Europe should look to Africa for solutions to climate change | The Weather Problem

As Europe faces repeated, extreme heat waves, the question is no longer whether rich countries need climate change. It is as if they are willing to learn from areas that have been used to climate change for years.

Across the country, extreme heat is straining hospitals, disrupting transportation and turning common areas into health hazards. In the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Italy, Germany and the Balkans, global warming is now becoming a social, economic and political aspect of climate change.

But in Africa, regions have experienced extreme heat, erratic rainfall, drought, water problems and fragile human settlements for generations. They have to adapt in difficult circumstances, often without the money, insurance support or recovery mechanisms available in rich countries. The continent has developed cultural, architectural, technological and social approaches that provide real lessons for a Europe that is becoming increasingly hot.

This does not mean that there are silver bullets. Climate change is not just a matter of change: A solution developed in Ouagadougou needs to be developed, tested and adapted before it can be implemented in Marseille or Madrid. Local geography, building codes, culture and governance are all important. But the basic processes and expertise behind them go beyond what is thought.

Take construction. Throughout West Africa, architects such as Francis Kere have pioneered the construction of climate-friendly buildings based on indigenous methods: light roofs, thick walls built with local materials, and windows and ventilation that cools homes without relying heavily on air conditioning. When European cities are faced with aging buildings that cannot cope with the constant heat, and the electricity that comes from the need for air, the policies to reduce the current and reduce the energy are very important.

Cities have also innovated. Sierra Leone’s capital has pioneered urban greening through “Freetown the Tree Town”, a massive tree-planting program designed to combat the urban heatwave that makes cities hotter than their surroundings. This project is supported by the carbon credit market.

European cities, many dense, packed and short on green cover, are facing this problem. The experience of Freetown, including how the organization has supported, funded and encouraged the planting of more trees in the city, is very important.

Across Africa, community-based health solutions have shown how heat transfer programs can be built to reach the most vulnerable, working through primary health clinics and health authorities to reduce the risk of heatstroke in informal settings, where people often have limited protection and limited resources. Burkina Faso, for example, uses a global heat warning system that goes beyond weather warnings, strongly encouraging irrigation and helping people cope with exposure during extreme heat, with the help of door-to-door visits to vulnerable people.

Europeans who have become more prominent: Elderly people who live alone, foreign workers, and those living in poorly protected homes, can benefit from health systems designed around the same principle: sustainable, sustainable, community-based care rather than general advice.

These climate change strategies are based on local communities, authorities and community groups. But the principle applies more broadly: Resilience works best when it creates common ownership, local jobs and visible benefits to society.

The main point is that change should not be seen as a cure or a response to problems, but as something new.

If climate change funding had been seen as a central pillar of climate action rather than a burden, many of these issues would have been paid for earlier, better documented and better placed to study. In fact, the international system has repeatedly paid for emergencies while spending less money on measures that reduce risk before it happens.

The European heat wave shows that underinvesting in any adaptation weakens the global capacity to respond to any. The more African cities, researchers, health organizations and community organizations are supported to test and scale up solutions, the more the world can take from them.

North-South cooperation should be a two-way street. Europe must continue to share climate science, technology and finance. But it should also listen to and learn from African practices. Municipalities must share records with other municipalities. Health officials should be learning from each other on all continents. Designers, planners and engineers should be studying what works in hot environments, not using things, not as a curiosity, but as a source of design wisdom.

We are entering an era where extreme temperatures will test human performance. It will test schools, hospitals, transport, housing, labor laws, food systems and public trust. No community has all the answers. But some communities are forced to face questions for a long time.

Africa’s experience of heat and climate stress is reported as a story of vulnerability. This story is true, but not complete. It is also a matter of innovation, change and expertise. As Europe searches for ways to live a warmer future, it should not look inward or upward to new technologies. It should also look to the south, to regions, cities and organizations that have been learning how to change in real time.

What is needed now is the humility to look at the solutions to the problems that have already been built, and the cooperation to use them wherever they are needed.

The views expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not reflect Al Jazeera’s influence.