Institutional challenges to climate change adaptation: A case study on policy action gaps in Uganda

Despite the considerable progress made in the last decade towards building governance systems for climate change adaptation in Africa, implementation still limits positive responses. This study applies an iterative process of field assessments and literature reviews across multiple governance levels and spatial scales to identify constraints to effective formulation and implementation of climate change related policies and strategies in Uganda. Data was collected through sex-segregated participatory vulnerability assessments with farming communities in Rakai district, policy document reviews, and interviews with policy actors at national and district levels. Findings reveal that the key challenges to effective policy implementation are diverse and cut across the policy development and implementation cycle. Policies are mainly developed by central government agencies; other actors are insufficiently involved while local communities are excluded. There is also a communication disconnect between national, district, and community levels. Coupled with limited technical capacity and finances, political interference, and absence of functional implementation structures across these levels, climate change adaptation becomes constrained. We propose strategies that enhance linkages between levels and actors, which will improve policy formulation, implementation and ultimately adaptation by smallholders.     

Forests and climate change adaptation policies in Cameroon

Nowadays, adaptation has become a key focus of the scientific and policy-making communities and is a major area of discussion in the multilateral climate change process. As climate change is projected to hit the poorest the hardest, it is especially important for developing countries to pay particular attention to the management of natural resources and agricultural activities. In most of these countries such as Cameroon, forest can play important role in achieving broader climate change adaptation goals. However, forest generally receives very little attention in national development programme and strategies such as policy dialogues on climate change and poverty reduction strategies. Using a qualitative approach to data collection through content analysis of relevant Cameroon policy documents, the integration of climate change adaptation was explored and the level of attention given to forests for adaptation analysed. Results indicate that, with the exception of the First National Communication to UNFCCC that focused mostly on mitigation and related issues, current policy documents in Cameroon are void of tangible reference to climate change, and hence failing in drawing the relevance of forest in sheltering populations from the many projected impacts of climate change. Policies related to forest rely on a generalized concept of sustainable forest management and do not identify the specific changes that need to be incorporated into management strategies and policies towards achieving adaptation. The strategies and recommendations made in those documents only serve to improve understanding of Cameroon natural resources and add resilience to the natural systems in coping with anthropogenic stresses. The paper draws attention to the need to address the constraints of lack of awareness and poor flow of information on the potentials of forests for climate change adaptation. It highlights the need for integrating forest for adaptation into national development programmes and strategies, and recommends a review of the existing environmental legislations and their implications on poverty reduction strategy and adaptation to climate change.     

Factor Biases and Promoting Sustainable Development: Adaptation to Drought in the Senegal River Basin

The ongoing drought in the Sahel region of West Africa highlights the vulnerability of food-producing systems to climate change and variability. Adaptation to climate should therefore increase the sustainability of agriculture under a long-term drought. Progress towards sustainability and adaptation in the the Senegal River Basin is hampered by an existing set of social and ecological relationships that define the control over the means of production and how people interact with their environment. These relationships are sensitive to the technological inputs and the administration of food production, or the factor bias in the different policy alternatives for rural development. One option is based on state-controlled, irrigated plantations to provide rice (Oryza) for the capital, Dakar. This policy emphasizes a top-down management approach, mechanized agriculture and a reliance on external inputs which strengthens the relationships introduced during the colonial period. A time series decomposition of the annual flow in the Senegal River at Bakel in Senegal suggests that water resources availability has been substantially curtailed since 1960, and a review of the water resources budget or availability in the basin suggests that this policy's food production system is not sustainable under the current climate of the basin. Under these conditions, this program is exacerbating existing problems of landscape degradation and desertification, which increases rural poverty. A natural resource management policy offers two adaptation strategies that favour decentralized management and a reduction of external inputs. The first alternative, “Les Perimetres Irrigués”, emphasizes village-scale irrigation, low water consumption cereal crops and traditional socio-political structures. The second alternative emphasizes farm-level irrigation and agro-forestry projects to redress the primary effects of desertification.     

