Page 9 - FMR64_Trafficking and smuggling & Climate crisis and local communities_2020_web

FMR 64 Climate crisis and local communities 9

June 2020 www.fmreview.org/issue64

crop was barley, a very simple crop
to grow. Using his first home-built
hydroponic system, Brahim was able
to feed his own goats, reducing his
need to move in search of pasture
while also increasing the quality and
quantity of the milk and meat produced
(goats in the camps often eat plastic
refuse, contaminating their products).
Expensive, complicated, high-
tech units are not a scalable solution
by themselves. In 2017, Brahim
demonstrated the success of his initial
system to the Innovation Accelerator
initiative of the World Food Programme
(WFP) in Munich. Brahim’s system was
selected for Innovation Accelerator
funding and a WFP programme called
H2Grow was subsequently established,
under which Brahim – working with
WFP and Oxfam staff – developed a
range of hydroponic units derived from
his first model, reducing the unit cost
while retaining productivity. These
new units were cheaper, relied on
locally available materials, and were
easier to use and repair. Crucially, they
could also be adapted to specific local
requirements. With assistance from
WFP, Oxfam and Polisario, Brahim © Taleb Brahim
began running hydroponic workshops
in the camps, eventually training
over a thousand Sahrawi refugees Taleb Brahim tends plants grown using a hydroponic system.
in the use of the low-tech systems. positive results. In cases where refugees have
Under the H2Grow programme, Brahim’s a history of nomadic movement, that heritage
hydroponic systems were tested in refugee presents specific opportunities (involvement
camps in Chad, Jordan, Sudan and Kenya; in regional economies, pastoralist autonomy)
in each case, the units could be modified and challenges (discomfort with sedentary
and optimised for local requirements. life, reliance on modes of production that may
This, Brahim argued in a speech in 2019, not be possible in a camp context) that must
“allows people to become part of their be taken into account by host communities
own solution”, implementing a refugee- and aid providers. More generally, the
driven, refugee-focused aid programme. 4 lesson of climate resilience in Tindouf is
that refugee communities are not essentially
Lessons for climate resilience alike; they retain the practices, skills and
There are several lessons here for analogous cultural contexts of their pre-displacement
contexts of displacement. Most obviously, worlds, and climate resilience policies must
the specific technologies and practices of be implemented in that context. Finally, it
hydroponic agriculture and climate-resistant is likely that in many cases refugees are
construction can be exported, and in some best positioned to devise these strategies
cases have already been tested elsewhere with themselves, approaching problems from their