Africa-Asia Drought Risk Management Peer Assistance Network

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Recognizing the increasing threats of extreme climatic events worldwide, the UNDP/DDC has launched the Africa-Asia Drought Risk Management Peer Assistance Network (AADP), with financial support from the Government of Japan. This Network was formulated as part of the three-year Africa-Asia Drought Risk Management (DRM) Peer Assistance Project (2010-2013). The objective of the project is to mitigate the risks of drought and improve human livelihoods in Africa and Asia by creating an enabling environment for inter-regional knowledge sharing among drought-prone countries and facilitating the up-scaling of proven DRM best practices in the two regions.

A rich collection of knowledge-based resources already exists in Asia for DRM and resilience building, both at policy and practice levels, many of which are deemed applicable in the African context, and vice versa. Yet much of this potential remains unrealized, in part due to lack of formalized institutional mechanisms to promote south-south cooperation and exchange across the regions.

In order to help link knowledge producers and users beyond regional boundaries, AADP aims to establish a robust, yet flexible, inter-regional network for DRM, building on the pool of experiences and expertise of the ongoing African Drought Risk and Development Network (ADDN) initiative. The network will work closely with ongoing and upcoming UNDP/non-UNDP programmes and projects and provide them with a variety of peer learning and capacity development support, based on their specific thematic priorities, operational gaps and capacity needs.


How We Work

Mirroring the established operational modality of the ADDN, a wide variety of activities are undertaken within the AADP framework to promote communication, interaction and networking among the network users.

Monthly AADP Newsletter
The AADP e-Newsletter is dedicated to informing the practitioners and decision-working in/for drought prone countries in Africa and Asia of the opportunities for DRM networking, training/workshops and employment at various levels.

Africa-Asia Drought Adaptation Forum
AADP is committed to convene the Drought Adaptation Forum at the Africa-Asia inter-regional level on an annual basis. The First Africa-Asia Drought Adaptation Forum was held in Bangkok, Thailand, on June 14-15, 2011. It intended to help establish effective modalities for identifying, exchanging and up-scaling good DRM practices within and between affected countries in the two regions.

In the face of catastrophic drought crisis in the Horn of Africa (HoA) region, the ADDN Secretariat, UN-ISDR and the UNDP-DDC, jointly organized the Fourth Africa Drought Adaptation (ADAF4) in Nairobi, Kenya, on October 13-14, 2011. AADP supported the ADAF4 by bringing in the resource persons with knowledge and expertise in different aspects of DRM from Africa and Asia, whose experiences and insights provided a strong ground based on which to map out the practical solutions to overcome the barriers and constraints for sustainable DRM in the HoA.

The Second Africa-Asia Drought Adaptation Forum was held in Nairobi, Kenya, on October 1-2, 2012. Building on the deliberations and recommendations from the First Africa-Asia Drought Adaptation Forum and ADAF4, the main objective of the forum was to develop a common vision and strengthened partnership among a dynamic and diverse set of participants engaged in different aspects of DRM issues towards sustainable drought-resilient development in the HoA specifically as well as at Africa and Asia levels more broadly.

Knowledge Products 
Various DRM knowledge products have been developed based on the data and information gathered through different AADP activities to promote awareness raising, policy dialogue and up-scaling of successful pilot practices.

Mainstreaming Drought Risk Management: A Primer (2011) provides a basic roadmap for mainstreaming DRM concept and principles into development planning and programming at different levels. It outlines the steps to define drought risks within a given context and presents a methodology for translating the risk assessment results into specific policy measures, planning instruments and measurable interventions.

Drought Risk Management: Practitioner's Perspectives from Africa and Asia (2012) reviews the current drought-related institutional and programmatic landscape in Africa and Asia, highlights important similarities in DRM capacity gaps and gap-filling opportunities across Africa and Asia and identifies priority areas to which the inter-regional south-south cooperation could add value.

Please visit Sustainable Land Management Library to view other resources.

In-field Exchange Events
AADP organizes small-scale inter-regional knowledge exchange events such as study tours and targeted seminars, together with various partners. These events allow countries and communities with common DRM interests and needs to learn from each other's experiences, expertise and skills and help scale up and out the proven DRM approaches and methodologies into development projects, programming and policy frameworks.

The first inter-regional DRM study tour was hosted by the Government of Kenya in October 2012 with the aim to foster partnership between China and drought-prone countries in Sub-Saharan Africa by promoting inter-regional dialogue on specific drought issues of mutual concern among key DRM-focused government and non-government actors.

The second study tour is scheduled to be held in China in July 2013.