Data Requirements for Developing Adaptations to Climate Variability and Change

An extensive foundation of high quality data and information on the climate and on the biological, environmental and social systems affected by climate is required in order to understand the climate impact processes involved, to develop new adaptation practices, and to subsequently implement these practices. Experience of the impacts of current and past variability of climate and sea level is a prime source of information. Many practices are in use to reduce climate impacts, for example in engineering design, agricultural risk management and climate prediction services, though their roles as adaptations to climate change are not widely appreciated. While there are good data sets on some factors and in some regions, in many cases the databases are inadequate and there are few data sets on adaptation-specific quantities such as vulnerability, resilience and adaptation effectiveness. Current international action under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) pays little attention to adaptation and its information requirements. Furthermore there are trends toward reduced data gathering and to restrictions on access to data sets, especially arising from cost and commercialisation pressures. To effectively respond to the changes in climate that are now inevitable, governments will need to more clearly identify adaptation as a central feature of climate change policy and make a renewed shared commitment to collecting and freely exchanging the necessary data.     

Adaptation policies to increase terrestrial ecosystem resilience: potential utility of a multicriteria approach

Climate change is rapidly undermining terrestrial ecosystem resilience and capacity to continue providing their services to the benefit of humanity and nature. Because of the importance of terrestrial ecosystems to human well-being and supporting services, decision makers throughout the world are busy creating policy responses that secure multiple development and conservation objectives— including that of supporting terrestrial ecosystem resilience in the context of climate change. This article aims to advance analyses on climate policy evaluation and planning in the area of terrestrial ecosystem resilience by discussing adaptation policy options within the ecology-economy-social nexus. The paper evaluates these decisions in the realm of terrestrial ecosystem resilience and evaluates the utility of a set of criteria, indicators, and assessment methods, proposed by a new conceptual multi-criteria framework for pro-development climate policy and planning developed by the United Nations Environment Programme. Potential applications of a multicriteria approach to climate policy vis-à-vis terrestrial ecosystems are then explored through two hypothetical case study examples. The paper closes with a brief discussion of the utility of the multi-criteria approach in the context of other climate policy evaluation approaches, considers lessons learned as a result efforts to evaluate climate policy in the realm of terrestrial ecosystems, and reiterates the role of ecosystem resilience in creating sound policies and actions that support the integration of climate change and development goals.     

Building regional priorities in forests for development and adaptation to climate change in the Congo Basin

Indentifying common priorities in shared natural resource systems constitutes an important platform for implementing adaptation and a major step in sharing a common responsibility in addressing climate change. Predominated by discourses on REDD + (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation and conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries) with little emphasis on adaptation there is a risk of lack of policy measures in addressing climate change in the Congo Basin. Forest products and ecosystem services provide security portfolios for the predominantly rural communities, and play major roles in national development programmes in both revenue and employment opportunities. Thus, raising the profile of forests in the policy arena especially in the twin roles of addressing climate change in mitigation and adaptation and achieving resilient development is crucial. Within the framework of the Congo Basin Forests and Climate Change Adaptation project (COFCCA) project, science policy dialogue was conducted to identify and prioritize forest based sectors vulnerable to climate change but important to household livelihoods and national development. The goal of the prioritization process was for the development of intervention in forest as measures for climate change adaptation in Central Africa. Participants constituted a wide range of stakeholders (government, Non Governmental Organizations, research institutions, universities, community leaders, private sectors etc.) as representatives from three countries directly involved in the project: Cameroon, Central African Republic and Democratic Republic of Congo. Building on national priorities, four forest related sectors were identified as common priorities at the regional level for focus on climate change adaptation. These sectors included: (1) energy with emphasis on fuel wood and Charcoal; (2) Water principally quality, quantity, accessibility, etc.; (3) Food with emphasis on Non Timber Forest Products, and (4) Health linked to healthcare products (medicinal plants). Using these prioritized sectors, the project focused on addressing the impacts of climate change on local communities and the development of adaptation strategies in the three pilot countries of the Congo Basin region. The four sectors constitute the key for development in the region and equally considered as priority sectors in the poverty reduction papers. Focused research on these sectors can help to inject the role of forests in national and local development and their potentials contributions to climate change adaptation in national and public discourses. Mainstreaming forest for climate change adaptation into national development planning is the key to improve policy coherence and effectiveness in forest management in the region.     

