Unlocking Climate Resilience: Why Investing in Care Services Is Africa's Next Frontier for Adaptation Finance

A landmark analysis published by the Brookings Institution on May 11, 2026, by authors Trelegan, Martinez, and Grown, presents a compelling case for rethinking how climate adaptation finance is allocated in Africa. Their central finding: care services — from childcare and elderly support to community health and unpaid domestic work — are systematically undervalued in climate planning, despite being essential for building community resilience. By mapping these services into National Adaptation Plans (NAPs) and Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), African nations could unlock new streams of adaptation finance while addressing deep-rooted vulnerabilities.

The Hidden Asset in Climate Adaptation: Care Services

The Brookings article challenges conventional adaptation strategies that focus primarily on physical infrastructure, early warning systems, and agricultural technologies. While these are vital, the authors argue that the "care economy" — the vast, often invisible network of activities that sustain households and communities — operates as a frontline buffer against climate shocks. [IMAGE: A simple infographic showing a Venn diagram of 'Climate Adaptation', 'Care Economy', and 'Finance' with the overlapping intersection labeled 'Untapped Potential'.]

What exactly constitutes the care services spectrum? It includes unpaid domestic work (cooking, cleaning, water collection), childcare, elderly care, and community-based health services. In climate-stressed environments, these tasks become more demanding: when droughts hit, women and girls spend hours longer fetching water; during heatwaves, caring for sick children or elderly relatives intensifies; after floods, community health workers become first responders. Yet current National Adaptation Plans and NDCs rarely include care-related metrics such as time-use data, care facility density, or the burden of unpaid care work. This omission, the Brookings authors contend, represents a critical missed entry point for effective adaptation.

The economic logic is straightforward: when care services are under-resourced, climate shocks magnify existing inequalities, trapping communities in cycles of vulnerability. For example, a woman who must walk three hours to collect water during a drought has no time to adopt drought-resistant farming techniques or participate in community adaptation planning. Investing in care infrastructure — such as nearby childcare centers or piped water systems that reduce domestic labor — frees up time and energy for adaptive activities, creating multiplier effects that strengthen entire communities.

Why Africa? The Dual Pressure of Demographics and Climate Vulnerability

Africa stands at the intersection of two powerful forces: rapid demographic change and acute climate vulnerability. The continent is experiencing the fastest urbanization and population growth globally, with the number of children under five projected to reach 500 million by 2050. Simultaneously, Africa is disproportionately affected by climate impacts — floods in Mozambique, droughts in the Horn of Africa, and heatwaves in the Sahel — all of which intensify demand for care services. [IMAGE: Map of Africa with hotspots of climate vulnerability (drought, flood) overlaid with markers showing existing care service gaps, e.g., child-to-elderly ratios.]

The adaptation finance gap in Africa is enormous, estimated at over $50 billion annually by the African Development Bank. Traditional adaptation projects — seawalls, irrigation systems, climate-resilient crops — are essential, but they often fail to address the underlying social infrastructure that determines how communities cope. The Brookings analysis highlights a powerful insight: directing even a fraction of adaptation finance toward care services could generate co-benefits across gender equality, health, education, and economic productivity.

Consider community-based childcare centers in drought-prone regions of Kenya and Ethiopia. Evaluations show that when mothers have access to reliable childcare, they are more likely to adopt climate-smart agriculture techniques, join savings groups, and participate in local governance. A 2023 study by the International Center for Research on Women found that such centers reduced women's time poverty by 30% while increasing household food security. Yet these services remain largely outside formal climate finance frameworks. The opportunity lies in blending adaptation funds with social protection budgets, development assistance, and private investment to scale proven models.

This aligns closely with emerging Africa finance investment trends. Impact investors and development finance institutions are increasingly seeking projects that deliver climate resilience alongside social returns. Bond issuances, green bonds, and social impact bonds that target care infrastructure — from urban childcare hubs to rural health clinics — are gaining traction. The Brookings article specifically notes that blended finance structures, where concessional capital from development banks reduces risk for private investors, could be a game-changer for the care-climate nexus.

Embedding Care in NAPs and NDCs: A Policy Roadmap

The key policy proposal from Trelegan, Martinez, and Grown is straightforward: integrate care services into national climate planning documents. This requires moving beyond vague references to "vulnerable groups" and toward specific, measurable indicators. The authors recommend including time-use surveys in adaptation needs assessments, mapping the density of care facilities in climate-risk zones, and setting targets for reducing unpaid care burdens as part of adaptation outcomes.

