New mobile application game set empower youth in Climate Change adaptation efforts in the Greater Horn of Africa

ZANZIBAR: A new mobile software application know as "Ponya Mobile Game" developed by a team of young software engineers in Kenya that was officially presented Thursday on the sideline of the 47th regional climate outlook forum taking place on island of Zanzibar, is considered to be more effective in reducing global warming impacts associated with extreme weather events and other disasters across the East and the whole Greater Horn of Africa region.

With this application that is especially focusing on creating awareness among young people on climate change adaptation to early warning systems, this specific category can learn and improve their skills with a range of fun games where by they also practice climate change terminology language because during the game people can use the mobile phone to display the detailed patterns of climate change caused by different human and natural influences in the region.

"The application contains basic information related to the Science of Climate Change , coping strategies, and other distraction techniques for assessing climate change impacts and exploring adaptation options," one of the developer of the application, Noah Kange said.

It is said that in several  parts across the Greater Horn Africa (GHA) region where most communities depend on alternate dry and rainfall seasons each year to sustain their livelihoods, for youth to be updated with information when it is going to rain and how much is more important in their communities seems to be much more important than relying on the traditional sources of information to know what the weather is going to be like, it said.

"New ways of monitoring and communicating the situation on the ground though using mobile application to this specific category are becoming more important for informing community actions and other external support responses, it said.

Latest estimates released by the team of World Food Programme (WFP) experts  predict that adaptation to climate change and specifically to El Nino phenomenon in many countries across the East African region and the whole Greater Horn of Africa (GHA)  might cost an annual average of up to USD 5.8 billion by 2050 if residual damages are considered.

Official estimates indicate that extreme years associated with droughts and floods in the Greater Horn of Africa (GHA) usually  coincide with two climate change phenomenon including El Niño and la Niña.

Reports by climate experts from the Kenyan-based Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) Climate Prediction and Application Centre (ICPAC)  show that la Niña was mostly associated with the recurrent droughts in many parts across the region especially in 1984, 1988, 1998, 1999, 2007, 2010, 2011 and 2016 for southern and central Somalia, north-eastern and coastal areas of Kenya, south-eastern Ethiopia and Tanzania and wet conditions in the northern sector.

ICPAC is a regional weather forecasting centre gathering 12 countries from East and the Greater Horn of Africa.

Members countries of this regional climate initiative which aspires to become a major center of excellence on climate prediction and development of affected areas. A are Eritrea, Djibouti, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Somalia, Burundi, Uganda, Ethiopia and Kenya.

Source: PANAPRESS