This free training course leading to a certificate was designed to help key stakeholders in climate change, food security and trade develop coherent programmes and policies cutting across the three areas in East Africa.
The way in which food security, trade and climate change policies are shaped may have a huge impact on people. This requires a good coordination between policies governing these areas, which is not always the case in the East African Community (EAC). Stakeholders’ better understanding about the linkages and their better ability to influence the related policy processes would be a giant step towards a harmonious policy framework where policies are mutually supportive and at last meaningfully contribute to food security.
Through four training modules tailored to foster information-sharing, interactions, and simulations, this three-day training course enables the participants to grasp the extent to which these issues are linked in-country as well as in international and regional agendas. This gives them a chance to become more prominent and better-informed actors in the policy landscape than they have been.
The first module introduces the key concepts, definitions, and status of climate change, food security and trade and their interrelationships. The second aims to broaden the participants’ knowledge on the national and regional policies. The third module is a guided tour of the international institutions, agreements, and instruments (WTO, UNFCCC, FAO etc.), including the impact of international agreements on national concerns. Finally, the last module consists of a simulation exercise designed as a unique experience of engaging with others on initiating, developing, revising, formulating, or monitoring a coherent policy or programme.
This training programme is part of CUTS International’s project “Promoting Agriculture, Climate, and Trade linkages in the EAC” (PACT EAC) that aims to contribute to more holistic responses to the challenges of climate change on food security, including by unlocking the potential of trade. In 2013 and 2014, CUTS and the Trade Policy Training Centre in Africa (trapca) delivered this training at several national and regional workshops in East African Community countries. The course builds on research studies published under the same project under the titles “Climate, Food, Trade: Where is the Policy Nexus?”.
Course contents
Module 1: Concepts and Linkages
This module introduces participants to food security, trade and climate change. It provides concepts and definitions of climate change, food security and trade; and discusses the status of these three in the country. The purpose is to provide solid background to enable participants to contribute to policy making-processes; recognize contradictions, overlaps and gaps in the different policies; and become familiar with effective policy responses to deal with climate change effects on food security, trade effects on food security, as well as climate change effects on trade.
Module 2: National and Regional Policy Lanscape
This module reviews the existing national and regional policies related to agriculture, climate change and trade. Participants will be better aware of the current policy framework so they will be better able to contribute to policy formulation, revision and make recommendations taking into account existing linkages accross climate change, food security and trade.
Module 3: International Framework
This module looks at the relevant international institutions working on climate change, food security and trade and their respective protocols, agreements and instruments in this regard. It will encourage holistic, substantive, collective and pragmatic thinking by the participants and make them more familiar with the relevant work of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the World Trade Organisation (WTO), and the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO).
Module 4: Simulation Exercise
This simulation exercise will train participants in applying the knowledge acquired through the previous modules. This will help them improve their policy/programme formulation skills in an interactive setting, sharpen their skills to interact with institutions and contribute to policy-making at the national level. It is anticipated that participants will be able to initiate, formulate, revise, or monitor current programmes and policies, as well as to come up with realistic solutions and recommendations.