Climate Change, Resilience and Informality

Enhanced awareness and advocacy for community driven resilience approaches: In line with the Global Year of Action, Cities Alliance members and strategic partners will feed the international discussion with results from ground.

Stronger Partnerships: Local Innovations for New Climate Realities in Cities: Through our call for innovation, we provide small grants to selected grantees through a competitive call for proposal in cities of the Greater Horn of Africa and the Bay of Bengal.

The Cities Alliance Community Upgrading Fund (CUF) is expanding its activities to finance climate adaptation projects in two Monrovia communities, West Point and King Gray Town. The move aims to help informal coastal communities build their resilience and better adapt to climate shocks. The expansion and the subsequent Call for Proposals for community projects related to climate adaptation was made public at an inception workshop on 15 September 2020 in Monrovia. 

Financing for much-needed climate adaptation projects

The urban poor, who often live in informal housing in precarious locations with little or no access to basic services, are most at risk from the impacts of climate change. Heavy rains can turn into disastrous floods or a devastating mudslide, especially in a crowded slum settlement with poor drainage.

With its focus on climate resilience, the CUF’s 2020 Call for Proposals will help two of Monrovia’s most at-risk coastal settlements identify vulnerabilities and craft community-driven responses that improve their adaptive capacity. 

The proposals should address the potential impacts of climate change on women, young people, vulnerable and underrepresented groups in urban poor communities. The selected projects should be inclusive and create opportunities for engagement with local governments and other relevant stakeholders. They should also demonstrate the potential to catalyse transformational change.

Cities need resilient environmental, social, and economic systems and infrastructure, that can withstand shocks and stresses, especially when seen through the eyes of the urban poor. Any infrastructure investment must be therefore designed and planned in a manner that is sustainable, climate resilient and capable to promote a low carbon growth trajectory. With upcoming large infrastructure investments, the need arises to deepen the discussion around existing practices, challenges and reform needs for social and environmental safeguards, accompanying these investments.

Therefore, we commission a deep dive study on the role of safeguards for the infrastructure challenge ahead.