Climate Modelling,Uncertainty and Responses to Predictions of Change

Article 4.1(F) of the Framework Convention on Climate Change commits all parties to take climate change considerations into account, to the extent feasible, in relevant social, economic and environmental policies and actions and to employ methods such as impact assessments to minimize adverse effects of climate change. This could be achieved by,inter alia, incorporating climate change risk assessment into development planning processes i.e. relating climatic change to issues of habitability and sustainability. Adaptation is an ubiquitous and beneficial natural and human strategy. Future adaptation (or, better, adjustment) to climate is inevitable at the least to decrease the vulnerability to current climatic impacts. The urgent issue is the mismatch between the predictions ofglobal climatic change and the need for information onlocal to regional change in order to develop adaptation strategies. Mitigation efforts are essential since the more successful mitigation activities are, the less need there will be for adaptation responses. Moreover, mitigation responses can be global (e.g. a uniform percentage reduction in greenhouse gas emissions) while adaptation responses will be local to regional in character and therefore depend upon confident predictions of regional climatic change. The dilemma facing policymakers is that scientists have considerable confidence in likely global climatic changes but virtually zero confidence in regional changes. Mitigation and adaptation strategies relevant to climatic change can most usefully be developed in the context of sound understanding of climate, especially the near-surface continental climate, permitting discussion of societally relevant issues. Unfortunately, climate models cannot yet deliver this type of regionally and locationally specific prediction and some aspects of current research even seem to indicate increased uncertainty. These topics are explored in this paper using the specific example of the prediction of land-surface climate changes.     

Climate change adaptation in the Sahel

Climate change adaptation now occupies central stage on the agenda of most environmental initiatives in Africa. Our current understanding on the state of adaptation is limited, however, both globally and in Africa in particular. This study examines the status of adaptation in the Sahel by reviewing the primary peer review literature that reports concrete climate change adaptation actions. Based on an analysis of 70 peer review papers that document 414 discrete adaptations, we create a snap shot of adaptations developed between 1975 and 2015, and also calculate the percentages of adaptation. The results show that from a country to country perspective, Kenya has the highest number of reported adaptation actions (75 or 18.1%). The percentages indicate that the adaptive capacity of the entire study area is generally low for all the countries being that the highest country-level percentage is recorded in Kenya and it is 18%. Regionally, West Africa has more adaptation actions (261 or 63%) when compared to other regions of the Sahel. Regional level percentages suggest a higher level of adaptation at the regional level being that the percentage falls within the high scale range. The most commonly used adaptation actions reported are income diversification and water harnessing respectively. When categorized, technically related adaptation actions dominate the adaptation charts. The decade 2008–2016 recorded the highest number of adaptations (65.2%). Adaptation actions are also reported to be triggered by climatic and non-climatic drivers which both record high frequencies but the climatic drivers (98%) of adaptation are slightly dominant relative to the non-climatic drivers (95%). These results should be viewed as proxies of climate change adaptation as much information may be found in grey literature and non-peer review national communications which are left out here because of their relative low standardization and acceptability due to the absence of peer review.     

Envisioning the future and learning from the past: Adapting to a changing environment in northern Mali

In West Africa, rural livelihoods depending on natural resources develop coping and adapting strategies to face climate variability or change and economic or political changes. The former Lake Faguibine in northern Mali has experienced drastic ecological, social, and economic changes. Forests have emerged on the former lake and have become important for local livelihoods. This paper analyses the coping and adapting strategies of forest- and livestock-based livelihoods facing ecological changes. Results from field research at different levels indicate that most local strategies are based on diversification including migration within the livestock production system or in complement to it, with differences according to gender, age, and ethnicity. Political discourses, cultural identities, and past experiences influence and shape adaptation strategies at the local level. The sustainability of the observed strategies depends on the access to natural resources and the sustainable management of these resources, which in turn depends on institutions at local and national levels. Many local strategies are reactive to external events but would need strategic support from higher levels to move from coping to adapting. Examples are the development of institutions and technical actions for natural resource management, as well as development actions supporting local strategies and sustainable investments. Researchers, practitioners and development planners will need simple methods and tools for understanding and analysing local adaptation perceptions and actions to achieve an effective support of sustainable and gender-equitable local adaptation and to avoid mismatches between strategies proposed by local and by sub national and national actors.     

