Accelerating adaptation action in Africa

The document outlines a strategic framework for accelerating climate adaptation in Africa, emphasizing the integration of indigenous knowledge with scientific data and the need for decentralized finance. It advocates for investing in a climate-smart workforce, resilient water and energy systems, and nature-based solutions to protect biodiversity and human livelihoods.

• Effective adaptation at scale in Africa requires locally-appropriate and locally-owned solutions rather than simple replication, integrating indigenous knowledge with scientific projections for long-term development decisions.
• There is a critical gap in climate finance reaching local actors, with an estimated 10 percent of global climate finance reaching the local level, leading to calls for a multi-fold increase in this proportion.
• Investing in people's skills involves creating climate-informed education systems and a climate-smart workforce, with particular opportunities for young entrepreneurs in agribusiness to use digital technologies for resilience.
• Climate services must provide 'actionable information' to be effective; while donor-backed investments have reduced storm-related deaths, these services are not yet financially sustainable or fully mature.
• Indigenous technologies, such as zai pits for water retention and Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR) for land restoration, demonstrate the potential for scaling locally-appropriate adaptation techniques.
• Gender-responsive and socially-inclusive approaches are essential because climate impacts affect women and men differently based on social roles, and inclusive policies lead to more sustainable outcomes.
• Climate-resilient economies require integrating climate risks into macroeconomic planning and applying the 'triple dividends' of resilience: reduced disaster losses, increased economic activity, and social-environmental co-benefits.
• Blended finance, combining public and private instruments, is emerging as a way to de-risk climate resilience investments, with some proposing a 10:80:10 ratio of public, private, and international funding.
• Water management requires bridging the action and finance gaps through initiatives like the Africa Water Investment Programme (AIP) and improving the measurement of freshwater use across the value chain.
• Energy development should move beyond mitigation to include climate risk assessments to ensure that renewable energy systems are not vulnerable to climate extremes, such as hydropower reliance during rainfall reductions.
• Nature-based solutions (NbS) must balance human wellbeing with biodiversity to avoid maladaptation, such as single-species tree plantations that exclude local people.
• Innovative financial instruments for natural infrastructure are being piloted, including green bonds, blue bonds, and debt-for-nature swaps, as seen in the Seychelles and South Africa.

APA

Dupar, M., McNamara, L., Carter, S., April, A., Araujo, J., Andargatchew, A., Baker, E., Bouwer, R., Gordon, C., Mlobeli, M., Mohanlal, S., Pillay, K., Rudolph, G., Scodanibbio, L., & Scott, C. (2021). Accelerating adaptation action in Africa. Climate and Development Knowledge Network. https://cdkn.org/sites/default/files/files/CDKN-paper_Accelerated-Adaptation-in-Africa_22Jan2021_WEB.pdf

Chicago

Dupar, Mairi, Lisa McNamara, Suzanne Carter, Amanda April, Julio Araujo, Arsema Andargatchew, Emma Baker, et al. Accelerating adaptation action in Africa. Climate and Development Knowledge Network, 2021. https://cdkn.org/sites/default/files/files/CDKN-paper_Accelerated-Adaptation-in-Africa_22Jan2021_WEB.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{dupar2021accelerating, author = {Dupar, Mairi and McNamara, Lisa and Carter, Suzanne and April, Amanda and Araujo, Julio and Andargatchew, Arsema and Baker, Emma and Bouwer, Roy and Gordon, Chris and Mlobeli, Mnoneleli and Mohanlal, Shanice and Pillay, Kamleshan and Rudolph, Guy and Scodanibbio, Lucia and Scott, Charlotte}, title = {{Accelerating adaptation action in Africa}}, institution = {Climate and Development Knowledge Network}, year = {2021}, month = jan, url = {https://cdkn.org/sites/default/files/files/CDKN-paper_Accelerated-Adaptation-in-Africa_22Jan2021_WEB.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }