DURBAN, South Africa (PAMACC News) - African experts in indigenous knowledge have begun steps that will culminate in the establishment of a Pan-African Indigenous Knowledge Systems-Informed Climate Information Service (IKS-CIS) platform.

The experts have also developed Natural Resource Management and Sustainable Livelihood and Communications strategies that will work hand in hand with the IKS-CIS platform.

The experts have also resolved to develop an IKS-CIS curriculum and spearhead teaching of IKS-CIS in African universities and other institutions to promote indigenous knowledge in promoting climate information.

The experts developed the above after a two-day workshop in Durban, South Africa last week.

Prof Hassan Kaya, Director of the Department of Science and Technology-National Research Foundation (DST-NRF) Centre in Indigenous Knowledge Systems (CIKS), University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), South Africa emphasized the importance of African IKS-CIS.

“Conventional weather services need to be more relevant and accessible to African local communities. We need to harness indigenous knowledge weather forecasting practices that are inbuilt in African indigenous cultures, established after long years of observation of their respective natural environments,” Kaya, who is also the chair and convener of the Durban workshop, said.

He noted it is mostly the only knowledge accessible, affordable and actionable source of weather and climate information for sustainable community livelihood.

“Most African local communities tend to perceive conventional weather information as unreliable and untimely. African local communities in their diverse ecosystems and   cultures make use of biotic indicators to predict future weather conditions. However, research also reveals increasing pessimism about the viability of indigenous weather forecasting mechanisms,” Kaya said.

Prof Joseph Matowanyika, of the Zimbabwe-based Chinhoyi University of Technology, Indigenous Knowledge Systems, Environment and Lifelong Learning Department, attributed the above scenarios to a number of factors.

“This is due to the extinction of some biotic species that were used for weather forecasting and expansion of modern education and monotheistic religions which undermines the claimed rationality of indigenous knowledge,” Matowanyika said.

He added, “It is also due to the precarious survival of indigenous weather forecasting skills is further undermined by poverty and lack of clear knowledge transfer mechanisms and poor documentation of  indigenous knowledge-related climate  information.

Kaya observed that the limitations of both (indigenous and conventional) weather information service systems require research on the status of indigenous weather forecasting practices among different African ecosystems and cultures and ecosystems.

“This should be done before they vanish beyond recovery; and integrating the experience of modern science and indigenous knowledge for more rigorous weather forecasting. It is this consideration which led to the initiative of developing a Pan-Africa IKS-CIS platform,” Kaya said.

The platform will serve as a coordinating tool for interfacing conventional/existing weather information services and indigenous knowledge systems-based climate change information services. This will make conventional weather information services more culturally and ecologically relevant and accessible.

“The platform will assist in building an interactive multi-media database informed by the nature and processes of production, sharing, storage and application of IKS-informed climate information which are culturally and linguistically specific,” Matowanyika said.

“The holistic and multidisciplinary nature of IKS provides the platform with the opportunity to engage diverse stakeholders from across disciplines, cultures and ecological zones for the sustainability of the platform,” Kaya said.

He added that the complementarity of knowledge systems makes the platform a unique tool for climate change research, innovation, policy development and human capital development.

“The interactive multi-media database will have the capacity to synthesize modern climatic information systems informed by community-based knowledge systems that will be applicable across biomes and regions,” Matowanyika said.

He added, “The identified gaps and strengths of the two climate information systems will be accommodated by the complementarity of the knowledge systems to mitigate climate change and variability.”

The experts pointed out that the platform will help Africa better understand climate change and policy taking and making.

“This platform is in line with the broader objectives of the Weather and Climate Information Services for Africa (WISER) Pan-Africa component which includes the strengthening of climate information governance and providing an enabling environment for climate information services uptake and use in Africa,” Kaya said.

Dr Mayashree Chinsamym a research manager at DST-NRF, CIKS noted the platform will provide an understanding of the importance of IKS in explaining the symbiotic relationship between ecosystems and human dynamics for climate change adaptation and mitigation.

“This includes the correlation between habitat, ecosystem services, culture including language, natural resources and their collective impact on community livelihood in terms of food security and nutrition and energy needs in the face of climate change and variability,” Chinsamym said.

