By Wellington Sibale

Neno, March 29, Mana: Civil Society Network on Climate Change (CISONECC) has urged district councils to integrate Early Warning Systems (EWS) including loss and damage issues into the council’s District Development Plans (DDP).

The network’s National Coordinator, Jullius Ng’oma, made the call during a meeting with Neno district council officials in Blantyre.

Ng’oma said councils should incorporate the importance of including loss and damage at policy and strategy level considering various challenges coming due to climate change.

“We have increased in frequency and density of climate related hazards, risks and disaster over the past few years and these need to be feared if we are actually trying to plan for any other interventions at national level including at district council level,” Ng’oma said.

He added that there is need to have guiding laws for the implementation of the policy to materialise.

The National coordinator said the country’s economy is bleeding because the climate-related issues are affecting social economical system.

He therefore, said there is need to scale up financing towards loss and damage to manage issues related to climate change.

Neno District Council Director of Planning and Development, Charles Lomoni said the initiative is very crucial as the district has been experiencing issues of climate change, indicating that they are formulating their district development plan.

“CISONECC has invited us here and help us to plan as we are preparing our district development plan which we are in the process of formulating and we will include issues of climate change” Lomoni said.

In his remarks, Department of Disaster and Management Affairs (DoDMA) Recovery officer, Ollings Mghandira said all councils need to embrace climate change in their plans.

“This art of incorporating these issues of loss and damage where most of the communities are affected and lose a lot of properties, will help the district to plan better as to what they are supposed to do and even if the district is not exposed to these other hazards,” said Mghandira.

CISONECC and Evangelical Association of Malawi (EAM) with funding support from Christian Aid are implementing the Climate Change Adaptation and Sustainable Energy in Malawi (CCASE): Investments for prevention of Loss and Damage in Malawi Project in Neno.

The project aims at developing anticipatory, Absorptive, adaptive and transformative capacities in Neno while financing risk reduction measures to prevent, minimise and address loss and damage ultimately strengthening national and local resilience to disaster risk and promoting sustainable development.