The Department of Forestry, fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) has developed a range of easy-to-use tools such as the Greenbook, the “Let’s Respond Toolkit” and the Municipal Climate Finance training manual to assist and provide support to municipalities to pivot from planning to implementation. This is what the minister of DFFE, Barbara Creecy, said last week during her address at the annual Garden Route Environmental Management and Climate Change Indaba 2023.
Held at the Nelson Mandela University, George campus, the event was organised by the Garden Route Environmental Forum (GREF) Secretariat. GREF gives a platform to scientists, local government practitioners, businesses, labour and the community to exchange ideas, build partnerships and collaborative efforts across the community of the Southern Cape. Creecy acknowledged the role played by GREF in planning to build climate resilience in Southern Cape.
The devastating impact of climate change
The event took place against the backdrop of recent devastating climate change-induced disasters that hit some parts of the country, notably KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) and the Western Cape provinces. These have impacted livelihoods, destroyed homes and local infrastructure as well as disrupted the provision of essential services such as water, food and energy.
Pre-industrial times
Creecy said climate change is no longer a distant reality as everyone knows that drought, severe wildfires and, more recently, flooding are part of our lived experience. She said according to the sixth international panel on climate change report, the world has already warmed on average by 1.1 degrees above pre-industrial times. In Southern Africa, she said, temperatures are increasing at twice the global average.
Alien forestry plantations
The minister said South Africa will experience climate change impacts differently in different parts of the country because it is a mega biodiverse country. She said this requires developing climate change resilience plans tailor-made for each local area. “Here in the Southern Cape we are part of the fynbos biome so we already know that wildfires are natural phenomena that will intensify as a result of both intermittent drought and the presence of alien forestry plantations,” said Creecy. The region will also face storm surges and gradual sea level rise as the polar ice caps melt, she added.
National climate change adaptation strategy
She said nationally her department has made tremendous progress in developing climate change adaptation architecture following the adoption of the national climate change adaptation strategy by cabinet in 2020. Once passed into law, the climate change bill, will ensure a legal framework is in place for integrating climate resilience planning and resourcing at all levels of government, said minister Creecy.
“Because climate impacts have local specificity, municipal governments are the frontline responders to the effects of climate change, and their actions will determine whether or not we have sustainable development pathways and whether we are helping local communities to understand the challenges that lie ahead and the importance for them to build resilience now”, added Creecy. She said they are concerned about the rise of sea levels which will impact coastal communities. To mitigate this, she said, they are focusing their efforts to specifically build the capacity of Western Cape municipalities to understand local vulnerability and plan to build climate resilient infrastructure.
Early warning mechanisms
Furthermore, Creecy said, the DFFE in partnership with the municipality are developing projects that will build early warning mechanisms to detect and manage wild fires as part of our climate change adaptation programmes. She said she has also worked with the department of tourism to develop climate change risk and vulnerability assessment report to help them understand how climate change will impact on the tourism sector and how we can take early action to save jobs and value chains.
Empowering local communities
The minister highlighted the importance of empowering local communities to understand how natural disasters will affect them in the future, saying this will definitely save lives and resources. She said social networks and state-citizen collaboration can help build climate resilience within vulnerable communities. She cited the role played by a locally based group, Enviro Champs, during the April floods in KZN. Trained and supported by the city of eThekwini and the University of KZN, according to Creecy, the group successfully used the FEWS early warning system to successfully evacuate residents from their homes in the Quarry Road West Informal Settlement.
She said through the dedication of the Enviro Champs volunteers as well as the early warning systems developed by the scientists not a single resident drowned when Palmiet River washed away 450 homes in the early hours of the 12 April 2022. Sadly, in the adjacent communities where this partnership did not exist the situation ended differently, she claimed.
Vulnerable communities
She called on other communities to adopt this climate resilience partnership to ensure that vulnerable communities do not have to be powerless in the face of the climate emergency. The minister concluded by thanking the GREF saying their model is worthy of emulation and should be replicated to other province.
