Ecosystem services provide considerable development opportunities, including incorporating land use planning and enhancing climate change resilience in peri-urban communities. However, the application of this concept in planning and enhancing climate change resilience is negligible in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). This article reviews state-of-the-art research on the potential contribution of peri-urban ecosystem services to climate change resilience in SSA and identifies research gaps for further work. This study was conducted through systematic review of articles from the Web of Science. The literature shows limited knowledge on peri-urban ecosystem services research globally and SSA in particular. The gaps in this knowledge stem from inadequate conceptualization and lack of understanding about how such knowledge can be translated into policy, planning and management and, hence, realizing development goals. In nutshell, the potential for climate change resilience of well-managed peri-urban ecosystem services includes reducing the physical exposure of peri-urban areas to floods and droughts and minimizing climate change risks through increased socio-economic resilience to hazard impacts and provision of the carbon sequestration function. However, specific peri-urban studies describing ecosystem service types and how they can be synchronized into mainstream urban planning and climate change resilience strategies are lacking in most SSA urban regions/landscapes. Therefore, case studies need to be conducted to contextualize and downscale the concept in periurban areas and to determine how the concept can be synchronized into broad urban planning and strategies for enhancing resilience to climate change in vulnerable urban and peri-urban communities.

This article is exploring socio-ecological system adaptive capacities for building resilience to climate change effects in the peri-urban belt of Dar es Salaam, at the Pugu and Kazimzumbwi forest reserves. Three selected hamlets (Nzasa, Kisarawe and Pugu–Kibaoni) constitute the study area. A combination of household interview, key informant interview, focus group discussion complemented by literature review compose data collection techniques deployed. The study revealed diverse socio-ecological system ‘adaptive capacities’ for building resilience to climate change effects. These includes socio-cultural i.e. heterogenous ethnic groups, promising literacy rate, diverse age cohorts within the population and diverse occupations. Another set of adaptive capacities at Pugu and Kazimzumbwi socio-ecological system regards diverse and innovative ecosystem services based income generating activities i.e. Bee keeping industry and tourism industry in its multiple forms (food tourism, arts and craft tourism and nature tourism). Overall, the Pugu and Kazimzumbwi socio-ecological system has considerable adaptive capacities providing ample platform for agents to act upon in building resilience to climate change effects. It is hereby recommended that the nature, role and extent of agency be explored so as to establish the status quo and therefore the feasible entry point for policy intervention.

This article aims to contribute to the literature on the quest for resilient cities by focusing on the climate change resilience building discourse in peri-urban areas, and specifically by exploring the role of social capital-an under-researched topic. The article examines bonding social capital and bridging social capital, with a focus on how they can potentially contribute to, or inhibit, the socio-ecological system resilience building processes in the context of climate change reality in peri-urban areas. Theoretically, the author draws on the existing social capital and resilience related literatures; empirically, the article presents findings from a study conducted in the peri-urban areas of Pugu and Kazimzumbwi forest reserves on the outskirts of Dar es Salaam city in Tanzania. The study deployed a household survey and key informant interviews. It found that both bonding and bridging social capital were strong in the research area, suggesting the feasibility of building resilience to climate change effects. Examples are given of a number of resilience building interventions that were established through synergies between social capital actors and local communities, although some doubt is cast over the sustainability of these initiatives. Overall, both theoretical and empirical evidence suggests the importance of including a focus on social capital in exploring the building of climate change resilience pathways in peri-urban areas, and especially in the context of the global south.