AKFC’s Speaker Series on Climate Resilience and Adaptation

Our event series aims to bring together practitioners, advocates, and others who share an interest in exploring and discussing how we may use the climate crisis as a catalyst for great leaps in addressing the complex challenges involved in confronting climate change in a manner that advances sustainable development, well-being, and resilient livelihoods for all.


Addressing Loss and Damage – COP27 Debrief

Loss And Damage Financing: A Critical Milestone on the Path for Climate Justice 

Developing countries have long sought financial support to help recover from losses and damages sustained through severe weather, prolonged droughts, and other extreme events propagated by climate change. At COP27 – the UN climate conference held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt in November 2022 – Parties marked a significant milestone on the path for climate justice by agreeing to establish a financing mechanism to address loss and damage.    

On December 1, 2022, Aga Khan Foundation Canada (AKFC) hosted a panel discussion, “Addressing Loss and Damage: A COP27 Debrief” to delve into the drivers, negotiations and potential outcomes stemming from the COP27 agreement to establish a loss and damage financing mechanism.  


From Knowledge to Practice: Advancing Gender-Responsive Nature-Based Climate Solutions

Gender-Responsive Nature-Based Climate Solutions Build Resilience Across Diverse Social and Ecological Landscapes  

Nature-based climate solutions (NBCS) can contribute to conserving and restoring biodiversity and ecosystems while providing an opportunity for people to realize rights, sustainably use ecosystems on which they depend, and build their resilience to climate and related crises. Yet for this to hold true across communities, it is crucial to adopt inclusive, gender-responsive approaches to NBCS initiatives.  

On October 7, 2022, Aga Khan Foundation Canada (AKFC) and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) co-hosted From Knowledge to Practice: Advancing Gender-Responsive Nature-Based Climate Solutions, a capacity-building session on promoting gender equality through rights-based, inclusive approaches to NBCS. Read the full summary.


Reframing Climate Action: Towards a more sustainable and inclusive future

As warning signs of climate breakdown grow ever more present in our daily lives, James Irungu Mwangi urges the global community to think of the climate crisis as a catalyst for positive change – with Africa in the lead.

Mwangi, executive director of the Dalberg Group and founder of the Climate Action Platform for Africa, made this case on May 12, 2022, as part of Reframing Climate Action, the first event in an AKFC speaker series on climate change resilience and adaptation.

AKFC welcomed an audience to the Delegation of the Ismaili Imamat in Ottawa, to join Mwangi in a discussion on shifting the climate narrative in Africa from vulnerability to opportunity. Moderated by Sue Szabo, director general of Innovative and Climate Finance for Global Affairs Canada, the conversation explored Africa’s role in accelerating global climate action by pursuing inclusive, sustainable climate initiatives. Mwangi addressed the opportunity for Africa to transition to an inclusive, green economy that would open opportunities across society in sectors such as renewable energy, green production, carbon removal, and regenerative agriculture. Read the full summary.


From Knowledge to Practice: Advancing Gender-Responsive Nature-Based Climate Solutions

The world is rushing towards the dangerous threshold of 1.5 degrees of global warming due to a lack of urgent action on climate change, while at the same time facing related crises such as biodiversity loss and severe food insecurity.

Nature-based solutions offer an effective approach to mitigating and adapting to climate change. By protecting, restoring, and sustainably managing ecosystems, nature-based solutions hold the potential to reduce climate-related risks and address the biodiversity crisis, while delivering social and economic benefits to those living within these ecosystems.

To explore the potential of nature-based solutions as well as the enabling policies they require, AKFC welcomed a hybrid (virtual and in-person) audience to the Delegation of the Ismaili Imamat in Ottawa on June 23, 2022. Read the full summary.