Radio Miraya
2702: Climate, Peace and Security Workshop by UNMISS: Using Analytical and Data-driven Approaches
The Civil Affairs Division of Enemies is conducting a climate peace and security training workshop from the 23rd of April to the 25th of April. Well, the training is geared towards government, civil society organizations, national, NGOs and academia. Now, the objective of the meeting is to equip government counterparts and civil society organizations with knowledge and capacity on climate, peace and security to facilitate the integration of climate, peace and security perspectives into their activities and using analytical and data-driven approaches. Well, to discuss more about this subject, we are joined by the climate security expert at Anvis Ratiya, Tae Kannet, good morning and welcome to the program. That's for having me today here. Right. So, just can you tell us more about this upcoming workshop next week? Yeah, sure, absolutely. So, this is an initiative that really, just to give some background, began last year and initially when the climate security adviser started out with the mission, we first started really building the capacity at the UNCT and also with an UNMIS itself to really get just our community inside the UN to really understand what is climate peace and security integrate this within our own work and then also start building out. So, this is sort of like the second phase of the training that's geared more now towards the national stakeholders and our target really is working with government, both at the national and state level. The CSOs who also work at the frontlines and the NGOs who work at the frontlines and also tapping into the institutions, the academia, the think tanks that are based here in Juba, because they already have a community of people, of trainers and they work at the local level. So, really wanting to broaden our scope and our reach to target our local level and this was basically their genesis of the second iteration of the workshop. All right, so what role does the analytical and data driven approaches play in addressing climate peace and security challenges? I think for starters first, for us in a peacekeeping mission, we need to have the required capabilities and the operational resilience to just operate first effectively, say in the case of flooding and using data helps us to do this, right? So, we are able to tap into different sets of data, both at the climate side, at the security side, integrates this and also make informed decisions because we realize that, you know, when you are working in silos, when we are working just with the climate data and we're not looking at the conflict dynamics, we're not looking at how these two interplay, we are at risk of making misguided decisions that do more harm to the people that we want to serve, you know? So, integrating this various components of data, be it from a peacekeeping perspective, be it from a humanitarian perspective, we are able to make very sound decisions both at the policy level, help us really also come in early, you know, rather than wait up until the floods have come, we don't know what to do about this, you know, so it also helps us to prepare ourselves much better and also be on the ground at a sooner time than otherwise, we would and we rely on data to make those informed decisions. Right, so what are the goals of this training workshop and how do you choose a targeted audience? Oh man, the target audience, I can say this was more like a pilot to see how it's gonna turn out and because we want to branch out not focused just on the national dynamics, you know, South Sudan is big, our team is very small still and we cannot be able to reach everyone at a goal, so we really brainstorm within our team to see what's the easier approach for us to start with and we took the concept of a training of trainers model to see how we can basically build a pool of instructors who can then teach this material to the people on the ground, they can go back to their respective institutions, they can go back to their communities and impart knowledge and so when you look at an institution like the SUD Institute, that's one of the people who will be attained in the training, they work with a lot of trainers at the national and the local level and so for us tapping into that is also enhancing the knowledge of not just a few people who sit here in Juba, but also someone who sits in Unity State and works with the SUD can be able to sort of get this, so we are looking at institutions that are also at the front lines, you know, who is where most of the impact, most of the climate risks are and how can we tap into that, and then engaging with them to really build their capacity, to build their understanding of climate risks and also how they can integrate this within their own different works and portfolios. So what role, sorry, how will the training equip the government counterparts in the civil society organizations with the knowledge and also the capacity and the subject, climate, peace and security? You know, first, just to kind of break it down from the policies, you know, we focus so much on the bigger policy dimensions when you talk about understanding what climate-related security risks are, but in simpler terms we want them to understand what are the shocks, you know. Communities have been dealing with floods for a very long time, they've been dealing with droughts for a very long time and they've been able to cope in very different ways, right? Over the years they've been able to cope. And so for us it's really to highlight some of these strategies of how they've been coping, how they've been dealing with this vulnerabilities, them migrating from one area to another once the rainy season starts. That's a coping mechanism that they've been using over the years. And so now bringing sort of the policy dimension into it and also learning from them, again, because we have to understand that communities at the end of the day, they hold the solutions and they hold the answers to some of these things. They've been doing this for years and years, so for us also it's a learning experience to know that this is what they have been doing over a period of time. It has worked for them. They've been able to leave different tribes and communities that have been able to coexist despite some of these challenges being there, like what are being an issue or anything like that. I think about those challenges and solutions, I mean, can you just speak to us about their specific climate security challenges faced in South Sudan, how to address them? Oh, I like their how to address them, how to address them. I think the key ones that we have seen over the last couple of years droughts, especially in the eastern equatorial state, looking at the Capoeira region that has been a huge challenge for the past. We've seen also unity state bent you struggling with floods for the last past cycles. And also we are seeing there's different shifting trends in terms of the cattle migration routes and the patterns that have been there over a period of time. And because the weather is changing so much, because temperatures are rising, their roots are beginning to shift, which is also bringing communities into tension with one another. But it doesn't necessarily have to be tension. We have seen cases where communities can coexist despite, you know, their traditional migration routes are shifting. Like in a whale, there's different communities there who are able to sort of find a common ground of how despite the migration patterns shifting, there is a gut and the dinka and the misery. They are working together and they're not coming into conflict anymore despite all this challenges. So just looking at how to address some of these things, it can be looking into climate smart agriculture. What are some drought resistant crops that can be introduced in parts of eastern equatorial that can help communities be able to manage with the extended periods of droughts like that. And also just be engaging with communities early on during cattle migration piss conferences. And to me, that has been a very fantastic model, I think I'm learning from south, I'm still very new to south Sudan, but also just learning about how cattle migration piss conferences can be able to bring communities who are in conflict or who are not agreeing on certain terms, to make them see the value of speaking to each other, to make them see that, you know, we can sort of define roots so that we're not in each other's spaces and we understand that we are working in a very changing climate where, you know, the temperatures are changing every day. We are not, we are not consistent. So just having this sort of conversations, it helps to build that social cohesion with people. It helps build that understanding and reduce the conflict at the local level because we're seeing more and more localized conflicts within the context of south Sudan, some are triggered by the climate shocks that we are experiencing here in the country. But there's a lot of opportunities for collaboration within the people and we are seeing evidence of that. We just need to bring it now to the masses to see that. And we are hoping that also through this workshop, for us, we can learn and elevate some of the voices from the local level because to me, the locals, they hold their answers. Right. Right. We're here taking it. Thank you so much for making our time. Just speak to us. Thank you very much for having us