Dr Yvette Smith and Dr David Smith of the DST-NRF, CIKS, noted the platform will facilitate research and documentation of African cultural and ecological histories, including indicators of natural early warning systems and innovative adaptation strategies to climate variability and change.

“It will also provide a clear and broad conceptualization of climate change and variability in the African context across time. This will provide foundation for devising policy strategies which are culturally and ecologically specific,” Yvette said.

She added that the platform will also identify IKS-based commonalities in ecologically and culturally comparable zones for climate change policy development and implementation.

David said the holistic and multidisciplinary nature of an IKS and climate change platform gives stakeholders from diverse backgrounds including disciplines, sectors and cultures across the continent, an opportunity to engage in innovative climate information service policy development.

Dr Richard Muita of the Institute for Meteorological Training and Research, Kenya pointed out that the involvement of local communities, as producers and end users of climate information is important.

“This should happen at all stages of developing the IKS climate change platform to create community ownership and sustainability of the process including policy development and implementation. This will mitigate the disjuncture between policy makers and communities,” Muita said.

The experts noted that IKS-CIS platform will allow collaboration between East Africa and Pan African Wiser components in knowledge management (KM) and offer guidelines for engagement with other initiatives such as BRACED, Future Climate for Africa (FCFA) among others.

It will also align itself with other KM strategies and processes in CIS, build on experiences of other KM initiatives in CIS (e.g. the Africa Adapt), and have mechanisms for reporting back on the performance of the IKS-Informed CIS platform and mechanisms for engaging with the wider CIS community through communications.

“This will be done through close coordination and collaboration with established initiatives and institutions at national and regional, continental and international levels and participation in the ongoing human capacity development initiatives such as curriculum development, short courses and training,” Matowanyika said.

Kaya said the platform’s broader achievements will be through formalised partnerships, networking and communication with ongoing initiatives for KM brokerage.

“We will be able to interface IKS-related climate information with conventional CIS to facilitate the transformation of existing CIS to become more accessible and relevant to local communities, achieved through co-production and co-design for strengthening and improving CIS with due consideration for international property rights (IPR),” Kaya said.

Faustine Ninga- United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Tanzania said the platform will develop joint monitoring, evaluation and learning strategies that produce specific IKS-informed CIS with clear indicators, best practices and models.

“We will undertake a SWOT (Strength Weaknesses Opportunities and Threats) analysis of other KM initiatives in CIS Facilitating continuous participation of all stakeholders in co-production and co-design in the performance and relevance of the IKS-Informed CIS platform,” Ninga said.

Ninga also noted that there are mechanisms for reporting back on the performance of the IKS-Informed CIS platform.

“Regular monitoring and reporting of IKS-informed indicators and best practices, feedback from end-users through multi-media channels, annual, intermediate and end-term performance evaluation of the IKS-CIS and biannual internal meetings,” he said.

Protus Onyango of the Pan-African Media Alliance for Climate Change (PAMACC), Kenya said the IKS-CIS communication strategy will be representative and gender sensitive in its application.

“The communication strategy will be accessible and relevant IKS-informed communication multimedia system using integrated information and communication technologies and platforms that target diverse co-producers and end user groups and stakeholders that is culturally and linguistically acceptable in terms of norms and values,” Onyango said.

He added, “It will also address targeted diverse end user groups and stakeholders, be culturally and linguistically acceptable in terms of norms and values and engage strategically with journalists and the media in general.”

Pan-Africa IKS-CIS knowledge management and communication Strategy will encompass a synthesis of climate knowledge systems, which includes IKS, citizen science and conventional climate science.  

The strategy will use local community radio stations, social media platforms like mobile phones, WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter and mainstream media.  

The target audiences include farming and other community members, opinion leaders, urbanized and rural communities, women farmers, youth, traditional leaders, traditional health practitioners and schools.

Others are researchers, policy and decision-makers, government, specialist users of climate information, transport sectors, communication experts, and the media, funders and donors (resource mobilization), development agencies, traders, conservation NGOs, tourism and energy sectors among others.

The meeting is a follow up on an earlier workshop organized by the African Climate Policy Center (ACPC) of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) on a knowledge management (KM) partnerships and communications in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in May.