Africa is especially vulnerable to the disastrous aftereffects of climate change. Not only is Africa just more susceptible to rising temperatures due to its geography, but many of its countries also suffer greatly due to a lack of economic safety nets. Let’s shed some light on how the most affected African countries navigate this crisis.

Why is Africa So Impacted?

Multiple factors make Africa’s position dire in the face of climate change. The climate itself works against it; developing countries struggle to match the losses, and political issues ravage the continent. Together, these factors pose a unique challenge for the entire continent.

• Disproportionate impact due to geography. Africa heats up at a faster rate than other regions, hitting a temperature increase rate of +0.4C per decade. Other regions, such as the Americas and Asia, see only around +0.2C increases at the same timeframe.
• The high cost of climate change solutions. Many developing countries in Africa are unable to cope with the additional costs of climate change relief. For example, Chad’s position is ranked most concerning, with widespread famine and staggering poverty statistics.
• Political issues. Political instability in countries like Somalia, Syria, Chad, and the Democratic Republic of Congo exacerbates the problem even further. Political struggles and uprisings do not give any breathing room for climate change relief.

All these issues combined make Africa the most vulnerable continent on Earth. The continent’s rising population faces many unfortunate consequences of climate change: water, shelter, and access to necessities are massive problems for many of its people.

Vectors of Economic Impact On Africa

The ecological damage caused by climate change and its impact on Africa’s wildlife is massive, but we’ll focus on the region’s economy in this section. The changing climate can be described as a multi-directional attack on the economies of African states. Its sweeping consequences are most painful in the following aspects of Africa’s economy:

Agriculture and Food Security

The most basic of necessities are under attack in Africa. Countries like Somalia, South Sudan, and Ethiopia struggle with intensifying droughts on top of political instability. The island of Madagascar wrestles with what has been dubbed the “world’s first climate-change-induced famine.”

Climate change isn’t just droughts: in some regions, like Mozambique, they manifest in flooding and cyclones, causing massive damage to agriculture and infrastructure. The warming ocean also poses a danger as many African rural communities rely on fisheries. Climate change contributes to rapidly depleting fish stocks.

Job Security And Worker Conditions

The previous point ties directly into Africa’s labor market problems. Over 60 percent of sub-Saharan Africa’s population are farmers; any damage to the land, livestock, and agriculture in general means loss of livelihood for millions. Cities in developing countries are not safe from the impact, either. Urban centers become overcrowded due to waves of ecological refugees. Unemployment, unsanitary and hazardous working conditions are commonplace in developing cities.

Resource Scarcity and Conflict

Degradation of land and loss of drinking water can cause the most extreme of issues: resource wars. For instance, the conflict around Lake Chad was partly caused by the fact that this lake has shrunk by over 90% since the 1960s! The heightened tensions around this precious resource gave rise to extremist notions. While not all conflicts result in all-out wars, resource pressure heightens the social issues all around, resulting in social unrest, ethnic tensions, and other “threat multipliers.”

These problems combine and compound one another, leaving those at risk scrambling for solutions. Africans impacted by climate change’s economic aftershocks often turn to risky activities, like gambling, to make a living in the absence of other options.

At the same time, the increased internet reach has given rise to online betting. Many young Africans turn to gambling as a quick way to make money. But, online gambling has introduced a whole slew of new issues itself: the need for regulation of online casino providers and mental health concerns.

Climate Change Mitigation and Economic Resurgence

Thankfully, it’s not all doom and gloom for the continent. African leaders are taking steps to face the challenges, though their nature is so great that massive and continuous effort is needed. International organizations, NGOs, and private companies also chip in and invest in the continent’s climate future. Most of these solutions are aimed at helping the impacted populations; some have been decided to address the issues head-on. These key initiatives include:

1. African Union’s Climate Change and Resilient Development Strategy. This pan-African international strategy was created to address the continent’s issues in unison. Climate change, political instability, and economic downturns are in the crosshairs of the African Union.
2. Africa Adaptation Initiative. This initiative was created to improve the stability of the continent’s agriculture sector. With AAI, African leaders opened the dialogue on disaster risk reduction and water resource management – among other goals – in 2015.
3. The Great Green Wall Initiative. This initiative is one of the largest-scale projects in human history. Members of the Green Wall seek to restore over a billion hectares of land in just a decade and stop the looming desertification process.

African leaders and allies came together for many more projects like these, including ARC, AFR100, ACCF, and others. While it’s too early to draw any conclusions about their effectiveness yet, we are hopeful Africa and its partners will pull through.

Summing Up Africa And Climate Change

Africa is in a unique position in the face of climate change. The climate phenomena not only disproportionately affect the continent, but they also are compounded by issues like political discord in the region. As a result, Africans are disproportionately affected by the economic damage caused by climate change.

