Adapting urban areas in Africa to climate change: the case of Kampala

Climate change has added a new layer to the existing challenges in Africa that adaptation is high on the development agenda. Adaptation is necessary to build resilience of cities’ response to climate change. Inland, coastal and mountainous cities face different climate risks ranging from storm surges, droughts, excessive rainfall, heat waves and cold waves. The impacts also range from flooding, storm surges, water scarcity and landslides. The urgency of climate change adaptation promises to revitalize practice in urban development around which innovations in planning, institutional readiness and community resilience are crucial to successful adaptation. Being an inland city, Kampala experiences increased frequency of floods with associated impacts on health, infrastructure and human settlements. Building on early and scalable adaptation measures is paramount to enable communities, institutions, urban authorities and different actors become climate ready while addressing the inherent challenges. In Kampala, community adaptation offers lessons but the requirement for scaling up needs urgent attention by city authorities and government for widespread adaptation.