Africa can learn from pioneering efforts elsewhere. Nepal, for instance, explicitly included unpaid care work in its National Adaptation Plan, recognizing that women's time constraints limit their ability to respond to floods and landslides. As a result, Nepal’s adaptation programs now fund childcare facilities in flood-prone areas and train women as climate-resilient agriculture extension workers. In Latin America, Colombia’s NDC includes gender-responsive adaptation indicators that track time spent on care activities. The Brookings article, published on May 11, 2026, draws on these examples to argue that Africa can leapfrog by embedding care from the outset — avoiding the costly retrofitting that other regions now face.

What would this look like in practice? First, African governments should conduct national time-use surveys to quantify the economic value of unpaid care work, which the International Labour Organization estimates accounts for up to 10% of GDP in some countries. Second, climate finance proposals should require applicants to assess how their projects affect care burdens, similar to environmental impact assessments. Third, adaptation funds — including the Green Climate Fund and the Adaptation Fund — could introduce a "care co-benefit" scoring criterion to incentivize projects that reduce time poverty.

The Brookings article, authored by experts Trelegan, Martinez, and Grown, with deep experience in gender and development economics, emphasizes that this is not about diverting resources from other adaptation priorities but about making existing finance more effective. When a community has reliable childcare, elderly care, and basic health services, its capacity to absorb climate shocks increases dramatically. The cost of providing these services is often modest compared to the benefits. For example, investing in a network of community health workers in rural Mozambique costs roughly $15 per person per year, yet it reduces mortality during extreme weather events by 25%.

The Slow-Brewing Industry Shift

Investment trends are beginning to reflect this recognition. Several development banks, including the African Development Bank and the World Bank, have recently launched gender-smart climate finance initiatives that include care services. Private investors, too, are exploring opportunities in "care infrastructure" as a distinct asset class. The Brookings analysis points to a growing interest in blended finance mechanisms: for instance, a facility that combines grants from the Green Climate Fund with equity from impact investors and debt from commercial banks to build climate-resilient childcare centers in peri-urban areas.

However, significant barriers remain. Adaptation finance is still heavily skewed toward large-scale infrastructure projects, and measuring the impact of care services on resilience is methodologically challenging. Standardized metrics for "care resilience" do not yet exist, making it difficult for investors to compare projects. The Brookings authors call for a coordinated effort among multilateral development banks, national statistical offices, and research institutions to develop such metrics, leveraging time-use data and community-level surveys.

Another challenge is the political economy. In many African countries, care services are seen as a private, not public, responsibility — a perception that reinforces gender inequality and underinvestment. Embedding care in NAPs and NDCs requires shifting this narrative, framing care as a public good essential for climate adaptation. The May 11, 2026 Brookings article provides a strong evidence base for this shift, rooted in rigorous analysis of the care-climate nexus.

Looking Ahead: A New Frontier for Climate Finance

The Brookings analysis arrives at a critical moment. As Africa prepares to update its NDCs in 2026 and 2027, and as the Global Goal on Adaptation framework is being operationalized, there is a window to integrate care services into the architecture of climate finance. The authors argue that doing so would not only improve adaptation outcomes but also attract new sources of finance — including from gender-lens investors, social impact funds, and development agencies — that have been slow to engage with traditional adaptation projects.

For policymakers, the message is clear: care services are not a distraction from climate adaptation but a strategic entry point. For investors, they represent an under-explored asset class with measurable social and climate returns. For development banks, they offer a way to forge multipurpose projects that simultaneously address gender inequality, health, education, and climate resilience. [IMAGE: A conceptual collage showing a split scene: on the left, a rural African village with women and children engaged in caregiving activities under a drought-affected sky; on the right, a modern green building with graphs, coins, and wind turbines. A glowing thread shaped like a human hand connects the two scenes.]

The hidden logic of care services as a climate adaptation asset is slowly gaining traction. The Brookings article by Trelegan, Martinez, and Grown provides the analytical framework. The question now is whether African governments, international financiers, and private investors will seize the opportunity to turn this untapped potential into tangible resilience — unlocking a new frontier for adaptation finance on the continent.