ARUA-CD: Building African Capacity for Climate and Development Challenges

ARUA气候与发展卓越中心（ARUA-CD）应对三重挑战，即实现公平的发展，抵御现有和预期的气候风险和影响，并降低碳排放，从而减少非洲对全球变暖的贡献。从本质上讲，ARUA-CD是一个战略性的泛非合作应对非洲大陆的气候和发展挑战以及应对这些挑战所需的紧迫知识和能力需求。在整个非洲，从事气候变化与发展之间复杂相互关系研究的专业人员和研究人员人数相对较少。需要更多的专业知识来：（i）了解威胁非洲大陆当前和未来福祉的气候和发展挑战;（ii）与社会共同产生关于如何应对这些新风险和挑战的知识;（iii）共同设计、评估和维持跨越可持续发展目标的特定背景和文化上适当的创新和解决方案。由非洲主导的、跨越地方、国家和跨国规模的跨学科研究可以帮助做到这一点，为有效的气候变化政策、战略和行动提供必要的证据和动力，支持社会创新和适应新的不确定未来。开普敦大学（非洲气候与发展倡议是欧洲委员会秘书处和南部非洲区域中心），加纳大学（环境与卫生研究所是西非区域中心）和内罗毕大学（气候变化与适应研究所是东非区域中心）。欧洲委员会的每个成员在气候变化与发展方面都有广泛的现有能力、地方和国际网络以及研究和学生教学经验，这为协同和互动提供了机会，并为进一步发展奠定了基础。每个区域中心都按照“中心辐射”模式与本区域的其他ARUA大学和非ARUA大学建立联系，整个中心将这些群体聚集在一个泛非实践社区中。通过这一点，我们设想ARUA-CD作为一个领导者和灵感来源，为非洲的气候变化和发展挑战提供变革性的解决方案。本建议中所述的活动都有助于《非洲区域行动纲领》的核心重点，即建设非洲应对气候和发展挑战的能力。通过成功实施这些活动，该项目旨在建设非洲开展比较性、参与性和变革性研究的能力，以加强决策、政策进程和科学的影响，实现公平和气候抗御未来的目标。这些活动旨在支持有能力和有技能的非洲学者和专业人员面对现状，寻求最先进的解决方案，以应对非洲气候变化带来的复杂挑战。在改善培训和能力建设的愿景中，我们希望扩大和加强非洲在区域和全球平台上的声音。要成功执行这一方案，就需要努力与专家、决策者、从业人员和目标明确的社区建立开放和建设性的伙伴关系，以查明研究差距，共同设计项目，共同创造知识，并采用适合具体情况的解决办法。这些活动的最终目标是建立一个强大和包容性的高等教育机构和其他合作伙伴网络，致力于非洲各地的气候变化问题和解决方案。

The ARUA Centre of Excellence in Climate and Development (ARUA-CD) tackles the triple challenge of enabling development that is equitable, resilient to existing and expected climate risks and impacts, and is low in carbon emissions such that African contributions to global warming is reduced. Essentially, ARUA-CD is a strategic, collaborative pan-African response to the climate and development challenges of the continent and the urgent knowledge and capacity needs required to address these. The community of professionals and researchers working on the complex interrelationships between climate change and development is relatively small throughout Africa. Greater expertise is needed to: (i) understand the climate and development challenges threatening the continent's current and future well-being; (ii) co-produce knowledge with society on how to respond to these new risks and challenges, and (iii) co-design, evaluate and sustain context-specific and culturally appropriate innovations and solutions that cut across the SDGs. African-led, engaged transdisciplinary research that spans local, national and transnational scales can help do this by providing the evidence and impetus required for effective climate change policies, strategies and actions that support societal innovation and adaptation to a new and uncertain future.The ARUA-CD consists of three core partners; the University of Cape Town (the African Climate and Development Initiative is the CoE Secretariat and Southern African regional hub), the University of Ghana (the Institute for Environment and Sanitation Studies is the West African regional hub, and the University of Nairobi (the Institute for Climate Change and Adaptation is the East African regional hub). Each of these CoE members have extensive existing capacity, local and international networks and research and student teaching experience in climate change and development, which provides opportunities for synergy and interaction and a foundation on which to build. Each of the regional hubs reach out to other ARUA and non-ARUA universities in their region following a 'hub and spoke' model, with the Centre as a whole bringing these groups together in a pan-African community of practice. Through this, we envisage the ARUA-CD as a leader and source of inspiration for transformative solutions to the challenges of climate change and development in Africa. The activities described in this proposal all contribute to the core focus of the ARUA-CD, that is, building African capacity for climate and development challenges. Through successful implementation of these activities, this project aims to build capacity in Africa for comparative, engaged and transformative research that enhances decision-making; policy processes and science for impact, towards the goal of an equitable and climate resilient future. These activities build towards supporting capable and skilled African scholars and professionals in confronting the status quo and pursuing state-of-the-art solutions to the complex challenges posed by climate change in Africa. In the vision of improved training and capacity building, we hope to amplify and strengthen African voices in both regional and global platforms. The successful execution of this programme requires efforts in developing open and constructive partnerships with experts, decision-makers, practitioners and with well-targeted communities in order to identify research gaps, co-design projects, co-create knowledge and apply context-appropriate solutions. The activities are designed with the end goal of building a robust and inclusive network of higher education institutions and other partners working on climate change problems and solutions across Africa.