Thaketa Climate Adaptation Pilot Project – Strengthening Climate Resilience through Social Innovation •	Short general project overviewThe Thaketa Climate Adaptation for Water Security Project is a 2-year pilot project aiming to design, implement and evaluate a variety of climate adaptation interventions in the Thaketa township in Yangon, Myanmar.In the pilot project, the partners will establish an innovative network-driven stakeholder participation process for designing and implementing different types of climate adaptation interventions, based on the social innovation approach from one of the most successful, innovative climate adaptation programmes in the Netherlands: Amsterdam Rainproof. The project will be supported by community awareness and education campaigns and capacity building for YCDC staff.The pilot project is undertaken at the request of the Yangon Region Government and Yangon City Development Committee and funded together by the consortium partners (below), the Yangon Region Government and the Dutch Government.•	Initial activities and results of the projectIn this pilot project, we will establish a community-driven stakeholder participation process for designing and implementing different types of climate adaptation interventions in Ward 5 of Thaketa. It is important to note that the implementation of the (technical) interventions is an important part of the project, but it is really the activities that establish the community-driven stakeholder participation process that form the heart of what we do in this project. Making the community adopt climate adaptation as a way of life, improves their resilience long-term. The success of any technical intervention depends on this.Anticipated results are:- Improved water supply from household rainwater harvesting and improved lake management. A first estimation is that these interventions have an impact on 264 households (around 1,000 people): 64 from household rainwater harvesting and 200 by improved lake management;- Improved access to safe drinking water for approximately 164 households, by providing them with a Nazava water purifier;- The flood incidence and impact in the wet season is decreased, by increasing direct infiltration, delayed infiltration, and improved drainage function;- Educed water pollution & reduced risk of water-borne diseases - less stagnant, shallow water, less solid waste and wastewater on the streets and in the drainage;- Increase in groundwater recharge, due to increased infiltration of rainwater;- Strengthen valuation by residents of water and awareness of water cycle, relation between waste, flooding and diseases etc. Measured by amount of waste, participation in clean-up activities.•	What makes the technology, product, method or approach used innovativeThe pilot project is based on one of the most successful climate adaptation programmes in the Netherlands: Amsterdam Rainproof. Essentially a “social innovation” programme, Amsterdam Rainproof has developed an innovative approach and methodology to make neighbourhoods, streets and houses in Amsterdam more climate adaptive, applying a broad range of tools and interventions – all founded on strong community involvement and participation and multi-stakeholder collaboration (city government, councils, residents, local associations, architects, construction companies, utilities, transport, etc).Amsterdam Rainproof was deliberately designed as an independent programme outside of the remit of the municipal organisations in order to build an egalitarian and broad network coalition. This is essential as climate change will result in larger changes in precipitation patterns and periods of drought. Important: Amsterdam Rainproof is not only about too much water, but also too little! For the local governments in and around Amsterdam, it meant stepping beyond their traditional roles and be open for trial-and-error experiences. As a result, the first years of the rainproof programme have already led to all kind of physical interventions and to the inclusion of climate adaptation as a key part in the relevant government’s standards and investment programmes.The main innovation in this project lies in the dual approach: getting inspiration from state-of-the-art Dutch approach combined with low-key technical interventions, developed together with the community and executed with the community and the local government, thus together learning and experimenting to find the best climate adaptation measures fit for Yangon. Merging the best of both worlds rather than implementing Dutch practices in Yangon.This way of working is new for Myanmar – were decisions are generally taken by the government with little or no consultation and emphasis lies on large-scale infrastructural structures (around the world, big civil works are often used as billboards for governmental action). However, this bigger-is-better approach is not necessarily the most cost-effective and efficient approach and big schemes are often delayed and fraught with budget overruns and high maintenance costs.As our consortium partner, World Waternet brings first-hand experience from the innovative Amsterdam-based rainproof climate adaptation programme to our pilot, which builds on stakeholder participation whilst combining small-scale measures taken by different stakeholders with sound modelling and a strategic approach.Doh Eain, also one of the partners in this project, also has a lot experience with community engagement and participative project development (e.g. placemaking projects in downtown in Yangon), but not with a specific focus on climate adaptation.Resilience has extensive experience of providing innovative drinking water solutions to underdeveloped communities in Indonesia, also working with various micro finance institutes. These type of solutions for household-level water treatment and financing are quite new in Myanmar.