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Speaking to Channel Africa on Friday, Adaptation in Drought-Struck South-Western African Communities (ADSWAC) Project Director and Development Aid from People to People (DAPP) Namibia Managing Director Alfred Besa said Africa was positioning itself as an essential partner in tackling climate change.<\/p>\n
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Besa is attending COP31 in Antalya, T\u00fcrkiye, where global leaders, policymakers, climate experts and development practitioners are discussing decarbonisation, renewable energy, adaptation and other responses to climate change. \u201cThe conference is not yet over, but what we can say is that Africa is positioning itself as not a passive recipient, but as an indispensable partner in fighting climate change through decarbonisation and renewable energy,\u201d Besa said.<\/p>\n
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Besa said African countries were already implementing locally led climate adaptation activities, including in Namibia.<\/p>\n
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Africa has contributed a relatively small share of historical global greenhouse gas emissions but faces severe consequences from climate change. Besa said the Global North had not fulfilled climate finance commitments made to developing countries. \u201cThis has been a discussion over the many years of COP. Africa is the recipient, or the continent most affected by climate change, and yet the Global North is doing quite little in committing to what it has promised,\u201d Besa said.<\/p>\n
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\u201cWhat we have seen in the last decade is promise and promise and promise. Africa is now demanding action. We need the finances to rectify all the injustices that have been happening throughout the continent.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Besa said fulfilling financial commitments would help produce tangible results, particularly among communities already experiencing climate-related shocks.<\/p>\n
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Communities required support to implement local adaptation measures and strengthen resilience. Besa said some of the actions needed at community level did not require large amounts of funding, but communities needed access to resources to implement the measures. \u201cCommitting to what you have promised and taking action would lead to the tangible results that we can see, especially at community level,\u201d Besa said.<\/p>\n
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\u201cWhat communities need is support for them to do what they would like to do to adapt to climate change, to take action and to take the fight into their own hands. That requires very limited resources.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Besa said providing those resources could produce the results expected from international climate commitments.<\/p>\n
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ADSWAC is being implemented in Namibia and Angola along the Kavango River Basin. The regional initiative supports communities seeking to adapt to climate change, strengthen food security and build resilience against climate-related shocks. \u201cThe project is supporting communities to adapt to climate change and build resilience, thereby ensuring that people can survive the shocks of climate change,\u201d Besa said.<\/p>\n
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The project works with families to improve their ability to produce food and strengthen food security and sustainability at the household level. It also works with young people in schools to encourage early awareness and action on climate change. \u201cWe are working with families to ensure that they are able to grow food for themselves and build food sufficiency and sustainability within the household,\u201d Besa said.<\/p>\n
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\u201cWe are also working with young people in schools to understand that doing something about climate change starts at an early stage.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Besa said simple technology and innovations in agricultural production could increase household incomes and help families diversify their livelihoods.<\/p>\n
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Climate change is threatening the traditional livelihoods of small-scale farmers and surrounding communities, increasing the need to reconsider food production, water management and support for rural economies.<\/p>\n
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Besa identified access to water as one of the principal challenges facing agricultural production. Investment in basic irrigation systems and new technology was needed to make farming more resilient. \u201cWhen you talk about agriculture, one of the key challenges that one would face is the issue of water for production,\u201d Besa said.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThat means there is a need to invest in basic irrigation systems using new technologies such as solar technology and, of course, the introduction of artificial intelligence in terms of monitoring crops and being able to address the issues faced at farms.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Besa said those innovations required financial resources. Communities also needed education about the importance of conserving and managing water, particularly along the Kavango River Basin.<\/p>\n
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The river basin supports livelihoods in Namibia and Angola, making the protection and responsible management of the shared resource essential to the region\u2019s adaptation efforts.<\/p>\n
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Besa said projects had to operate within regulations and support systems at local, national and regional levels. Cooperation between the governments of Angola and Namibia was therefore important to the implementation of ADSWAC.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThe communities are not asking for handouts. They are ready to be at the centre of action,\u201d Besa said.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThe people we are working with have embraced this. They see that they have to be part of making decisions and deciding what their destiny is going to be.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Besa said cross-border cooperation between Angola and Namibia was central to preventing future water insecurity and ensuring the project achieved its objectives.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThe working relationship between the two countries is paramount to this project,\u201d Besa said. \u201cWhere there is a good neighbourly relationship between the two countries, it makes results possible in a project like ADSWAC.\u201d<\/p>\n
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A regional steering committee monitors the project and works to ensure the conditions are in place for ADSWAC to meet its objectives.<\/p>\n
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Besa said the involvement of both governments was necessary because the Kavango River system was a shared lifeline for communities, agriculture and ecosystems in Angola and Namibia.<\/p>\n
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–ChannelAfrica–<\/p>\n
Image: Reuters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":44426,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[78,44,26],"class_list":["post-50949","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-finance","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Africa is demanding action on climate finance as leaders and experts meet at COP31 to discuss responses to the growing global climate crisis.","published_date":"","news_description":"Africa is demanding action on climate finance as leaders and experts meet at COP31 to discuss responses to the growing global climate crisis.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/50949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/50949\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50951,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/50949\/revisions\/50951"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=50949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}