced. In particular, most refineries in SSA have either phased out lead (7out of 18) or have firm plans to do so (10 out of the remaining 11)
- by the end of 2005 virtually all of SSA is expected to have phased out leaded gasoline with only a few countries in East Africa possibly failing to meet the target.
For a complete status report, please refer to the following:
Recommendations
Session 1– Finalization of Leaded Gasoline Phase-out – Technical Specifications and Harmonization of Fuel Quality
The countries of Western and Central Africa have made very significant progress with leaded gasoline phase-out. The main objective of the 2001 Declaration of Dakar, namely the complete phase-out of leaded gasoline by 2005, should be achieved in the entire region. Please refer to the attachment below for detailed information about the recommendations.
Session 2: Improving the Urban Air Quality
Any intervention aimed at reducing air pollution should take into account the special conditions existing in each city. In particular, it is important to establish the pollutants of concern and their most likely sources. This entails, amongst others, measuring ambient concentrations of common air pollutants (such as particulate matter, oxides of sulfur and nitrogen, carbon monoxide, ozone, and lead), identifying which pollutants are present at concentrations high enough to cause a public health concern, and estimating which emission sources are likely to be major contributors to the elevated ambient concentrations. Please refer to the attachment below for detailed information about the recommendations.
Jane Akumu
Frank Bousquet
Françoise-Alice Lambert
Paul Martin
Eleodoro Mayorga-Alba
Zéphirin Athanse Ouedraogo
Mark Quist
Olukayode Taiwo
Chabi Theophile Worou
| 
