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The Resilient Agriculture Innovations for Nature (RAIN) Challenge is an initiative by the Global Resilience Partnership (GRP) and Munich Re Foundation to identify and scale nature-positive agricultural innovations in East Africa. The program provides selected not-for-profit organizations with mentoring, leadership training, and communications support to transform seed-level ideas into sustainable business models attractive to private investors.

The December 2023/January 2024 edition of the Peace & Security Council Report evaluates the African Union's (AU) Peace and Security Council (PSC) performance in 2023, highlighting a trend toward discussing thematic issues over sensitive country crises. It examines the challenges of consensus-based decision-making, the upcoming 2024 AU chairship and PSC membership elections, and the potential impact of the UN's New Agenda for Peace on African security architecture.

This background note provides energy production and demand forecasts for Africa and the global community up to 2043, based on the International Futures (IFs) forecasting platform. It details the transition of energy sources, the growth of African energy demand driven by population increases, and the status of fossil fuel reserves and renewable energy projects across the continent.

This background note from the Institute for Security Studies provides projections for energy demand in Africa through 2043, highlighting a significant increase in total demand driven by population growth and development needs.

The November 2023 Peace & Security Council Report examines the diplomatic implications of the first Saudi-Africa summit, the coordination between the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) and the UN Security Council's A3 members, the precarious state of South Sudan's transition toward elections, and the AU's efforts to integrate youth into peacebuilding and economic integration via AfCFTA.

This report examines the relationship between the African Union (AU) and civil society organisations (CSOs) over the last 20 years, focusing on governance, peace, and security. While the AU has established institutional frameworks to facilitate engagement, the report finds that CSO participation remains unpredictable and often restricted, particularly in political processes and high-level summits. It highlights the critical technical and research contributions of CSOs while identifying systemic barriers, including shrinking civic space in member states and bureaucratic hurdles within AU organs like ECOSOCC.

The Resilient Agriculture Innovations for Nature (RAIN) Challenge is an initiative by the Global Resilience Partnership (GRP) and Munich Re Foundation to identify and scale innovative, nature-positive agricultural solutions in East Africa. The program provides not-for-profit organizations with mentoring, leadership training, and connections to investors to transform seed-level ideas into sustainable business models that enhance biodiversity and climate resilience.

The May 2023 Peace & Security Council Report by the Institute for Security Studies examines the African Union's (AU) responses to crises in Sudan and Chad, the slow adoption of structural vulnerability assessments, the complexities of the AU-EU partnership, and the challenges facing the 'Silencing the Guns' initiative.

This case study describes the Jasiri Gender Bond, a financial instrument launched in February 2022 to stimulate economic growth and empower women-led businesses in Tanzania. It highlights the bond's financial performance, its role in supporting women in both traditional and male-dominated sectors, and provides a specific example of a business, High Quality Tanzania, that scaled its operations using Jasiri loans.

The Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN) has issued a call for concept notes for its 'From Knowledge to Action' program, which provides grants to African organizations to support locally-led, inclusive, and climate-resilient actions by mobilizing indigenous and local knowledge.

The 2023 Healthy NDC Scorecard finds that while 90% of analyzed NDCs mention health and climate linkages, there is a significant gap between health recognition and actual climate ambition. Low- and middle-income countries generally score higher on health integration than high-income nations, though the report notes that these health benefits remain theoretical without increased finance from high-income countries.

The Resilient Agriculture Innovations for Nature (RAIN) Challenge is a joint initiative by the Global Resilience Partnership (GRP) and Shockwave Foundation to identify and scale nature-positive agricultural innovations in East Africa. The program provides selected winners with mentoring, leadership training, and connections to private investors to transform seed-level ideas into sustainable, funding-ready businesses.

This policy brief by Zero Carbon Analytics explores the establishment of comprehensive loss and damage facilities at the national level for African countries to address climate-induced economic and non-economic losses. It distinguishes between avoidable, unavoided, and unavoidable risks, proposing a framework that combines risk finance (e.g., insurance, bonds) and curative finance (e.g., trust funds, impact investments) to build resilience and provide compensation.

This briefing by the Stockholm Environment Institute argues that multilateral adaptation finance largely treats climate risk as a local phenomenon, failing to address transboundary and 'teleconnected' risks that cross borders through trade, financial flows, and shared ecosystems. The authors propose a shift toward 'systemic resilience'—interventions focusing on whole systems rather than individual countries—to deliver shared benefits for both recipient and contributor nations.

This policy brief examines the challenges and opportunities for securing sustainable finance to support Africa's regional infrastructure agenda, specifically within the framework of the Programme for Infrastructure Development in Africa (PIDA) and the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). It highlights the gap between Africa's high climate vulnerability and its low access to sustainable finance, proposing lessons from the ASEAN region to improve project bankability and regulatory harmonisation.

This policy brief argues that the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) cannot reach its full potential without a unified industrial policy to address systemic supply-side constraints. The author contends that the current landscape of overlapping national, regional, and continental policies creates coordination failures and proposes a consolidated strategy focusing on pooled infrastructure resources, regional product specialisation, SME growth, clean energy, and indigenous technology.

The April 2022 Peace & Security Council Report examines the security crisis in Burkina Faso, the implementation of the African Union's (AU) youth, peace and security agenda, the appointment of the fifth Panel of the Wise, and Senegal's priorities as AU chair.

This report by the Institute for Security Studies examines the application of the principle of subsidiarity within the African Union (AU) and its relationship with regional mechanisms (RMs). It argues that the lack of a clear operational definition of subsidiarity has led to contradictions, competition, and inconsistent decision-making within the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA). The authors recommend establishing a comprehensive legal, policy, and financial framework to shift the relationship from competition to collaboration, clearly distinguishing between the region as a 'first responder' and the AU as the 'primary actor'.

A case study on Climate Investor Two, a fund managed by a consortium including Climate Fund Managers and FMO to manage the EUR 160 million Dutch Fund for Climate and Development, focusing on water, oceans, and sanitation infrastructure in low- and lower middle-income countries.

This case study describes AgDevCo, a subsidized impact investor and project developer targeting early-stage small and medium agri-businesses in Sub Saharan Africa to improve food security, employment, and climate resilience for smallholder farmers.