GCA and Partners Launch $180 Million Climate-Resilient Healthcare Initiative in Nigeria’s Sokoto State
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otterdam, Netherlands, 16 March 2025 — The Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) today announced its support for a landmark USD$180 million initiative to transform healthcare infrastructure in Nigeria’s Sokoto State, bolstering resilience to the growing impacts of climate change. This collaborative effort is jointly financed by the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), the African Development Bank (AfDB), ASR Africa, and the Sokoto State Government.
GCA is supporting the $50 million contribution from IsDB. Overall the initiative will establish six new medical faculties, a teaching hospital, several regional hospitals, and a modernized pharmaceutical supply chain network, with advanced zonal warehouses equipped to deliver affordable essential medicines across Sokoto and neighboring states. The initiative is projected to serve more than 6.3 million people with significantly improved, climate-resilient healthcare services.
GCA’s involvement, delivered through the African Adaptation Acceleration Program (AAAP), is centered on ensuring that these investments are fully climate-proofed. GCA is conducting detailed climate risk and vulnerability assessments, informing the design, operations, and maintenance of new healthcare buildings and infrastructure networks such as water, energy, roads, and hazardous waste management systems. By integrating climate adaptation measures directly into the planning and delivery phases, GCA aims to secure the long-term sustainability and operational resilience of these critical health services.
Moreover, GCA is leading a capacity-building program that includes stakeholder workshops and masterclasses to equip local and regional decision-makers with the knowledge and tools needed to embed climate risks into healthcare investment and infrastructure development planning. The project will also deliver operational guidelines to support resilient healthcare logistics and management, ensuring a lasting impact beyond the immediate project scope.
Professor Patrick V. Verkooijen, President and CEO of the Global Center on Adaptation, welcomed the new investment and emphasized its significance, stating:
“This project exemplifies the resilience dividend—where investments in climate adaptation not only protect communities from climate shocks but also drive sustainable development. By integrating climate resilience into healthcare infrastructure, we are safeguarding lives and enhancing livelihoods in Sokoto State and beyond. It shows how we can simultaneously close the healthcare gap, build local capacity, and create a future where climate risks do not derail human development.”
The need for action could not be more urgent. Sokoto State’s healthcare system faces considerable challenges, including a severe shortage of healthcare workers, inadequate primary healthcare coverage, and a fragile supply chain system that leaves rural and marginalized communities without reliable access to essential medicines. These vulnerabilities are compounded by climate threats such as flooding and drought, which regularly damage infrastructure and disrupt healthcare delivery. According to climate risk assessments, the project area faces medium to high risks of flooding and water scarcity, which, if unaddressed, could threaten the viability of new investments.
This new initiative directly addresses these challenges, creating 700 annual medical training opportunities, generating 1,000 direct and 1,500 indirect jobs, and vastly increasing access to affordable vaccines and medicines, particularly for underserved populations. It represents one of the most significant investments in climate-resilient healthcare infrastructure ever undertaken in Nigeria and provides a model for scaling similar efforts across the Sahel and Sub-Saharan Africa.
GCA will document the full approach and outcomes of the project as part of its Adaptation Insights series, ensuring that the lessons learned contribute to a broader global effort to mainstream climate resilience into health and development investments worldwide.
Notes to Editors
About the Global Center on Adaptation
The Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) is an international organization that promotes adaptation to the impacts of climate change. It works to climate-proof development by instigating policy reforms and influencing investments made by international financial institutions and the private sector. The goal is to bring climate adaptation to the forefront of the global fight against climate change and ensure that it remains prominent.
Founded in 2018, GCA embodies innovation in its approach to climate adaptation as well as in its physical presence. It operates from the largest floating office in the world, in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. GCA has a worldwide network of regional offices in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire; Dhaka, Bangladesh; and Beijing, China. The Center will open a new office in Nairobi, Kenya in 2025.
