BACKGROUND:
Tooro Kingdom is home to some of the greatest tourism assets and attractions that make Uganda, the Pearl of Africa. Climate change is likely to disrupt the Earth’s ecological systems and have serious negative consequences on tourism, agricultural production and productivity, forests, water supply, health systems and overall human development. Uganda like the rest of the world and more particularly the Least Developed Countries with the least capacity to adapt, is vulnerable to the negative impacts of climate change. Vulnerable populations (mainly the poor and most marginalised, including children, women, older persons and people with disabilities in developing countries) are particularly poorly equipped to cope with the adverse impacts of climate change. This is exacerbated by the environmental deterioration and degradation Uganda has been suffering in the last two decades.
TISED-U subscribes to SDG 15: “Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss”. We believe that addressing the environmental and climate change challenges is key to enhancing sustainable economic and social development in Uganda. The loss of biodiversity as a result of reduced vegetation cover and the disappearance of species and genetic resources is widely recognized. Uganda lost 27% (1329, 570 hectares in total or 88, 638 hectares per year) of its original forest cover between 1990 and 2005. At that time, this rate indicated that, if little is done to avert the situation, Uganda’s forest resources would be exhausted by 2050 (NFA 2009).The main causes include excessive logging, fuelwood collection, the expansion of agricultural land, and overgrazing. The TISED-U’s climate change and environment conservation programme is informed by the Uganda National Climate Change Policy goal of promoting sustainable development and a green economy.
SPECIFIC PROGRAMME INTEERVENTIONS:
- Promote efficient utilization and management of natural resources, energy and environment
- Promote efficient energy cook stoves, bio-gas, solar energy and briquette making.
- Supports natural disaster management initiatives
- Support massive tree planting including establishment and management of community tree nurseries and restoration of degraded forests.
SPECIFIC PROGRAMME OBJECTIVES:
- Increase awareness of local communities and decision makers on the importance and the urgency of adopting climate change adaptation strategies and the relevance of environment conservation and management.
- Support youth and women initiatives that increase the ability of local communities adapt to climate change.
- Build capacities of local communities and decision makers on climate change adaptation & mitigation mechanisms and environment conservation.
- Promote tree planting, agro forestry and natural resource conservation and conserve wildlife and biodiversity.
