Navigating the New Normal
Is this Normal?
Rise and shine or should, I say rise and sweat? It’s 7.30 A.M EAT in Nairobi, Kenya and the sun is playing its own version of tag, except no one signed up for this level of heat! We were expecting rain two weeks ago, as the Kenyan meteorological department reported. Kenyans on X are now referring to this heat phenomenon as El Jua, ‘’Jua’ means sun in Swahili as most parts of the country are sunny and experiencing extreme heat. Looks like we’re in for a sun-drenched surprise, leaving us to trade our umbrellas for sunscreen. The UN secretary Secretary-General António Guterres was spot on when he warned that ‘‘the era of global warming has ended” and “the era of global boiling has arrived.” Although climate change is evident, “we can still stop the worst,” he said. “But to do so we must turn a year of burning heat into a year of burning ambition.”
Globally, we have already established that climate change is here, Kenya, like most countries in the world has experienced drought, extreme heat, forest wildfires, landslides and floods. The weather patterns have drastically changed, we can no longer predict rainy seasons, and planting our agricultural produce has become quite a challenge. As a matter of fact, over the years farmers have reported low yields.
Nations, Individuals and companies are coming up with initiatives to cut greenhouse gases and have made climate pledges aligning with the Paris Agreement to ensure they limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius and pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5 degrees Celsius. The big question is, beyond everything we are doing to cut emissions through our sustainable initiatives, what do we need to do to adapt to climate consequences so we can protect ourselves and our communities?
Adaptation Measures
What is adaptation? According to NASA, it’s adapting to life in a changing climate. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) further highlights that adaptation to climate change means adjusting our behaviour during the climate crisis and adjusting our infrastructure by greening our urban areas to adapt to the changing climate. The IPCC authors have also raised 5 key questions when assessing progress in climate adaptation regionally and globally:
Is there an awareness that climate change is causing risks?
Are the current and future extent of climate risks being assessed?
Have adaptation measures to these risks been developed and included in planning?
Are those adaptation measures being implemented?
Are their implementation and effectiveness in reducing risks monitored and evaluated?
A number of countries have developed National Adaptation plans through The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCC). United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), in 2019 committed to support at least 100 countries to enhance their climate pledges to the UNFCCC, since the launch 115 countries have signed up seeking support to scale up their climate response. There is an Adaptation Fund which finances initiatives in developing countries. The UN highlighted that vulnerable communities are the least able to adapt especially those in developing countries. Further highlighting that based on a commitment made in the Paris Agreement wealthier countries are obligated to provide $100 billion a year in international finance and at least half of that money goes to adaptation.
Taking Initiative
United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has over 75 projects on climate change adaptation in over 50 countries to improve climate adaptation knowledge, restore lands, and build water harvesting stations and weather stations. According to the United Nations, everyone has a role to play and there are many ways we can also adapt to what is happening and what will happen. Below are a few initiatives recommended:
Take the initiative and grow trees around your home to keep temperatures cooler inside. It’s important that when we plant trees, we nurture them till they survive.
Communities need to be aware of natural disasters where they live and what resources they have in case they’re faced with one of the natural disasters. This can be done through capacity building.
Our economies and societies need to be more resilient to climate impacts. Our governments globally will need to orchestrate large-scale efforts. From improving infrastructure to withstand extreme heat and storms.
Communities around coastlines and mountains need to find ways of preventing flooding, melting glaciers and landslides, or better yet move to other locations in case it’s too difficult to adapt.
As much as measures have been put in place to adapt to the changing climate globally, we still have gaps i.e inadequate climate finance and a lack of understanding of climate adaptation especially in developing countries, which according to research will be the most affected by the adverse effects of climate change. Further mitigation and adaptation are interlinked, therefore as much as we are working on adapting, we should also increase efforts in mitigation. We only have one Earth, it’s better to heavily invest now than regret it in the future.