The impacts of climate change are threatening the livelihoods of already vulnerable pastoralist, agro pastoralist and farming communities in East and Southern African drylands. In order to meet the scale and magnitude of these challenges, where extreme events and recurrent drought will be ongoing features, actors in development, adaptation, disaster risk management, social protection and humanitarian action are recognizing the need to focus on achieving resilient outcomes.

Community based adaptation (CBA) to climate change is providing valuable practical approaches and evidence of use for drylands related programmes and policy decisions.

Aim of the learning event
Bringing together stakeholders from a diverse range of disciplines working with dryland communities across East and Southern Africa, the aim of the event is to facilitate learning from experiences and evidence on climate change adaptation, in particular CBA, and resilience. Participants will co-generate new insights on the links between CBA and achieving resilient development.

The conference will explore:

1. What is the added value that CBA practical experience brings to achieving resilience in dryland communities?
2. How are climate change and related responses exacerbating the entrenched drivers of differential vulnerability among communities living in drylands? What are the barriers and drivers to change?
3. What would an integrated and coherent approach to achieving resilience in vulnerable dryland communities look like?

CARE Ethiopia will host the event together with CARE’s Adaptation Learning Programme (ALP), the CGIAR Climate Change Agriculture and Food Security programme (CCAFS) and the International Centre for Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE).

Target audience: Practitioners working with drylands issues (government, non-government and donors) and researchers, who have knowledge and experiences to share on adaptation and resilience in drylands. Policy makers concerned with East and Southern African drylands are also welcome to register.

Participation will be dependent on the relevance of information shared in the registration form.

Location: ILRI complex, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Date: 1–4 September, 2014

Download the full concept note here

Express your interest to participate: download the registration form here and email it to alp@careclimatechange.org

Deadline for registration: June 10 at midnight (GMT + 3)