International Alert and the Netherlands Embassy in Mali hosted a workshop on climate change & security in Mali on 23 and 24 October 2017 in Bamako.
The purpose of the preparatory workshop was to bring stakeholders from the climate change, natural resource management, security and development sector together to discuss and analyze the compound risks of the climate change – natural resource – security nexus in Mali. Participants identified what policies and programmatic approaches currently exist to address climate-security risks in Mali (peacebuilding approaches, development programming, climate change adaptation), what the challenges are, what good practices exist and what is needed to develop more effective and joined up responses by government, private sector, donors, international NGOs and civil society.
Mali faces multiple and interconnected governance, conflict and security risks related to the management of natural resources. Local resource use conflicts in Mali between herders, farmers and agro-pastorlists stem from disputed access to and control over land and water resources. Environmental degradation, climate change, agricultural and development policies, population growth and poor governance are increasing the conflict risk between different natural resource user groups.
While some risk analyses for Mali do examine the multiple political, security, environmental and climate risks and thread these interconnections together, policy and programmatic responses rely on traditional approaches that posit development responses as separate to climate change programming, and as separate to peacebuilding efforts. Responses to natural resource conflicts, food insecurity, and climate change adaptation rarely address these interlinked risks through joined up programming. The workshop identified suggestions to address this apparent blind spot.