The damage is threefold: it affects the land and resources, the labour market and causes a climate refugee crisis. African leaders had to come up with impressive solutions to the growing problem, creating some of the biggest collaborations in human history. Africa has immense potential and is known for its resilience – which inspires some hope in these initiatives’ futures.

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According to the United Nations, about 80 percent of the world’s food is produced by family farms, so the impact of climate change on agriculture could have consequences that reach far beyond individual farmers and their families. Unless humans take significant steps to change course and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the situation could continue to worsen. No one knows for sure what impact this will have on future food supplies, but models from the International Food Policy Research Institute estimate that global corn production could decline by 24 percent by 2050.

Challenges facing African farmers

Farmers in sub-Saharan Africa are particularly vulnerable, in part because they rely heavily on rainfed agriculture instead of irrigation. In central Tanzania, the rainy season typically lasts from November to April, after which the weather becomes too dry to support crop production. Each year, farmers must produce enough food from their annual harvest to feed their families until the next season. In favorable years, farmers have enough grain left over to sell as income, but when the harvest fails, families often experience the annual “hunger season,” a time of skipping meals and replacing them until the next harvest.

Each year has its own challenges, but thanks to climate change, farmers now face greater difficulties due to three main threats:

Extreme weather: Unstable weather is a sign of climate change, and it can manifest itself in many ways: droughts, floods, severe storms, heat waves, cooling, and frost. Extreme weather events are expected to become more frequent as the Earth’s atmosphere warms. Farmers in Eastern and Southern Africa are already feeling the effects – in 2016, the region experienced the worst drought in decades, which sharply reduced crops and left many families hungry.

Pests and diseases: Changes in temperature and humidity conditions can facilitate the migration of crop diseases and pests to new areas. Recently, the bed borer, an invasive caterpillar that can devastate maize crops if left unchecked, spread in sub-Saharan Africa. We still don’t know exactly what caused this outbreak, but some scientists have linked its spread to climate change.
Higher temperatures in the long term: Average global temperatures are expected to rise over the coming decades, which could lead to desertification and reduced crop yields in sub-Saharan Africa. If global temperatures rise by 4 degrees Celsius by 2100, corn yields in some African countries are likely to decline by more than 20 percent, according to the study.

What will happen next

Increased access to better agricultural inputs and agricultural training can help improve yields and sometimes mitigate the impact of extreme weather.

While the future may look uncertain, it is not too late to change course. Governments, institutions, and private sector groups should incorporate support for smallholders into their broader efforts to combat climate change. Providing farmers with access to the necessary financing, tools and training will help ensure that millions of rural families can sustainably harvest crops for years to come.

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Residents of these areas – the poorest neighborhoods of coastal cities and low-lying islands – are most vulnerable to the adverse effects of the planet’s changing climate and have little or no ability to mobilize the necessary resources to adapt to these effects, a recently released report found. They live in a world where climate change is leading to increasing adverse impacts that will threaten food supplies in sub-Saharan Africa, arable land and water resources in South Asia and South-East Asia over the next three decades, and extreme weather events threaten their homes and lives.

The effects of climate change are already being felt in different parts of the world today, with only a 0.8°C increase in global average temperature compared to the pre-industrial era. Unless strong global action is taken, many of us will feel the more severe effects of a 2°C rise in global average temperature (which will happen in 20-30 years), and by the end of this century temperatures will have risen by 4°C above pre-industrial levels.

Sub-Saharan Africa

In sub-Saharan Africa, according to the researchers, the main problem will be food supply, due to the presence of hazards such as droughts, floods, rainfall variations.

According to the researchers, if global average temperatures rise by 1.5-2°C as a result of droughts and the expansion of drylands, the area under maize, millet and sorghum cultivation will be reduced by 40-80% by the 2030s-2040s.

According to numerous studies, a 4°C increase in global average temperature, which could occur around the 2080s, could reduce annual rainfall by 30% in southern Africa and increase rainfall in eastern Africa. Changes in rangeland ecosystems, in particular a decrease in grass savanna with an increase in sparse forest savanna as a result of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide emissions, could reduce cattle feed supplies.

Southeast Asia

In South-East Asia, coastal cities will suffer from the adverse effects of climate change.

A 30-centimeter rise in sea level, which could occur by 2040 unless vigorous action is taken, will lead to widespread flooding of major cities and saltwater flooding of lowland crops, leading to crop failure. The Mekong Delta area of Vietnam, one of the world’s rice-growing centers, will be particularly affected by sea-level rise. A sea level rise of 30 centimeters will result in the loss of about 11% of agricultural production. At the same time, the intensity of storms is likely to increase.

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