Policy Brief: How does law and policy respond to climate-linked migration in Ethiopa - advances and continuing gaps

The B-EPICC migration team, in collaboration with colleagues from the HABITABLE Project, have just had a policy brief published with the International Organization for Migration's (IOM) Environmental Migration Portal.

The policy brief looks at the links between climatic change and human mobility in Ethiopia, a country at the forefront of the human impacts of climate change. The brief focuses on advances concerning relevant law and policy developments - in the areas of migration management, disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation, etc. - and notes progress as well as areas ripe for future developments. A look at regional developments with relevance to Ethiopia is also included. The policy brief is due to be followed soon by a fuller Assessment Report looking at how climatic change is occuring in Ethiopia - now and into the future, and the impacts this has on human livelihoods, human development, migration, as well as conflict.

ClimateImpactsOnline: Interactive Online Session with Ethiopia, 8th December 2023

B-EPICC conducted an online session with Ethiopian stakeholders to test the web solution for Ethiopia in the web portal ClimateImpactsOnline.

Following up on the workshop “Strengthening Resilience Against Climate Change in Ethiopia” held in Addis Ababa in May 2023, B-EPICC invited Ethiopian scientists and political stakeholders to participate in an interactive test session on Friday, 9 December. The session focused on the web portal ClimateImpactsOnlinewhich provides tailored climate data and information to different stakeholder groups, using advanced visualization techniques. In particular, participants explored the tools of the web solution for Ethiopia in order to give feedback and discuss further needs and changes to better customize the web portal.

Workshops on capacity building for climate migration research in forestry development, 25th-26th September 2023

Dr Alec Thornton, researcher for the Migration portfolio for B-EPICC, conducted two workshops focusing on research skill capacity building for climate migration research in forestry development.

On the 25th of September 2023, he talked about mixed methods in climate migration and forestry research and grant writing for cc-mig-for research and on 26th of September 2023 the topics were researcher profile building, publishing and networking.

The workshops address the capacity building needs as expressed by our key partners in the government agency Ethiopia Forest Development-Jimma Center (EFD-JC). In addition to researchers at EFD-JC, other participants included stakeholder from Jimma University and guest speakers from the Center of International Forestry Development (CIFOR), where a recent study on climate migration and forestry was conducted in the SNNP region of Ethiopia.

B-EPICC Workshop “Strengthening Resilience against Climate Change” in Ethiopia, 10th-12th May 2023

On 10-12 May 2023, the B-EPICC Workshop “Strengthening Resilience against Climate Change” was held at the Hotel Golden Tulip in Addis Ababa. Ethiopia became a partner country to the B-EPICC project in 2022. This workshop was conceived as a showcase of the project’s work with partners in Ethiopia.

In the opening remarks, the German Ambassador to Ethiopia, Mr Stephan Auer, highlighted the importance of international collaboration to strengthen resilience against climate change. The project team, together with in-country partners, introduced its scientific capabilities and priorities in the areas of monsoon and El Niño forecasting, agriculture, hydrology and water resources, forests and biodiversity, as well as migration. Furthermore, capacity building and knowledge transfer activities of the project were presented, including partner exchange and visualization of climate impacts in the web portal ClimateImpactsOnline.

On Day 2, the programme focused on migration. Opening remarks were provided by Mr Florian Rehli, Regional Officer Refugees and Migration, Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany. Throughout the day, special attention was paid to the planned IOM-PIK Risk Assessment Report on the nexus between climate change, migration and conflict in Ethiopia. Dr Diogo Serraglio from PIK, provided insights into the development of the report and its topics were discussed in smaller groups which included participants from the International Organization for Migration Ethiopia and Ethiopian Forestry Development, amongst others. Special thanks go to all below listed speakers for their insightful insights on the climate-migration nexus in Ethiopia.

Day 3 of the workshop focused on agriculture. Mr Axel Wildner, Counsellor for Food and Agriculture of the German Embassy, shared his thoughts on the global context of food production and security. The given presentations by both PIK experts and experts from our partners were discussed lively from different perspectives.

This day was rounded off with a visit to the Debre Zeit Agricultural Research Center (DZARC) in Bishoftu, where Director Dr Dagne Mojo and his team warmly welcomed the participants. The group had the chance to visit the National Tef Research Program and learned about livestock research in the Center’s cowsheds. The day provided valuable insights into local research capabilities in agricultural research. 

All in all, the goal of arriving at, and advancing, a joint research and collaboration agenda to support the aims of the project and its collaborators in the coming months was achieved. We would like to warmly thank all participants for generously exchanging knowledge, discussing and collaborating!

Below you can find a PDF versions of the presentations held during the workshop.