Roles of the resilience concept in natural resources management in East Africa

Natural resource management in developing countries is often placed in the context of strengthening climate change resilience. However, the resilience concept is highly abstract. This study will analyze how the resilience concept is reflected in policies, measures, and implementation in Ethiopia and Kenya, two countries with arid and semi-arid lands, and examine the effective use of the resilience concept.

The Ethiopian government has identified the activities needed to strengthen resilience in each sector (agriculture, natural resources, social capital, etc.) and proposed measures and implementation. The Kenyan government has kept the concept of resilience to an abstract definition, and has proposed measures and implementation necessary for each sector as an adaptation policy. In addition, aid agencies are identifying activities related to resilience enhancement by sector and developing specific indicators. The proposed measures, practices, and indicators are already defined in policy and project documents. However, the proposed practices and indicators under the resilienct concept have no difference from existing ones in the respective sector. In this case, it is necessary to examine whether activities aimed at enhancing resilience are additional to existing activities and what value they can add to the livelihoods of the population.