UNDP Jordan Country Program aims to support the national efforts in reaching a solution pathway that boosts the resilience and inclusion of the nation through its five programmatic pillars and can efficiently address the development challenges it is faced with. Among these pillars is the Environment, Climate Change, and DRR Portfolio that assists the country to integrate the environmental concerns, climate adaptation plans, and Disaster Risks Reduction in the national and sectoral strategies, secure resources, and foster sustainable development through advocacy, program implementation, and coordination.
The Portfolio of Environment, Climate Change, and DRR supports for nationally owned sustainable development pathways that include the following areas: Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services; Sustainable Land Management and Desertification; Water and Marine Governance; Climate Change and Drought; Energy; Waste Management; Green Economy; and Disaster Risks Reduction. Driving towards these goals, UNDP Jordan CO supported Jordan to release its National Climate Change Policy (CCP) for 2022-2050 and the Natural Disaster Risk Reduction National Strategy 2023-2030.
Jordan is one of the most water-scarce countries in the world with less than 61 m3/capita/year (2021); demographic changes, rapid population growth, chronic overuse of groundwater, reliance on transboundary water, and climate change impacts are major challenges that drive an urgent need to increase available water supplies, and better manage the available water sources. Climate change impacts aridity due to increasing temperature, reduced rainfalls, and population increase. Climate change induced hazards such as droughts, extreme temperatures, and floods have almost tripled in Jordan since 1980s, which negatively affected the availability of water, water demand for agriculture, and existence of agriculture.
UNDP is now implementing the “Building resilience to cope with climate change through improving water use efficiency in the agriculture sector (BRCCJ) project in the Dead Sea Basin in Karak, Madaba, Talifah, and Maan Governorates in partnership with FAO, Ministry of Environment, Ministry of Agriculture, and Ministry of Water and Irrigation.
The BRCCJ project has three interrelated components which will work synergistically and enhance the impact of project investments. The components are designed to deal with the key barriers identified above and are grouped into three components addressing climate change vulnerability as below:
- Component 1: Climate Resilient Water Systems for enhanced water security.
- Component 2: Climate Change resilience for Enhanced Livelihoods and Food Security.
- Component 3: Scaling-up climate adaptation into policy and across actors (institutions, private sector, civil society).
Under the component one, UNDP will be responsible for implementing activities related to roof-top water harvesting units and water-saving devices at the household level in the four targeted governorates.
As part of the BRCCJ project to improve the water use efficiency in the agriculture sector, UNDP is conducting a socio-economic mapping in the four targeted governorates (Madaba, Karak, Tafila, and Ma’an) in which vulnerable residential communities will be prioritized to implement the rainwater harvesting systems to Improve Water Use Efficiency in the Agriculture Sector. The selection process will be based on eligibility criteria and vulnerability matrix provided by UNDP, these households should be located within the vulnerable residential communities identified through socio-economic mapping assessment.
