Evidence on climate security risks and best-bet resilience-building practices to inform common African agendas on climate, peace, and security.
As climate impacts intensify and conflicts escalate, there is an increasing demand for evidence and capacity building on the linkages between climate, peace, and security. ClimBeR has contributed evidence on climate security risks and best-bet resilience-building practices to the African Union’s African Climate Security Risk Assessment and the IGAD-CAEP Climate Adaptation Strategy 2023-2030. ClimBeR has also briefed members of the UN Security Council and trained more than 250 policymakers and climate negotiators on how to build more resilient and peaceful societies.
In conflict-prone, marginalized areas across Africa, extreme climate variability amplifies existing risks and insecurities. Increasing pressure on limited resources causes social tensions, conflict, and potentially violence.
In response, ClimBeR has developed robust, localized, and policyrelevant evidence on climate security risks. Notably, its CSO pinpoints how, where, and who is impacted, and highlights risk mitigation options. This work has enabled ClimBeR researchers to respond to rising demand from national, regional, and international partners for evidence and capacity building.
In early 2023, ClimBeR was invited to contribute evidence on climate security risks to an African Climate Security Risk Assessment (ACRA) report, at the request of the African Union Peace and Security Council, to support the African Union and its member states in mobilizing a Common African Position on climate, peace, and security. ClimBeR researchers have contributed chapters to the report, outlining climate security risks in North, East, and Southern Africa and proposing best practices with the potential to address and mitigate these risks. An executive summary of the ACRA report was published in late 2023. The forthcoming complete report will inform the African Union Chairperson’s Report, which will serve as the foundation for the Common African Position on climate, peace, and security. The Common African Position will be used to discuss, negotiate, and advance the climate-peace-security nexus within member states and to identify opportunities to leverage climate finance for adaptation projects in conflict-affected areas. It is slated to be developed in time for COP29 in 2024.
ClimBeR has also provided evidence and strategic input to the IGADCAEP in Eastern Africa as it developed its Climate Adaptation Strategy 2023-2030. ClimBeR researchers identified central challenges in the region and recommended measures to address climate security risks. The strategy—which was launched at COP28 in late 2023—is expected to support the IGAD member states to address their climate adaptation needs and priority actions, including climate security.
ClimBeR researchers have also shared evidence and insights with national and global stakeholders. In Kenya, ClimBeR ensured inclusion of the climate security dimension in the recently launched NCCAP. At the global level, ClimBeR researchers formally and informally briefed members of the UN Security Council in New York.
For policies and strategies to successfully address climate security risks in Africa, a greater, shared understanding of the issue among policymakers, leaders, and climate negotiators is essential. In 2023, ClimBeR researchers trained a total of 212 national climate negotiators, as well as representatives from the private sector and NGOs, as part of a Climate Governance, Diplomacy, and Negotiations Leadership Program hosted by the African Group of Negotiators Experts Support. The participants gained knowledge that enables them to identify and address climate security risks in their work. ClimBeR also worked with the Cairo International Center for Conflict Resolution, Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding to train 42 national policymakers on the role of food systems transformation in building peace and security.
These activities demonstrate how ClimBeR researchers have designed their interventions to prompt policy actors both across and beyond Africa to integrate climate security concerns into their programs and policy work to build more resilient and peaceful societies in the wake of the climate crisis.
I want to emphasize the importance of using sound scientific evidence, and that is why we are working with partners such as adelphi and CGIAR. This
study will inform key decisions, and it will steer the direction of the African Group of Negotiators and different climate initiatives.Tendai E. Kasinganeti, Climate Security Advisor at the African Union Commission
Header photo: Youth pastoralist. ILRI.