30 November 2012: The World Future Council (WFC), the Heinrich Böll Foundation (HBF), and Friends of the Earth jointly held a side event during the 18th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 18) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Doha, Qatar, to discuss renewable energy feed-in tariffs (FiTs) in Africa and the Middle East.

The side event, which took place on 30 November, featured presentations by representatives of: the World Resources Institute (WRI); the World Future Council Africa Office; Renewable Energy Ventures, Kenya; and the Palestinian Solar and Sustainable Energy Society.

Participants discussed, inter alia: the role of FiTs in poverty alleviation; examples from Germany, South Africa, Mauritius, Tanzania, Egypt, Palestine, Morocco and Tunisia; the role of fossil fuel subsidies in inhibiting a change towards renewable energy; benefits and disadvantages of FiTs in developing countries; the cost of implementing FiTs in oil-producing countries; and creating political will to support FiT policies in Africa and the Middle East. [IISD RS Coverage of the Side Event]