Adaptation to climate change in the transport sector: a review of actions and actors

This paper identifies the literature that deals with adaptation to climate change in the transport sector. It presents a systematic review of the adaptations suggested in the literature. Although it is frequently claimed that this socially and economically important sector is particularly vulnerable to climate change, there is comparatively little research into its adaptation. The 63 sources we found are analysed following an action framework of adaptation. This distinguishes different adaptational functions and means of adaptation. By an open coding procedure, a total of 245 adaptations are found and classified. The paper shows a broad diversity of interdependent actors to be relevant—ranging from transportation providers to public and private actors and households. Crucial actors are hybrid in terms of being public or private. A substantial share of the identified adaptations follows a top-down adaptation policy pattern where a public or hybrid operator initiates action that affects private actors. Most of the exceptions from this pattern are technical or engineering measures. Identified adaptations mostly require institutional means, followed by technical means, and knowledge. Generally, knowledge on adapting transport to climate change is still in a stage of infancy. The existing literature either focuses on overly general adaptations, or on detailed technical measures. Further research is needed on the actual implementation of adaptation, and on more precise institutional instruments that fill the gap between too vague and too site-specific adaptations.     

Numerical model to assess the impact of the strategies to mitigate desertification

Desertification is considered a global environmental problem with political and socioeconomic implications. Desertification, exacerbated by climate change, is the largest environmental problem in Chile affecting almost two third of the national territory. This study takes place in a latitudinal gradient of the north-central Chilean drylands, where desertification is a threat to agriculture, livestock and forestry (ALF). In the context of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and the implementation of the Chilean National Action Programme (NAP), the country is conducting policies and investing in mitigation strategies to combat land degradation and desertification. The main objective of this paper is the development of an integrative methodological approach using real data of the territorial and socioeconomic indicators. With the proposed methodology we assess the impact of the mitigation and land degradation strategies supported by the ALF promotion agencies in the fight against desertification, projecting different scenarios of change. The data were collected in 2008 in Santiago, Chile. The results of the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) suggest that technical irrigation and the improvement of grasslands and pastures play an important role in the fight against desertification. The results of the model projections are consistent, suggesting that the efforts of the ALF promotion agencies have a positive impact in fighting desertification. Inaction of ALF mitigation strategies would increase desertification. This methodological approach, performed with real data, is a contribution for the development of integrative assessments, for replication and for forthcoming discussions.     

Assessing local climate vulnerability and winegrowers’ adaptive processes in the context of climate change

Adaptation to climate change is a major challenge facing the viticulture sector. Temporally, adaptation strategies and policies have to address potential impacts in both the short- and long term, whereas spatially, place-based and context-specific adaptations are essential. To help inform decision-making on climate change adaptation, this study adopted a bottom-up approach to assess local climate vulnerability and winegrowers’ adaptive processes in two regulated wine-producing areas in the Anjou-Saumur wine growing sub-region, France. The data used for this study were collected through individual semi-structured interviews with 30 winegrowers. With a focus on wine quality, climate-related exposure, and sensitivity were dependent on many contextual factors (e.g., northern geographical position, wine regulatory frameworks, local environmental features) interacting with the regional oceanic climate. Climate and other non-climate-related variables brought about important changes in winegrowers’ management practices, varying in time and space. This ongoing process in decision-making enhanced winegrowers’ adaptive responses, which were primarily reactive (e.g., harvesting, winemaking) or anticipatory (e.g., canopy and soil management) to short-term climate conditions. Winegrowers described changing trends in climate- and grapevine (Vitis) -related variables, with the latter attributed to regional climate changes and evolving management practices. Regarding future climate trends, winegrowers’ displayed great uncertainty, placing the most urgent adaptation priority on short-term strategies, while changing grapevine varieties and using irrigation were identified as last resort strategies. The study concluded by discussing the implications of these findings in the context of climate change adaptation in viticulture.     

