DARAJA

DARAJA is a ground-breaking city and community weather forecasting and early warning initiative and service.

DARAJA has been delivered to date in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam by Kounkuey Design Initiative (KDI) in Nairobi, the Centre for Community Initiatives (CCI) in Dar es Salaam, Resurgence, the Kenya Meteorological Department (KMD), the Tanzania Meteorological Authority (TMA) and array of key local community partners, leaders and stakeholders.

DARAJA means ‘bridge’ in Swahili. DARAJA aims to improve the climate resilience of vulnerable populations living in informal settlements in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya by building bridges between communities and weather and climate information providers.

DARAJA has been financed and developed under the UK FCDO (UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office) Met Office-led Weather and Climate Information Services for Africa (WISER) Programme.

DARAJA’s goal in East Africa is to improve the climate resilience of vulnerable populations living in informal settlements in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya by improving their access to actionable weather, climate and early warning information.

DARAJA IMPACT FINDINGS

A joint Resurgence-KDI-CCI research team working under DARAJA has carried out one of the most comprehensive mappings of information flows through the two cities to date, solely dedicated to access, uptake and use of extreme weather and climate information services.

As a result of DARAJA , communities living in the informal settlements of Nairobi and Dar es Salaam have been able to take better preventative action ahead of high impact weather events. This has resulted in both avoided loss and improved livelihoods for the communities.

The impact results achieved on the ground in each city by KDI, CCI, KMD, TMA and  DARAJA  local partners and stakeholders are based on research conducted  at the start and end of the project involving  over 700 household surveys  across the two cities.

Download: DARAJA Impact Results Slides

DARAJA SCALE UP

DARAJA is receiving additional support to scale out of Nairobi and Dar es Salaam into other global cities, from the EIT Climate-KIC, the EU‘s leading public private climate innovation partnership.

In 5 years the DARAJA aims to be serving 250 million residents of informal settlements  in 30 cities across the globe.

DARAJA aims to make a significant contribution to the Risk-informed Early Action Partnership (REAP) and its goal to make 1 billion people safer from climate disasters by 2025.

DARAJA 2020 AWARD WIN

On the 21st October 2020, Resurgence won the International Collaborative Project of the Year Award for DARAJA, at the British Expertise International Awards 2020. The Award recognises and celebrates the best of UK expertise in international development, infrastructure and capacity building.

To read more, please click here.

Watch Awards win announcement here.

DOWNLOAD DARAJA IMPACT FINDINGS

The impact information below, is taken from a robust sample of community residents who accessed or used Weather and Climate Information through DARAJA services.

Download: DARAJA Impact Results Slides