Delayed climate adaptation is a false economy SA cannot afford

For Dineo, a resident of an informal settlement on the periphery of Johannesburg, the loss of her job last month was not a matter of poor performance, but of infrastructure failure. Expected at her post by 7.30am, she found herself trapped by the geography of fear.

To leave home at 5am in the absolute darkness of a community without streetlights or reliable power is to risk sexual violence. For Dineo, and millions like her, load shedding never truly ended; it simply became a permanent state of exclusion.

Poor and marginalised communities across South Africa also bear the brunt of other infrastructure failures, from water to housing shortages. Where the wealthy can insulate themselves with lithium batteries and private water tanks, the poor remain tethered to failing grids and dry taps.

This failure is not merely a social and governance shame; it is an early warning system for a continent on the front lines of a warming world; and it is likely to cost the South African economy dearly if left unacknowledged.

The adaptation deficit

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has been unequivocal: Africa is the continent most vulnerable to climate volatility, despite contributing less than 3% of cumulative global carbon dioxide emissions since the industrial revolution.

The scientific consensus, as articulated across the Sixth Assessment Cycle (AR6), establishes that the biophysical sensitivity of the African continent is inextricably linked to its developmental context including the legacy of colonialism; approximately two-thirds of the population live in informal settlements characterised by poor housing, limited access to basic services, and a lack of formal infrastructure, making them uniquely vulnerable to climate volatility.

The devastating floods in Durban in 2022 and 2024 caused by record-breaking rainfall, the deaths in Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe caused by Cyclones Idai and Freddy in 2019 and 2023, and the severe El Niño-induced drought in southern Africa, are just a few examples of how the limits of human and ecological adaptation are being stress-tested in Africa, in real time.

Yet, as global leaders congregate at successive Conference of the Parties (COP) summits to negotiate the parameters of a “just transition”, a glaring imbalance persists: the vast majority of climate-related capital – more than 90% – flows toward mitigation, including activities designed to reduce emissions in industrialised and emerging economies where commercial returns are more predictable, while adaptation strategies in regions like Africa remain chronically underfunded.

In 2021-2022, global adaptation finance amounted to only about $63-billion annually, representing just 5% of the total climate finance tracked. Africa saw just 20% of these funds (about $13-billion), woefully short of the estimated more than $50-billion the continent needs for safe adaptation each year by 2030.

The reasons for this extreme gap are twofold. First, adaptation lacks the “glamour” of large-scale mitigation projects like vast wind farms or green hydrogen plants. Second, adaptation is difficult. It often does not scale with a “one size fits all” blueprint. It requires granular, local knowledge – a commodity that is often ignored by top-down bureaucracy. Historically, policy has been something done to the poor, rather than with them, and this needs to change.

Building resilience starts from the ground up

If the continent is to build genuine resilience against worsening heat and floods, in the absence of significant financing, it must pivot toward participatory budgeting and community-led design. We have seen this model work with remarkable success in China. Since 2008, Chengdu has used “special funds” for more than 12,000 projects in 4,300 villages, ranging from rural roads to water infrastructure.

The success of these initiatives was predicated on resident mobilisation; by the time the first shovel hit the ground, 80% of the community was aware of the plan and had reached a consensus on its priority.

In Porto Alegre, Brazil, participatory budgeting approaches have led to an estimated 20% reduction in infant mortality because residents prioritised sanitation and clean water over more visible, but less vital, vanity projects. In South Africa, the “Iqhaza Lethu” initiative in eThekwini provides another working example of alternative bottom-up approaches. By scaling informal settlement upgrades through community data collection and municipal partnerships, we move away from guesswork toward evidence-based resilience.

The economic imperative

The imperative to adapt to climate change offers governments a historic opportunity to leapfrog development and financing deficits to upgrade marginalised communities using alternative approaches.

This is not only the right thing to do from a moral point of view, there is a solid economic logic to this approach, too. A community that cannot safely navigate its streets to get to work or access clean water to prevent disease is a community that cannot contribute to the growth of an economy. When we allow infrastructure to fail the marginalised, we invite a surge in healthcare costs and a precipitous drop in productivity.

Conversely, resilient communities are productive ones. Designing spaces that protect human health, whether through biophilic design to combat rising temperatures or robust drainage to mitigate flood risk, is an investment with a high internal rate of return.

The loss of human potential caused by our failure to adapt is more than a policy error; it is an economic and humanitarian crime. Doing what we have always done is no longer an option. The transition must be just, or it will not be a transition at all. It will simply be a catastrophe. DM

Zamageda Zungu is a lecturer in the School of Construction Economic and Management at Wits University. Emmanuel A Essah is a professor at the University of Reading, where he is Head of the School of the Built Environment. The two are collaborating on a new research project, funded by the University of Reading, to build energy resilience in marginalised South African communities.