A workshop was held on the 3rd of April in Entebbe, Uganda. Over 25 stakeholders attended the workshop, including researchers, policymakers, NGO members and community representatives. The project findings were presented by Joseph Luomba, Fonda Jane Awuor, Bwambale Bmbilingi, Stefan Liersch and Karlijn van den Broek. The participants of the workshop reflected on the findings…

Together with the team from NaFIRRI, the MECCA teams have prepared the final wave of data collection in Uganda. With this last study, the researchers want to compare individual mental models to group mental models. This study will provide insights into how groups combine their climate knowledge to result in a better understanding of climate…

A MECCA symposium was held at the conference for the annual meeting for Society of  Analysis in Bergen, Norway, 27-29 Sept 2022. This symposium showcased the initial findings of the MECCA project. Dr Stefan Liersch presented the role of different domains held responsible for the causes, consequences, and actions of climate change.  Dr. Usman Isyaku…

Members of the MECCA team travelled to Nigeria and Kenya to prepare the data collection in both regions. The East Africa team consisting of staff members from NaFIRRI, KMFRI and TAFIRI met in Kisumu, Kenya, with Karlijn van den Broek to develop the study materials. After a pilot in Homabay, the team made some final…

We have completed the data collection for the community survey in East Africa. This survey assesses perceptions of climate change among fishers, farmers, cattle-rearers, and urban dwellers. We asked our participants what they think causes climate change, what the consequences are, and what can be done to adapt to climate change. Thanks to Lake Victoria…

An online workshop was held on the 30th of November, 2020. Around 20 policy-makers and researchers from Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania attended this meeting. In this meeting, the MECCA team was introduced to key policy-makers and researchers in the region, and presented the project’s aim, activities and expected output. The research project was well-received, and…

Community surveys were conducted in Lagos in November 2020 with participants from Bariga/Ilaje, Makoko, Adediji/Adele and Mushin/Idi Araba. These communities are selected due to their vulnerability to flash and seasonal floods, and are located close to the coasts and lagoons. Participants were very excited to be involved and have shown cooperation with the field research…

 A new app called M-Tool allows users to capture people’s perceptions of complex systems (or mental models) with mobile devices, and can be tailored to map perceptions of any system or phenomenon. This is the tool that will be used in the MECCA project. For example, one can draw the processes that cause climate change,…

  The MECCA project team held its second consortium meeting on 17-18 February at Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact research (PIK), Germany. The objective was to discuss progress and preparations for the upcoming stakeholders workshops in Lagos and East Africa.

  On the 5th and 6th of November AXIS project PIs met in Brussels to present their respective projects and find synergies for potential future collaboration and cooperation.  The MECCA project, or Targeting Mental Models of Climate Change Risk to facilitate Climate Action aims to identify adaptation and mitigation strategies by analyzing the gap between…