Lessons from Adaptation Leaders: A Grassroots-Donor Dialogue on Locally Led Action

The document outlines lessons from a dialogue between grassroots organizations and donors on advancing locally led climate adaptation in Africa. It emphasizes the need to shift from top-down to circular decision-making, build mutual trust through transparency, and move away from short-term, projectized funding models. The briefing argues for the integration of development-sector knowledge into climate finance and the reduction of accreditation barriers for local actors. It further advocates for a shift in the 'hierarchy of knowledge' to better value indigenous and local expertise, and calls for more flexible funding that supports long-term agency and administrative costs rather than just direct climate benefits.

• Effective climate adaptation requires a shift from vertical, top-down decision-making to circular, demand-driven processes that involve communities in program design and implementation to leverage local knowledge.
• Current funding modalities are often too short-term to be transformative; the typical three to five-year model is insufficient for building the trust and institutions necessary for sustainable programs.
• There is a systemic divide between climate finance and general development knowledge that creates artificial barriers to implementation; the document argues this dichotomy must be addressed at the international level.
• Accreditation requirements often hinder local and national actors from accessing climate finance, though the Adaptation Fund (AF) and Green Climate Fund (GCF) provide some support through Readiness Programmes, streamlined accreditation, and the GCF Enhancing Direct Access (EDA) Pilot.
• The prevailing 'hierarchy of knowledge' prioritizes technical and scientific data over grassroots and indigenous knowledge; this can be inverted by documenting local successes through storytelling.

APA

Global Resilience Partnership (2020). Lessons from Adaptation Leaders: A Grassroots-Donor Dialogue on Locally Led Action. https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/grassroots-donor-dialogue-may-21-2020-key-messages-final.pdf

Chicago

Global Resilience Partnership. Lessons from Adaptation Leaders: A Grassroots-Donor Dialogue on Locally Led Action. 2020. https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/grassroots-donor-dialogue-may-21-2020-key-messages-final.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Global Resilience Partnership |title=Lessons from Adaptation Leaders: A Grassroots-Donor Dialogue on Locally Led Action |date=21 May 2020 |url=https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/grassroots-donor-dialogue-may-21-2020-key-messages-final.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{globalresiliencepartnership2020lessons, author = {{Global Resilience Partnership}}, title = {{Lessons from Adaptation Leaders: A Grassroots-Donor Dialogue on Locally Led Action}}, institution = {Global Resilience Partnership}, year = {2020}, month = may, url = {https://www.globalresiliencepartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/grassroots-donor-dialogue-may-21-2020-key-messages-final.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }