Cities and Climate Adaptation in Africa

The African Secretariat of ICLEI - Local Governments for Sustainability has recently launched a Climate Change adaptation project entitled “Sub-Saharan Cities: A five City Network to Pioneer Climate Adaptation through Participation Research and Local Action”. It is supported mainly by the Climate Change Adaptation in Africa (CCAA) research and capacity development program, which is a joint program of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Canada, and the Department for International Development (DFID), U.K. Five cities have been selected as key project beneficiaries: 

•                Cape Town – South Africa

•                Walvis Bay - Namibia

•                Maputo - Mozambique

•                Dar es Salaam – Tanzania

•                Port Louis - Mauritius

Project Background 

The project will address knowledge, resource capacity and networking gaps in the five selected sub-Saharan African cities over a three-year period, commencing in September 2009. The main aim of the project is to assist, equip and strengthen local authorities and cities in their ability to plan for, and adapt to, the threats and impacts associated with different variables related directly to climate change. We anticipate that this initiative will lead to a number of immediate and tangible results for each of the five participating cities during the initial phase.

This project will focus on particularly vulnerable communities in each of the five cities and their livelihoods in different geographical, climatic and ecosystem zones. It will establish and/or add to Local Climate Adaptation Frameworks (LCAFs), taking into account relevant localised climate change impacts. Therefore each participating local government will take unique action during this process in order to assist with assessing and addressing their specific vulnerabilities to climate change.