Solutions to combat climate change and emerging issues
Following our 3 hour-discussion on climate change, emerging issues and potential solutions with reference to different contexts and geographical regions, the following points are some of the key issues that came up. The discussion was themed: Solutions to combat climate change and emerging issues and was coordinated by Biophilic conversation with the participation of several players including our own Caroline Kibii, Team leader and coordinator, Enviro Wild Initiative. The conservation was held on Twitter Spaces.
- While all communities/individuals are victims of climate variability and risks, their experiences, vulnerabilities, and exposure vary. Cultural, social, economic and ecological factors play a significant role here.
- Most initiatives to combat climate change are not designed to solve the root cause of the problem.
- Local knowledge is a fundamental element in climate adaptation measures across various communities in the global south, especially in Africa. However, this knowledge is hardly given the urgency it deserves when designing climate-related policies, in climate finances or when making general decisions.
- Perceived climate variability is getting more recognition in climate research.
- Climate communication is vital in sharing knowledge and research outputs and decoding the climate jargon into a language the general public can understand. It was established that many research documents are often produced where most of the public needs to read but cannot due to inaccessibility, unawareness or lingo complexity.
- Limited knowledge of climate science impedes some journalists from communicating climate issues concretely. Therefore, people communicating climate issues must equip themselves with the basics of climate and environmental science.
- The relevance and vitality of utilizing artificial intelligence in climate communication, determining and predicting climate models is a subject receiving praise and criticism simultaneously.
- The climate policy area in Africa is expanding and crawling in equal measures. Several climate-related policies have been developed within the past decade in, for example, Kenya and Tanzania; however, their practical implementation is still a challenge. The challenge is designing several overlapping policies making them difficult to implement. Inadequate finances and political will to support full policy implementations also curtail their effectiveness.
