Reducing Vulnerabilities, Building Skills and Bolstering Local Capacities for Sustainable Peace in Myanmar

This innovative Lives in Dignity Grant Facility-funded peacebuilding project (June 2022 - July 2024) in Myanmar's western region developed a groundbreaking "friendship-center approach" to address the complex challenges of poverty, conflict, and climate vulnerability affecting communities experiencing protracted internal displacement, ethnic and religious conflicts, and severe monsoon-related disasters. The initiative established multi-ethnic community centers that were co-designed and managed by Rohingya, Rakhine, and other minority community members, serving as safe spaces for dialogue and community building while delivering integrated responses focusing on livelihoods, WASH, climate change adaptation, and disaster risk reduction for both IDPs and host communities. A key innovation was the implementation of the Climate Adaptation Fund for Emergencies (CAFE) microgrant model, which empowered communities to respond independently to natural disasters and climate change while building resilience through indigenous knowledge systems. The project fostered community relationships through multiple channels including sustained dialogue, joint village committees, leadership training, vocational training, agricultural initiatives, and disaster management, with selected centers equipped to serve as emergency shelters with bunkers for protection during airstrikes, flooding, or cyclones, demonstrating how adaptive humanitarian-development-peace nexus programming can effectively reinforce social cohesion and build sustainable peace in highly complex conflict environments.