LocationsResilience, close to the ground: Five young African women trace Africa’s climate response through land, energy, finance and shared authority
September 18, 2026
Rain now arrives as evidence. In Eswatini, hail tears through roofs and farm produce. In Botswana, a season can hold drought and flooding. In rural Kenya, a shrinking harvest reaches into a family’s capacity to pay school fees. In Lesotho, the landscape speaks through thinning soil and the silence where a river used to be. Nthuseng Lizbeth Mothibeli, a Lesotho fellow placed in New York, gives this altered geography its clearest form: “In Lesotho, climate change looks like an empty grain store. In New York, it looks like a flooded subway station.”
The five African Young Women Leaders fellows writing here treat climate change as a force moving through food, health, education, energy and public finance. They also locate Africa’s climate intelligence in farms, wetlands, women’s groups, community enterprises and local committees. Their argument is grounded and ambitious: resilience grows when resources meet lived knowledge and communities hold real authority over the systems shaping their future.
When the season rewrites daily life
Veronica Terenoi Nkooyio, a Kenyan fellow placed in Italy, remembers predictable rains and abundant yields in rural Kenya. As harvests declined, farming households lost income alongside food. Her analysis connects climate adaptation with education, enterprise and intergenerational opportunity. Tinomuda Daphne Gora, from Zimbabwe and placed in Zambia, traces another chain: intense rain can flood peri-urban homes and contaminate water, while prolonged dry spells strain schools, health facilities and hydropower generation. Women and girls frequently carry the extra journeys for water and the care work that follows a shock.
Tumelo Makobo, a Botswana fellow placed in New York, brings the issue to the farm gate. Late rains, sudden downpours and persistent heat shape whether smallholders can harvest an income. Her conclusion is concise: “Equity means rethinking where resources flow.” Climate policy gains meaning through the places where risk is lived and where people are already testing responses.
Equity means rethinking where resources flow.Tumelo Makobo, 4th cohort AfYWL fellow
Ownership is a climate technology
Temantungwa Ndlangamandla, an Eswatini fellow placed in New York, sees community ownership as infrastructure. Rural residents have pooled microfinance to build roads from locally sourced materials and to install solar mini-grids. Roads preserve access to markets, schools and health services through heavy rain. Local energy supports homes, clinics and livelihoods. “What stood out most was the sense of ownership.” She writes from a community experience in which small-scale financing carried expansive consequences: residents could choose, build and maintain assets around their priorities.
Veronica finds the same principle in Kenya’s climate-smart agriculture, renewable-energy hubs and innovation ecosystems. Water harvesting, solar-powered irrigation, clean cooking and cold storage can stabilize livelihoods while pilots are refined through partnerships among communities, academia and industry. “Together, these locally grounded initiatives strengthen environmental resilience while supporting sustainable livelihoods.”
Together, these locally grounded initiatives strengthen environmental resilience while supporting sustainable livelihoods.Veronica Terenoi Nkooyio, 4th cohort AfYWL fellow
In Botswana, conservation agriculture has introduced drought-tolerant crops, mulching, crop rotation and raised beds through practical training and demonstration plots. Tumelo emphasizes design that farmers can use: “What made this approach particularly effective was its accessibility.” In Lesotho, Nthuseng points to the mapping of 950 wetlands across mountain catchments feeding the Polihali Dam. “These wetlands are Lesotho's natural water towers.” They filter water, slow erosion and regulate rivers across borders. Her summation carries the rhythm of the work itself: “Small interventions. Deep roots. That is how resilience gets built.”
Move finance to the work
Public systems can extend these gains. Tinomuda describes conservation farming, drought-tolerant seeds and cooperatives in Zambia, then turns to solar power in rural health facilities and renewable energy for agro-processing, irrigation and cold storage. “Through my exposure to UNDP Zambia’s climate and development work, I have seen adaptation responses that translate policy commitments into practical, life-changing outcomes.” Her framing makes implementation the measure of policy: a vaccine refrigerator that stays powered, water that keeps pumping and a producer able to protect a harvest.
Through my exposure to UNDP Zambia’s climate and development work, I have seen adaptation responses that translate policy commitments into practical, life-changing outcomes.Tinomuda Daphne Gora, 4th cohort AfYWL fellow
Nthuseng names the enabling conditions with equal precision: “Effective climate action in Africa needs two things above all: money that actually arrives, and leadership rooted in the communities most at risk.” Accessible grants, flexible time horizons and accountable local channels can help strong ideas travel from a ward, cooperative or women’s group into durable public systems. Temantungwa adds early-warning systems, climate-responsive infrastructure, and agritech investment. The investment case already has evidence in community roads, solar mini-grids, wetland protection, productive energy and climate-smart farming.
Effective climate action in Africa needs two things above all: money that actually arrives, and leadership rooted in the communities most at risk.Nthuseng Lizbeth Mothibeli, 4th cohort AfYWL fellow
Women carrying knowledge into power
Across the five accounts, young African women connect scales that institutions often separate. Tinomuda sees them carrying grassroots realities into policy conversations and institutional decisions. Veronica writes: “Young African women leaders play a particularly vital role in this space.” Temantungwa is equally direct: “Young African women are central to this transformation.” Their leadership draws authority from technical expertise, community trust and lived experience of how climate shocks travel through care, income and public services.
That leadership calls for seats with decision-making power, sustained financing and routes into national, regional and global climate governance. It also calls for recognition of work already underway. Women are leading tree planting, clean-energy adoption, recycling, farming cooperatives and advocacy. They are translating local priorities into programmes and carrying institutional commitments back into practical delivery.
A climate future already taking shape
These fellows offer a portrait of African climate action rooted in capability. Its materials are familiar: soil, water, sunlight, knowledge, public institutions and collective trust. Its methods are equally clear: share authority, finance local design, connect adaptation with livelihoods and place women’s leadership at the centre of governance.
Africa’s climate future is taking shape through this work — practical, inventive and connected across borders. The invitation to partners is precise: recognize the expertise already building resilience, direct resources toward it and create the conditions for its reach to grow.