Africa is vulnerable to natural variations in climate and human-induced climate change. Adapting to these impacts is key to achieving Africa’s development targets, and requires a coordinated and synergistic approach from a diverse range of actors across sectors, as well as better understanding of the drivers of risk and vulnerability. The African Climate Risks Conference (ACRC) is an open platform for sharing the latest African climate research among researchers, policy makers, practitioners and development partners.
The NATO Parliamentary Assemblies’ Science and Technology Committee drafted a new report on Food and Water Security in the Middle East and North Africa. The report underlines that pressures on natural resources and connected impacts on food production are factors that contribute to the (in-) security of the MENA region. The document summarizes causes as well as possible technical and governance approaches to improve food and water security in the region. The initiative shows that the role of environmental resources is increasingly taken seriously in the sphere of security policy. The Science and Technology Committee will discuss the draft and recommendations to NATO countries at the Spring Session in Tbilisi from 27-29 May.
There has been a surge in international migration in recent years, reaching a total of 244 million individuals in 2015. Forced displacement has also reached a record high, with 65.3 million individuals displaced worldwide by the end of 2015 – including refugees, IDPs and asylum seekers. Yet while the absolute numbers have increased over the last 15 years, migrants as a percentage of total global population has remained stable at about three percent. A majority of migrants remain on their own continents – nearly nine out of ten African migrants settle on the African continent, while eight out of ten Asian migrants remain in Asia. Forced displacement is predominantly an issue outside wealthy economies:
nine out of ten refugees are hosted by low and middle-income countries.
Despite six years of crisis in Syria, agriculture remains a key part of the economy. The sector still accounts for an estimated 26 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) and represents a critical safety net for the 6.7 million Syrians – including those internally displaced - who still remain in rural areas. However, agriculture and the livelihoods that depend on it have suffered massive loss. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has now conducted the first comprehensive nationwide assessment on the cost of the war to the agriculture sector.
The 9th Africa Carbon Forum (ACF) will focus on how engagement between State and non‐State actors can be further strengthened in the key sectors for Africa (energy, agriculture and human settlements), including the role of future carbon markets to achieve enhanced climate action, towards the goals of sustainable development.
The event will cover:
This volume brings together insights on the interactions between environmental change and human security in the Middle East and Africa. These regions face particular challenges in relation to environmental degradation, the decline of natural resources and consequent risks to current and future human security.
This edited volume, entitled Conflict-sensitive climate change adaptation in Africa, focuses on conflict-sensitivity in climate change adaptation strategies and practices in Africa and brings together the voices of academics, practitioners and policymakers from across the globe and Africa. Key questions that frame the contributions are: how do climate change and/or climate adaptation projects cause or contribute to conflicts, and how can adaptation measures be conflict-sensitive?
The T20 Africa Conference will bring together opinion leaders from think tanks and universities in Africa and the G20 countries to further promote the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The key objective of the conference is to discuss options about what future cooperation between the G20 and Africa could and should look like.
Climate change is a decisive global challenge which, if not urgently managed, will put at risk not only the environment but also world economic prosperity, development and, more broadly, stability and security. Africa’s vulnerability to climate change is exacerbated by a number of non-climatic factors, including hunger, high prevalence of disease, widespread poverty, chronic conflicts, high dependence on rain-fed agriculture, low levels of development and low adaptive capacity.
This briefing paper argues that in order to achieve the targets set out in the Malabo Declaration, which was adopted in 2014 with the aim to improve nutrition and food security across Africa, and to increase agricultural productivity by 2025 while building resilience to the effects of climate change, African governments must support programmes that will contribute to strengthening smallholder farmers’ resilience and improving their livelihoods.
On 12 May 2016, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) through its Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) launched its annual publication “The Global Report on Internal Displacement (GRID)”, identifying climate change and related natural hazards, such as droughts, sea-level rise and desertification as increasingly important factors causing internal displacement.
The 8th Africa Carbon Forum (ACF) invites project developers and policymakers to exchange on the latest investment, finance and development opportunities relating to climate change.
The “Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation in Africa” will focus on “fostering African resilience and capacity to adapt”, meaning that it serve the purpose of showcasing experiences from research, field projects and best practice in climate change adaptation in African countries, which may be useful or implemented in other countries in the continent.
To support Africa's towards better preparedness for COP21, this year's conference theme is "Africa, climate change and sustainable development: what is at stake at Paris and beyond?". The event will be convened at Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe from 28-30 October 2015.
This conference will take place over two days under the theme “Re-imagining Africa food security through harnessing eco-system-based adaptation (EBA) approaches now and into the future”. The conference is co-organized by the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), the Food and Agricultural Organization of the UN (FAO) and the African Union Commission (AUC), in collaboration with a range of partners from UN agencies, international research and policy organizations, civil society networks and the private sector.