This report synthesizes climate change governance issues in Botswana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe. Case studies assessed vulnerabilities to climate change; climate change adaptation policies, plans and strategies, and their genesis and relation to the state of national knowledge on vulnerability; the institutional actors involved in climate change policy and responses; public awareness of climate change; and the role of state and non-state actors in international climate change negotiations.

The way we respond to climate change now and in the near future will have huge implications - ecologically, socially and politically. One of the most immediate ways in which we are going to experience climate change in South Africa is in the pressure it places on our already scarce water resources, and on our already weak water services. The processes of changing water from a raw natural resource into a treated, piped and widely distributed consumable, involves the use of a lot of energy, which means the emission of a lot of greenhouse gases.

There has been a general expectation that the emerging economies of South Africa and China, which are heavily dependent upon fossil fuels, could successfully leverage the potential of the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). However, experience to date indicates that South Africa has significantly lagged behind China in the uptake of CDM, accounting for only 0.9 per cent of the worldwide registered annual Certified Emission Reductions (CERs), whereas China has dominated the market, generating 54 per cent of the annual worldwide CERs.

Southern African Agriculture and Climate Change: A Comprehensive Analysis examines the food security threats facing eight of the countries that make up southern Africa — Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia, and Zimbabwe — and explores how climate change will increase the efforts needed to achieve sustainable food security throughout the region. Southern Africa’s population is expected to grow at least through mid-century. The region will also see income growth.

A global convergence toward Western-style diets that are high in calories, protein, and animal-based foods poses challenges for food security and sustainability. To quantify the benefits of shifting these consumers to more sustainable diets, several possible diet shifts are modeled. A framework is proposed to tackle the crucial question of how to shift people’s diets through the retail and food services sector.

THROUGH THE WORLD HEALTH ASSEMBLY (WHA), COUNTRIES HAVE SIGNED ONTO GLOBAL NUTRITION TARGETS, AND AS CHAPTER 2 SHOWS, ONE WAY to track countries’ progress is to apply these global targets to the national level. Yet targets that countries set for themselves are likely to be more effective tools for promoting accountability. By definition, these self-generated targets have greater government buy-in and ownership than those set from outside the country.

How do women represent an immense resource to combat climate change associated disaster risks? Their responsibilities in households, communities, and as stewards of natural resources equip them with knowledge and experience to build resilience in their communities as natural hazards intensify. This publication features various organisations’ initiatives in different parts of the world, which have successfully used disaster risk reduction as a tool to adapt to climate change, reducing risk and vulnerabilities while promoting gender equality in socio-economic development.

What are the gendered impacts of climate change at household level in Sub Saharan Africa? How can the capacity of women and men be strengthened to better adapt to climate change and climate variability? This executive summary provides an analysis of the findings of eight case studies carried out in Botswana, Namibia, Mozambique and South Africa. It finds that women cope better with the impacts of changing circumstances than men, as women are more likely to explore opportunities that enable them to cope better.

An analysis of the gender impacts of climate change can help us understand how different groups in society, even at the most micro-level, are differentially at risk from threats to their livelihoods. A gender analysis can also inform possible solutions for better protecting men and women against these potential impacts. This paper maps some of the impacts of climate change in the Bohlabela district of Limpopo province in South Africa, while also assessing local knowledge on climate change adaptation in terms of food security and livelihoods.