EAST AFRICA UNIVERSITIES TACKLE CLIMATE CHANGE THREATS

Based on the recent global assessment report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, in the next six years 200 million people in Africa will be exposed to a scarcity of clean water because of the impacts of climate change.

During the same period, the IPCC predicts agricultural production from rain-fed farming in the continent will drop by 50%, while the prevalence of malaria will increase by 5% to 7% by the end of the 21st century. Between 25% and 40% of mammal species in national parks in sub-Saharan Africa will also become endangered.

Africa is one of the world’s most vulnerable ‘hot-spots’ because of climate change and climate variability. This situation, the IPPC’s scientists say, has been aggravated by low levels of climate adaptation and limited mitigation initiatives in many countries.

But amid efforts to avert the calamity, some universities across Africa have embarked on programmes geared to reducing the climate adaptation gap. In addition, they are showing a way forward towards the global collective ambition of achieving a carbon neutral world.

Universities allied to international organisations

Professor David Mungai, deputy director of the Wangari Maathai Institute for Peace and Environmental Studies at the University of Nairobi, says most African universities that conduct research, training and education on environmental protection and sustainability are allied to the UNEP-backed Global Universities Partnership on Environment for Sustainability, known as GUPES, the UN-Habitat University Network Initiative, or UNI, and the World Bank’s infoDev project that supports Climate Innovation Centres.

“Whereas the GUPES group of universities, which comprises 80 universities from Africa, promotes the overall integration of environment and sustainability concerns into teaching, research, community engagement and greening of the university infrastructure, the UNI category concentrates on capacity building of planners of green cities and other human settlements,” Mungai said.

The infoDev climate technology programme is helping universities train early-stage entrepreneurs to launch clean technology companies, create jobs as well as provide communities with clean water, energy and food while using limited resources.

“Over the past two years, infoDev has assisted selected universities in Sub-Saharan Africa to incubate technology-enabled business programmes that are aimed at promoting the growth of new ventures in the climate change, mobile and agribusiness sectors,” the World Bank points out in a recent report entitled The Business Models of mLabs and mHubs: An evaluation of infoDev’s mobile innovation support pilots.

Climate initiatives

Such programmes include the Kenya Climate Innovation Centre at Strathmore University in Nairobi and the Ethiopia Climate Innovation Centre which was recently launched under the wider Horn of Africa Regional Environment Centre which is hosted at Addis Ababa University.

Also included are the East Africa Climate Innovation Network that has nodes at the University of Dar es Salaam, Egerton University in Kenya and Rwanda’s Kigali Institute of Science and Technology.

The network involves infoDev’s collaboration with the Nairobi-based African Centre for Technology Studies in Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. It has the objective of identifying technological innovations for climate change adaptation.

“The partnership seeks to open and grow climate technology markets in east Africa,” said Dr Cosmas Ochieng, executive director of the African Centre for Technology Studies.

In West Africa, the World Bank in collaboration with the Danish International Development Agency launched the Ghana Climate Innovation Centre whose projects will be implemented at the University of Ghana and Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology.

infoDev’s programme manager, Valerie D’Costa, said Ghana’s Climate Innovation Centre was part of the World Bank’s related climate technology projects in Kenya, Ethiopia, India, South Africa, Vietnam, Morocco and the Caribbean.

Need for capacity building

Whereas the projects specifically targeted the intersection of innovation technology and entrepreneurship by building competitive clean technologies, many African universities have also been aware of the urgent need for capacity building on climate resilience and vulnerable human systems.

Also, while infoDev targets innovation of marketable clean technologies, many African universities have also been aware of a paucity of climate resilience knowledge to support adaptation policies, planning and design of human settlements on the continent.

The prevailing scenario is that extreme weather events that include droughts, floods, heat-waves and coastal erosion are likely to become more frequent and put heavy strain on natural resources.

“With continuing rises in temperature and extreme conditions, agriculture productivity is projected to decline in most countries in Africa,” said Dr Terezya Huvisa, president of the African Ministerial Conference on Environment.

Responding to the challenges

In response to these challenges, the University of Nairobi has established an Institute for Climate Change and Adaptation. Institute director, Professor Shem Wandiga, said the mandate was to build the human capacity needed to address climate change and adaptation in Africa by offering conventional degrees and short training courses.

“We also encourage action-oriented research activities, especially in climate adaptation technologies,” Wandiga said.

The university, a member of GUPES and UNI tie-ups, has robust environment programmes that run through its engineering, agriculture and geography departments.

“The nascent Wangari Maathai Institute for Peace and Environmental Studies is expected to spearhead holistic multi-disciplinary research, training and community empowerment and outreach services in eastern Africa,” said Mungai.

In July last year, Makerere University, in collaboration with the Rockefeller Foundation, launched the Makerere University Centre for Climate Change Research and Innovations.

The centre, hosted at the university’s College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, is expected to conduct research on climate sciences, mitigation and adaptations of climate change processes.

The University of Dar es Salaam has also established a Centre for Climate Change Studies, after learning of such institutions at the University of Nairobi, the University of Ghana, Mekelle University in Ethiopia and the University of Nigeria, among other leading universities on the continent.

The centres are partially funded by the Open Society Foundations – an African charity undertaking work on food security and climate change – and are geared towards promoting education, research and outreach activities related to climate change and sustainable development issues.

Urban vulnerability

Africa’s urban population is projected to increase beyond 1.2 billion by 2050, and many cities are already stretched to capacity in terms of housing, safe drinking water and sanitation services.

Consequently, several African universities that are members of the UN-Habitat’s Cities and Climate Change Academy are working with the International Institute for Environment and Development and other groups to develop design strategies to be applied to selected African cities.

The aim is to manage climate risks, reduce vulnerabilities and improve resilience to climate change, under the Climate Change and Urban Vulnerability in Africa Project.

According to Dr Axumite Gebre-Egziabher, director of the global division at UN-Habitat, some African universities at the Cities and Climate Change Academy are the Addis Ababa University, Ardhi University and University of Yaoundé I.

Case study cities include Addis Ababa in Ethiopia, Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, Douala in Cameroon, Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso and Saint-Louis in Senegal.