The African Development Bank Board approved an additional financing of US $8.37 million (on March 4, 2015 from the Global Environment Facility's (GEF) Least Developed Countries Fund (LDCF)[1] for the Water Supply and Sanitation Programme (WSSP), already financed by the Bank.
The GEF financing will increase the resilience of the natural environment and the physical infrastructure of vulnerable drought and flood prone districts in Eastern Uganda.
The programme is designed to build resilience in the face of a changing climate and adverse weather conditions, in particular increasingly frequent flooding conditions, thereby enhancing economic, social and climate resilience. The project will strengthen water and sanitation infrastructure - the development of which is indispensable for consolidating sustained and diversified growth in the region - and will mainly focus on rural and peri-urban water development support.
Reflecting projected climate changes in Uganda, and related priorities identified in the country's National Adaptation Programme of Action (NAPA), the project will address these objectives through the implementation of three components designed to climate-proof the underlying WSSP: 1) Building resilience to climate change in flood-prone areas of Mount Elgon; 2) Ensuring climate-resilient sanitation in flood-prone peri-urban areas; and 3) Ensuring access to water for production in drought-prone areas.
The additional GEF funding complements the initial AfDB project funding of US $62 million for the WSSP that was approved in October 2011.
[1] The Least Developed Countries Fund (LDCF) was established on directives to the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at its seventh session to address the needs of least developed countries (LDCs) under the Convention on Climate Change. Absolute priority is accorded to adaptation and particularly the financing of the preparation and implementation of National Climate Change Adaptation Programs of Action (NAPAs). The Fund's objective is to finance projects that address the urgent and immediate climate change adaptation needs of LDCs by seeking to reduce the vulnerability of sectors and resources which are essential to social progress and national development such as water, agriculture and food security, health, the management and prevention of catastrophic risks, and infrastructure, as have been identified and prioritized in NAPAs.
