The African Meridian Newsroom · Southern Africa · 1 July 2026
As cyclones and prolonged droughts continue to force thousands of families from their homes across Southern Africa, the European Union and the International Organization for Migration have moved to formalise a joint regional response, launching a new programme this month aimed at helping governments in the region better manage — and where possible prevent — climate-driven displacement.
The initiative comes against a backdrop that has become grimly familiar across the region: successive tropical cyclones battering Mozambique, Malawi and Madagascar in recent years, paired with recurring drought cycles across Zimbabwe, Zambia and parts of South Africa that have hollowed out rural livelihoods and pushed populations toward cities and, increasingly, across borders. The IOM has long tracked climate mobility in the region through its Displacement Tracking Matrix, and officials say the scale and frequency of weather-driven displacement in Southern Africa has outpaced the region’s existing early-warning and resettlement systems.
The EU-IOM programme is expected to focus on strengthening national disaster-preparedness frameworks, improving data collection on climate-linked movement, and channelling funding toward community-level adaptation — from flood-resistant housing to drought-tolerant agriculture — in the areas most exposed to repeat displacement. It reflects a broader shift in how international donors are approaching climate mobility in Africa: rather than treating displacement purely as a humanitarian response after each disaster, the emphasis is increasingly on anticipatory investment that keeps communities in place, or at least gives them options, before the next cyclone season or drought cycle arrives.
For families in cyclone-prone districts of Mozambique or drought-hit parts of Zimbabwe, the practical effects of the programme will likely take time to materialise. But the launch itself marks a formal acknowledgment from two of the region’s largest development partners that climate displacement in Southern Africa is no longer an occasional shock to be managed after the fact, but a recurring pattern that requires standing infrastructure of its own.