Current projects
Building Climate Knowledge Ecosystems for Policy-Making in Kenya and Tanzania
Evidence on the breakdown of ecological systems is ample, yet the uptake of this evidence in climate policymaking remains limited. Addressing the climate crisis requires new forms of collaboration—knowledge ecosystems that extend beyond universities and research organisations, involving policymakers and communities as active partners. Funded by the British Academy, this project aims to build such ecosystems in Kenya and Tanzania, fostering collaboration to ensure that climate evidence is not only produced but also mobilised for effective policy formulation and implementation.
Project objectives
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Establish participatory action research (PAR) groups in each country, bringing together community associations, NGOs, and civil servants at regional and national levels.
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Enable these groups to engage directly in evidence-informed policymaking to address two urgent issues: the water-depleting effects of eucalyptus monoculture in inland highland Kenya, and the degradation of mangrove and coral ecosystems in coastal Tanzania.
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Reflect on and analyse the collaborative process itself, generating insights into the conditions that support or hinder evidence-informed climate policymaking, with lessons relevant both locally and internationally
Acclimatise
Acclimatise is an innovative Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) Course offered by the Centre for Education and Sustainable Development in Africa (CESDA), in collaboration with other partners on the continent and beyond. It emerged from the experience of curriculum development in Kenyan universities in the Climate-U project from 2020-2024.
The course brings together 10 implementing partner African universities to offer this 12-week course on African Climate Change and Sustainability Education (Acclimatise) to undergraduate students. The Course features participatory research and engagement with local communities to create opportunities to innovate, to empower and to co-create solutions to the challenges of climate change and sustainable development in Africa. The course and accompanying seminars contain case studies and success stories from all over the world in areas of climate change and sustainability practices.
Past Projects
Transforming Universities for a Changing Climate
This project aimed to bring benefit to communities in four low and middle-income countries through enhancing the contributions of universities to addressing climate change.
The countries participating in the study contain populations that are highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. In Fiji, rising sea levels are the primary risk. Kenya and Mozambique are subject to extreme weather patterns and threats to agriculture and food security, while many Brazilians live in precarious housing vulnerable to flooding. All four countries contain substantial proportions of their populations living in poverty, and without access to the support that could help them adapt to these changes.
Positive responses to climate change can exist in the form of mitigation or adaptation, the former consisting of measures to prevent or limit the changes to the climate (mainly through emission of greenhouse gases) through advocacy for policy change or creation of alternatives, and the latter to managing the effects that are already evident.
Project objectives
​The project had the following key objectives:
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To support local action on climate change in Brazil, Fiji, Kenya, India, Indonesia and Tanzania through the creation of participatory action research groups in universities
To assess existing coverage of climate change in the curricula, research and community engagement activities of universities in the four countries
To contribute to theory and understanding of the impact of higher education on climate change and sustainable development
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To build and strengthen national, regional and global university networks and knowledge exchange on climate change