Across Africa, communities have long adapted to climate variability and change through local knowledge, collective action and Indigenous practices. Yet these forms of resilience often remain under-recognised in climate planning and under-supported by adaptation finance. Together, the reality of localised climate impacts, the strength of local knowledge, the need for locally appropriate solutions, and the ‘uneven playing field’ of climate finance have fuelled the locally led adaptation (LLA) movement.

This report, Locally led adaptation in African communities: Insights from practice, presents the experiences of practitioners in the CDKN network innovating tailored approaches to LLA across diverse African contexts. These voices are not normally heard in regional and international debates; the report gives them a platform. In this way, it seeks to deepen and enrich international understanding of LLA by highlighting how communities are innovating with hybrid knowledge systems that combine Indigenous knowledge, lived experience and scientific information. The report also shows why social equity is a core condition of LLA and a necessary feature of its enduring outcomes. 

Recommendations

For local implementing actors and the intermediaries who work with them:

• Support communities to advance conversations about climate change in their own language, framed with their own cultural references and dominant concerns, to stimulate a constructive cycle of interest, innovation, learning and action in climate change adaptation.
• Promote LLA action within existing community institutions – formal and informal – that are well used and respected by local people, with a view to sustaining capacity over time.

For funding partners:

• Be guided by the diversity of local contexts. Start with community knowledge, priorities and lived experience as the basis for designing and evaluating initiatives. Where relevant, steer funding toward local intermediary organisations that can do this.
• Recognise that vulnerability to climate change, as well as the capacity to lead adaptation, is shaped by intersecting social, economic, and cultural factors that go beyond single factors such as gender or age. 

The report is also available in French and Portuguese:

• L'adaptation menée au niveau local dans les communautés africaines: Enseignements tirés de la pratique 
• Adaptação liderada a nível local nas comunidades africanas: Reflexões a partir da prática