Side Event
Adapting to climate change in Africa– identifying impacts and planning adaptive management responses
Organizer
BirdLife International
Date and Time
17 May 2010 13:15 - 14:45
BirdLife will present the results of recent work that has examined the projected impacts of climate change on the distribution of birds and other biodiversity throughout Africa and the resilience of a network of over 800 Important Bird Areas across the region. An Adaptive Management Framework is under development for species and ecosystems as a model for guiding biodiversity management strategies and actions. BirdLife’s information-sharing platform ‘Africa Climate Exchange’ will be explained – a one stop website on Climate Change and biodiversity in Africa. Birds and biodiversity will clearly be impacted by climate change but they are also part of the solution. Case studies will be presented from BirdLife Partners in Burkina Faso, Kenya, Nigeria and Uganda providing compelling evidence of the roles that ecosystems play in climate change adaptation through protecting the natural resource base, providing alternative livelihood options, and maintaining resilience to future climate change. Experiences from these three countries will demonstrate how supporting the application of local knowledge and community engagement and action can build solutions to help communities, countries an economies adapt to the challenges of climate change.