Pursuing an integrated development and climate policy framework in Africa: options for mainstreaming

Climate change presents a major threat to the prospects for sustained economic development in Africa. In spite of this, climate change concerns do not feature prominently in the implementation of national and regional development programmes. The present paper identifies the likely trade-offs and synergies that may emerge from an integrated ‘development-climate’ approach to policy making. Also, the paper presents the case for the formulation and evaluation of an integrated policy approach based on four principle criteria, including; long-term environmental effectiveness, equity considerations, cost-effectiveness and the institutional compatibility of the policy combinations. What is more? The paper suggests specific options for mainstreaming climate change adaptation and mitigation in various sectoral development agenda such as; agricultural intensification, poverty eradication, rural development, urban renewal, energy security of supply and trade. Given the wide divergence of socio-economic systems and the peculiar challenges faced by individual countries in the continent, further research is required on robust country-specific strategies for pursuing an integrated development-climate policy framework.     

Climate change adaptation through local knowledge in the north eastern region of Bangladesh

Climate change adaptation in the low laying developing countries is becoming crucial at the present time. However, the local knowledge regarding climate change adaptation is not well focused. This study evaluates climate related perception and identifying various adaptation strategies in the low lying areas of North-Eastern Bangladesh. Six focus group discussions and 120 households?? survey were carried out to identify the major climate events in our study areas which were temperature change, drought, heavy rainfall and cyclone and storm surges. Furthermore, main livelihood problems arising from these events were lack of fish availability, scarcity of water in drought seasons and frequent flood in the rainy seasons. Results also revealed that a little portion (10%) of the respondents had well knowledge about the present climate change. However, seasonal livelihood and hazard calendar demonstrated that local people were increasingly changing their livelihood status with changing climatic hazards. At that situation local people tried to adapt themselves with the changing climate through changing their own behavior and introducing some adaptation strategies. We recognized total 16 adaptive measures in the study areas within which crop diversification, floating garden, duck rearing, cage aquaculture, wave protection walls, re-digging of canal and construction of embankments were popular. The present study revealed that local experiences in the face of climate change adaptation have merits which need special consideration. Continuous research and more incentives required for proper documentation and relegate the local adaptation knowledge in the tropic.     

Mitigation and adaptation synergy in forest sector

Mitigation and adaptation are the two main strategies to address climate change. Mitigation and adaptation have been considered separately in the global negotiations as well as literature. There is a realization on the need to explore and promote synergy between mitigation and adaptation while addressing climate change. In this paper, an attempt is made to explore the synergy between mitigation and adaptation by considering forest sector, which on the one hand is projected to be adversely impacted under the projected climate change scenarios and on the other provide opportunities to mitigate climate change. Thus, the potential and need for incorporating adaptation strategies and practices in mitigation projects is presented with a few examples. Firstly, there is a need to ensure that mitigation programs or projects do not increase the vulnerability of forest ecosystems and plantations. Secondly, several adaptation practices could be incorporated into mitigation projects to reduce vulnerability. Further, many of the mitigation projects indeed reduce vulnerability and promote adaptation, for example; forest and biodiversity conservation, protected area management and sustainable forestry. Also, many adaptation options such as urban forestry, soil and water conservation and drought resistant varieties also contribute to mitigation of climate change. Thus, there is need for research and field demonstration of synergy between mitigation and adaptation, so that the cost of addressing climate change impacts can be reduced and co-benefits increased.     

Policy misfits,climate change and cross-scale vulnerability in coastal Africa: how development projects undermine resilience

Coastal social ecological systems in eastern Africa are subject to a range of environmental, social and economic changes. They are already vulnerable to these multiple stressors, and the impacts of climate change are likely to further exacerbate their vulnerabilities. Some of these impacts may be observed and experienced already. The analysis presented in this paper is based on mixed methods empirical research exploring local perceptions of recent changes at four sites in coastal Tanzania and Mozambique. People recognise and rank a number of climate and non-climate stressors which have contributed towards more risky and less diverse livelihoods. Importantly, regional and international policy initiatives – in the form of river basin management in Mozambique and South Africa, and development of a Marine Protected Area in Tanzania – are perceived to further erode resilience and exacerbate vulnerabilities. We suggest this is a form of policy misfit, where policies developed to address a specific issue do not take account of cross-scale dynamics of change, the interactions between multiple stressors, nor longer term climate change. This policy misfit may be remedied by a move towards adaptive forms of governance, and necessitates an explicit focus on building the adaptive capacity of the poor and most vulnerable in society.     

