The project aims to support the Government of Kenya (GoK), five county govern-ments (Laikipia, Samburu, Isiolo, Meru and Nyeri), local communities, and agro-based private enterprises to promote Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) practices and integrated planning for water, energy, agriculture and land use for resilient liveli-hoods in the Ewaso Ng’iro North Catchment Area (ENNCA). Kenya is a water scarce country; 80% of the landmass is classified as arid and semi-arid land (ASAL) and is highly vulnerable to the effects of climate change, including droughts and floods and to land degradation. The project will be implemented in the five Counties that partially or wholly lie in the largely ASAL based Ewaso Ng’iro North Catchment Area (ENNCA) region. It will apply Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) and the nexus approaches for addressing the combination of climate and other pressures in an integrated way. The project will facilitate the co-production of knowledge with stakeholders on the impact of climate change on water, energy, agriculture and land use and the range of EbA measures for resilient livelihoods in the basin. The design of the project, which involves policy makers, local community groups, private sector, and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) in implementation is to ensure that the knowledge generated as part of the project is can be applied in decision- and policy making. The planned measures include: Stakeholder analysis; mobilisation, sensitisation and engagement of different actors, including local communities, gov-ernment officials from the national and county governments working in the different sectors (water, energy, agriculture and land), researchers and agri-business compa-nies etc,; Development of water, energy and food/biomass scenarios simulating dif-ferent interventions and development pathways using the nexus toolkit; Knowledge management, learning and capacity strengthening for stakeholders; and Scaling and transfer of EbA nexus solutions for policy coherence.
The key long term impact of the project is “People, animals and ecosystems in the Ewaso Ng’iro North Catchment Area have adequate water and energy to ensure food security, are resilient to the impacts of climate change, and develop within a low carbon green economy.” The project supports through its EbA / Nexus approach climate smart water, energy, and food systems. This has been achieved through the active participation of a broad range of policy and decision making organs in the public sector, as well as key players in the private sector, the civil society and local communities at different levels and scales. These stakeholder institutions are supported by the knowledge generated and shared about the socioecological dynamics and socioeconomic developments and their impacts on the natural resources, ecosystems services and human securities with a view to promoting policy integration and mainstreaming of the EbA nexus approach into the existing policy frameworks, strategies and action plans and foster coordination and collaboration across water, energy, food and environment.
PIK will in particular contribute to the development of climate, water, energy, and food/biomass scenarios, to the simulation of different interventions and development pathways, as well as to the analysis and interpretation of simulation results and to the knowledge transfer.
