By: Staff Writer
The Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA – SAP006) recently concluded a nationwide training workshop in the regional towns of Keetmanshoop (/Kharas Region), Otjiwarongo (Otjozondjupa Region), Khorixas (Kunene North Region), Opuwo (Kunene East Region), Ondangwa (Oshana Region), Rundu (Kavango East Region) and Katima Mulilo (Zambezi Region), respectively.
The Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) project is the first to be approved in ecosystem restoration and is a project of the ministry of environment, forestry and tourism (MEFT), implemented by the Environmental Investment Fund of Namibia (EIF) through a Project Management Unit (PMU), and is spearheaded by a multi-stakeholder Project Steering Committee (PSC). It is a product of the proposal “Building resilience of communities living in Landscapes threatened under climate change through an Ecosystem-based Adaptation approach in Namibia”.
The workshops highlighted the Environmental Investment Fund of Namibia’s (EIF) and the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism’s (MEFT) commitment to addressing climate change issues. It further highlights the two parties’ contribution toward realising Namibia’s obligations to national and international climate change frameworks.
It aims to inform Community-Based Organisations (CBOs) or participants about the project objectives. It activates participants to identify the need priorities of their respective communities and familiarise participants with some technical tools in planning and climate change-related issues.
Leading the facilitation, Project Manager, Bryan Gaomab, said the emphasis was to develop possible answers on addressing known gaps and challenges in the different landscapes. To strengthen the knowledge of the participants about the EbA project and the roles of the various stakeholders, to ensure a better understanding of technical terms, to seek community inputs on adaptation mechanisms, to highlight matters on environmental and social safeguards, and gender mainstreaming and to effectively introduce the EbA grants and application procedures,” he said.
EbA project was approved by GCF on 28 February 2019 and is implemented under the environment, forestry and tourism ministry, funded by the Green Climate Fund (GCF) through the Environmental Investment Fund (EIF) of Namibia. The EbA (SAP006) project is financed to the tune of U$ 8,904,000. The project aims to increase landscape productivity across the targeted eight landscapes of Namibia to strengthen social and ecological systems that sustain livelihoods at local levels and facilitate the value chains of natural resources.
The environment ministry technical expert on climate change Johannes Munango, said Namibia is vulnerable to climate change because of the driest countries in Sub-Sharan Africa. It faces problems like water scarcity coupled with the changing climate. Therefore, making us more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. “During the vulnerability assessment that we conducted in 2020 for the regions in Namibia, we found that most regions are actually dependant on ecological based enterprises in the form of livelihood and are more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change,” Munango said.
He further alluded to the vulnerability to climate change being region-specific. They follow different factors that inform them about the contributing factors like livelihood income per household, considering women-led households and services in that region like school facilities. These, amongst others, determine the vulnerabilities of these regions to the impact of climate change.
“We used four indexes to inform our vulnerability: the exposure index, where we look at the impacts of climate change and how the regions are exposed to those impacts.
There was also the sensitivity index, which then determines how that region is sensitive to the impacts of climate change. Then we looked at the adaptive capacity and how the region can cope with the effects of climate change.
Those three indexes informed the last index, which was the national vulnerability index,” he added.
Further studies found that most regions in the north to the North-eastern are more vulnerable to climate change because they are primarily dependent on rain-fed agriculture and the rearing of animals as a livelihood making them more sensitive to the impacts of climate change.
On the other hand, the Southern areas already present drier conditions, which means they are more adaptive to those conditions already with or without climate change.
He also urged the nation to further read up on Namibia’s Fifth National Communication found on the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) website.
Furthermore, the EbA project aims to increase the climate change resilience of productive landscapes in Namibia by implementing Ecosystem-based Adaption actions that strengthen social and ecological systems to sustain livelihoods at local levels and facilitate value chains of natural resources. The project’s action responds to declarations and processes of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit and UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that promotes investing in low emission and climate-resilient development that have a high impact on local development and community livelihoods while increasing conservation of the ecosystem.
The regions of Namibia are clustered into eight landscapes which make up the Southern landscape, Kunene South and Daures landscape, Kunene North landscape, Lower-Eastern
landscape, North Central landscape, Kavango East and West landscape, Zambezi East and West and Ovitoto and Otjimbingwe landscapes.
The Environmental Investment Fund of Namibia (EIF), 2015, obtained the Green Climate Fund (GCF) accreditation. The GCF is a unique global fund established within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) rubric to respond to climate change by investing in low-emission and climate-resilient development.
The accreditation status makes EIF eligible for accessing climate change funding from the GCF.
The workshop was attended by Community Based Organisations, chairpersons, treasurers, secretaries, administrators, and company representatives who make up the team of facilitators of the Environmental Investment Fund of Namibia, Namibia Development Trust (NDT), and environment, forestry and tourism. The call for proposal from the SAP006 Small Grants Facility encourages Namibians to respond to the call made public by applying for a grant under the respective windows.
The training workshop commenced on 16 March 2022 to 10 April 2022.