牧民对气候变化的认知及应对措施——以镶黄旗为例

文章通过对镶黄旗60户牧户的调查访问,分析牧户对气候变化和极端气候灾害事件的认知和应对措施,结果显示:牧民对气温有较强的认知能力,而对于降雨和大风的认知与实际相悖;气候变化下牧户对草场情况和水资源状况等生态环境变化的认知来看,牧民对牧草产量、植物种类、土壤沙化、鼠虫害、地下水变化的认知比较明显;牧民对气候变化所采取的措施主要有政策措施、帮助措施和合作方式,而3种措施中牧民主要采取草畜平衡和春节休牧、畜种改良和防疫措施、邻里间的互助来应对气候变化。影响镶黄旗牧民的主要灾害天气主要是旱灾,占灾害天气的75%,从气候灾害事件影响方面的认知来看;气候灾害事件对畜、草、人的影响比较大,且影响程度为畜>草>人;牧民面对气候灾害事件主要采取处理牲畜、购买草料、走场、圈养、外出打工等5种应对措施。     

Effectiveness of the Local Adaptation Plan of Action to support climate change adaptation in Nepal

A key challenge in climate change adaptation in developing countries as a whole, and to handling global change in particular, is to link local adaptation needs on the one hand, with national adaptation initiatives on the other, so that vulnerable households and communities can directly benefit. This study assesses the impact of the Nepal government’s efforts to promote its Local Adaptation Plan of Action (LAPA) and its applicability to other least developed countries (LDCs). Based on data gathered from two field studies in Nepal, the research shows that the Nepal’s LAPA has succeeded in mobilizing local institutions and community groups in adaptation planning and recognizing their role in adaptation. However, the LAPA approach and implementation have been constrained by sociostructural and governance barriers that have failed to successfully integrate local adaptation needs in local planning and increase the adaptive capacity of vulnerable households. This paper describes the mechanisms of suitable governance strategies for climate change adaptation specific to Nepal and other LDCs. It also argues the need to adopt an adaptive comanagement approach, where the government and all stakeholders identify common local- and national-level mainstreaming strategy for knowledge management, resource mobilization, and institutional development, ultimately using adaptation as a tool to handle global change.     

The cost of mitigation strategies for agricultural adaptation to global change

Land recovery and the improvement of lands affected by desertification for agricultural use, is achieved when a sustained recovery of agricultural productivity over time is obtained. In the areas affected by desertification and drought, it is common that the ecosystems do not have enough funding for water management and irrigation. This situation leads to an inadequate assessment of the environmental goods and services in arid zones. As a result we have a misuse of these dry lands. Many countries are implementing policies and making investments and efforts to mitigate arid land degradation and desertification through the National Action Programs (NAP). However, for the long term planning of mitigation and adaptation strategies, it is necessary to know the cost of recovery and land improvement in certain areas in order to forecast the budgets. This is the main objective of this paper in order to combat desertification and drought in central northern Chile. We have calculated a recovery cost per hectare by region and for each of the agriculture, livestock and forestry (ALF) promotion agencies. The results indicate that the cost of land reclamation in the northern regions is much higher than in the southern regions of this studied area. The cost is especially high for Region II, where investment per hectare is almost to 3000 US$ per hectare. At the other extreme is the Region VII, in the south of the studied area where the investment required per hectare barely reaches 500 US$. The contribution of the promotion agencies to the total cost also varied among regions and agencies. We discuss the results within a context of recovery cost per hectare depending on the different environmental characteristics and agricultural development of each of the studied regions.     

Potential synergies between existing multilateral environmental agreements in the implementation of land use,land-use change and forestry activities

There is potential for synergy between the global environmental conventions on climate change, biodiversity and desertification: changes in land management and land use undertaken to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions can simultaneously deliver positive outcomes for conservation of biodiversity, and mitigation of desertification and land degradation. However, while there can be complementarities between the three environmental goals, there are often tradeoffs. Thus, the challenge lies in developing land use policies that promote optimal environmental outcomes, and in implementing these locally to promote sustainable development. The paper considers synergies and tradeoffs in implementing land use measures to address the objectives of the three global environmental conventions, both from an environmental and economic perspective. The intention is to provide environmental scientists and policy makers with a broad overview of these considerations, and the benefits of addressing the conventions simultaneously.