The Horn of Africa Regional Environment Center and Network (HoA-REC&N), is running a three day Horn of Africa Climate Change program (HoA-CCP) harvest workshop at Gullele Botanic Garden. The workshop was kicked off on Tuesday February 26, 2019. High profile personalities drawn from academia and civil societies are attending the event. Speakers were Prof. Tassew Woldehanna, AAU president, Prof. Mohamed Shadad, Regional Council President, Dr Mekuria Aregaw Director of Horn of Africa Regional Environment Center and Network and Mrs. Njeri Kabeberi, Executive Director of Green Peace-Africa.

The workshop intends to brainstorm achievements and lessons from HoA-CCP intervention landscapes during the last four years and propose future activities.

AAU President Tassew Woldehanna in his welcoming and opening remarks noted that challenges faced by the Horn countries has necessitated the development of a regional flagship program, HoA-CCP, designed to promote sustainable land management practices and collective platform interested in linking, learning and sharing knowledge, experience and good practices on issues of landscape restoration. “Since its inception, the program has made significant progress towards landscape resilience in the intervention of landscape restoration,” added Prof. Tassew.

Mrs. Njeri Kabeberi addressing her keynote speech-Horn of Africa landscape dialogue: envisioning the horn in the era of climate change also said that our continent is considered as the most vulnerable to climate change in the world because of existing vulnerabilities and the consequences of these crises are evident in the horn of Africa. The role of African continent cannot be underestimated, said Mrs. Njeri Kabeberi, as countries have major opportunity to leapfrog dirty development and invest in renewable energy instead.

The event also features plenary reflection on the landscape learning journey and partnerships, presentation sessions and panel discussion on climate change and migration in the Horn of Africa: policy options.

The Horn of Africa Climate Change programme (HoA-CCP) is (HoA-REC&N’s) prominent regional programme that integrates all the six national chapters from across six countries in the Horn of Africa including Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan and Sudan.