72 Chapter 3 2016) where land temperatures are projected to rise faster than the global land average (Niang et al., 2014). The region has one of the world’s highest poverty, unemployment and illiteracy rates (Heinrigs, 2010). Climate change is considered an important driver of rapid social transformation in West Africa, including urbanization, migration, growth in food imports and price fluctuations (Lambin et al., 2014). Similarly, the social and environmental context is impacted by, amongst others, conflicts, land privatization, encroachment of large-landholders at the expense of community landownership, changing donor policies and priorities and international infrastructural projects (Lambin et al., 2014; Mertz et al., 2012). Consequently, climate change is considered as being a development that quickly pushes West Africa’s social and environmental systems beyond their coping capabilities (Heinrigs, 2010; Yaro & Hesselberg, 2016). However, the extent and direction of climate change is considered highly uncertain because of already high seasonal, decadal and regional climate variability (Lee et al., 2021; Niang et al., 2014; Tschakert et al., 2010). Climate data sets that model this region are less complete and climate learning tools more scarce than in the Global North (Tschakert et al., 2016). Following the ratificationof theUNFCCCs Paris Agreement and the SustainableDevelopment Goals in 2015, international and national policymakers shifted the focus from addressing more present-day climate vulnerabilities to future climate challenges. Countries received, amongst others, support in drafting their National Adaptation Plan (NAP), to articulate medium-term and long-term adaptation needs (UNFCCC, n.d.). Each country follows a different path. Some countries focus on mainstreaming climate adaptation in diverse sectoral plans CGIAR, 2015) and others on integrating across sectors (Akamani, 2016; Sova et al., 2015b; Niang et al., 2014). Thus, a growing focus has been on anticipation processes to support this transition to more long-term future-oriented climate policy development (Noblet et al., 2018; Vervoort & Gupta, 2018). However, anticipation processes are still considered to be ineffectively integrated into policy plans (see e.g. for Senegal Noblet et al., 2018), particularly due to ad-hoc responses at the local level (Niang et al., 2014). Thus, this study considers West Africa as a region in the Global South where examining anticipatory climate governance is urgently required. For the analysis, five countries inWest Africa are considered, which are among the most vulnerable to climate change: Ghana, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, and Senegal (Huq & Ayers, 2007). I follow the justification as outlined by Förch et al. (2011), where they emphasize a) high climate impacts and related environmental problems; b) high poverty rates and a population depended on agriculture; and c) employment of anticipation processes. The analysis documents thewritten statements in 30 process reports and policy documents, and perspectives of 14 interviewees.
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