Mozambique’s risk profile places the country among the most exposed to climate change effects and natural hazards in Africa. The combination of the extreme natural hazards with high overall vulnerability and isolation of human settlements in rural communities increases the impacts of disasters, that are causing loss of many human lives yearly.
Zambezia was heavily hit during the January-March rainfalls in 2015. Due to floods, thousands of families were relocated in areas without access to public infrastructure and services. An UN-Habitat’s recent project (2015 to 2018), funded by UNICEF, provided technical support for resilient school reconstruction as requested by the Government of Mozambique.
Project Promoter:
UN-Habitat
Mozambique
Namacurra Distric, Province of Zambezia
The objective of the recent ‘Empowered schools in Namacurra District Project’ is to select 2 schools out of the 7 already built in Namacurra to provide them a renewable energy source, in this case, solar panels.
The access to renewable energy source will turn the school buildings into a higher quality learning infrastructure for students and teachers. Furthermore, the school buildings will also become an electricity service provider for the community around the school, also enabling the implementation of Early Warning Systems. Developed by the National Institute of Disaster Management (INGC, initials in portuguese), these systems are based on the usage of mobile phones as alert tools for communities.
The success of this initiative and the lessons learned with this pilot project will enable a project scale up to other post-disaster reconstructed schools in Mozambique.
Expected outputs:
- 12 classrooms in 2 schools with electricity
- Community access to education, extended school hours for adults
- Power charging stations in the schools, generating income for the schools
- Access to IT and Internet
- Installation of early catastrophe warning systems
- Reinforce community capacity in disaster preparedness
Status november 2020:
- Selection of 2 schools to receive the solar pv systems
- Community public consultation conducted
- School facility adaptation with installation of doors and windows to ensure the security of solar panels and electric system
- Installation and Commissioning of the PV System
- Training on risk management, early-warning systems and solar system maintenance conducted
- Inauguration took place after being postponed due to COVID-19 preventive measures
- Execution rate: 100%
