Kenyan university starts a course on climate change
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E-mail Xinhua, May 24, 2012
Agriculture and pastoralism are the lifeline and mainstay of livelihoods for farmers in rural Kenya and the entire East African region. But this trade that kept them in business for the past couple of decades is now failing in delivery courtesy of climate change effects.
Farmers are already seeing changes in the timing of rains, in the severity of rains through destructive floods, in temperature rise and in the progressive drying of their soils. And climate change experts say that adaptation to climate change in this critical sector is not an option but a necessity.
But seeing the challenges the farmers are going through, scientists at the University of Nairobi had embarked on brainstorming sessions with aim of helping find solutions to the farmers by coming up a comprehensive syllabus course.
"The Institute for Climate Change and Adaptation has been established at the University of Nairobi with the generous support from the Open Society Foundation," Professor Shem Wandiga, the Institute's Acting Director told Xinhua in an interview in Nairobi on Monday.
Wandiga said the university will offer postgraduate courses starting September/October 2012 for Master in Climate Change and Adaptation with options in 9 areas. He said that the University senate approved the course in December last year following an agreement that climate change is a reality in Africa as it is devastating to all sectors in the continent.
Even though it is real that Africa is vulnerable to the vagaries of the weather, the don observed that the universities in the continent have not thought of training people, government officials and students on adaptation and mitigation of climate change.
"Looking globally, one finds that several colleges have institutes managing climate change training but none exist in Africa yet the universities are supposed to lead in capacity building," he said.
According to Wandiga, the course is open to students from all disciplines since climate change is cross cutting and affects all sectors equally. The institute will also start mounting short regular courses on a weekly, month basis and certificates be awarded at diploma levels.
"We had initially received requests to start short course from the business community and interested individuals who have witnessed the effects of climate change and therefore wanted to learn coping mechanisms from the scientists," he noted.
The course that is the first of its kind in Eastern Africa will focus on governance, case studies and co-benefits of mitigation. Many students are already applying for the course that will offer 30 scholarships, 15 each for Masters and PhD levels.
"The number of students is expected to increase as self sponsored students who may miss scholarships will also be absorbed, " he noted.
Besides applying for more grants from donors, the university has in the meantime aligned several ways of keeping the department running. The curriculum has been described by Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, Chairman of the International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC), as timely and something worth duplicated in several other Universities in developing countries.
"The syllabus that you have put in place is very comprehensive and thorough and I am sure it will prove extremely successful," Pachauri said in a letter to the University.
Pachauri urged the University to include governance issues since they are critical to dealing with initiatives required to meet the challenge of climate change.
He observed that given that weak governance structures exists at the global level, the university should build appropriate frameworks and structures at the national level and also strengthen governance at the local level.
"Detailed analysis of case studies of effective adaptation should also be taught so that students get to share the findings with the people in rural areas who are mostly affected by climate change," Pachauri noted.
Pachauri observed that the developing world must look at the different patterns of energy use and opportunities for low carbon development.
"It is important that governments in developing world evaluate the multiple co-benefits that are associated with low carbon strategies for growth and are inherently energy efficient and have greater reliance on renewable sources," added Pachauri who is also the Director General of India based The Energy Resource Institute (TERI).
According to climate change experts, the global temperature rise must be limited urgently to avoid serious impacts on African agricultural production given that 80 percent of the population in the continent rely on rain fed agriculture for a living.
They observe that at the current rate of temperature increase, global average temperatures will have increased 1.5°C by 2050.
The latest science estimates that average production losses by 2050 for African maize at 22 percent, sorghum 17 percent, millet 17 percent, groundnut 18 percent and cassava 8 percent.
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