Abstract
Making climate-resilient planning and adaptation decisions is, in part, contingent on the use of climate information. Growing attention has been paid to the “usability gap” and the need to make information both useful and useable to decision-makers. Less attention has, however, been paid to the factors that determine whether, once created, useful and useable information is then actually used. In this Perspectives piece, we outline a framework that puts together the pieces necessary to close the “usability gap” – highlighting not only what is required to make information useful and useable, but also what is required to ensure that useful and useable information is actually used. Creating useful information is subject to understanding and being able to deliver metrics that address identified needs in a range of decision-making contexts. Creating useable information requires legitimate and credible information that is visualised and communicated in ways that are accessible and understandable. The framework highlights traditionally under-recognized enablers necessary to promote effective use of the growing availability of useful and useable climate information in decision-making; supportive institutions, appropriate policy frameworks, capacity of individuals and agency to make decisions. Whilst this is not enough in itself to effect information use, we argue that greater focus on these enablers can re-balance the activities promoted through climate services and increase the likelihood of successful use. We illustrate the framework with case examples of co-producing climate information for the tea and water sectors in sub-Saharan Africa.
Highlights
Making climate-resilient planning and adaptation decisions for effective climate risk management is, in part, contingent upon the use of climate information (Jones et al, 2015)
Less attention has been paid to investigating whether or not useful and useable information – once generated with a focus on user needs – is used (Vaughan and Dessai, 2014; Lemos et al, 2018). We address this gap by presenting a conceptual framework that highlights enablers that are under-recognized, but that need to be in place to ensure that useful and useable information is being used when demand exists (e.g. Vogel et al, 2019)
While the work has not been formally used, the process has provided a platform from which different actors can engage further through interactions that are more informed about climate risk. These effects are less tangible, harder to quantify and in themselves not sufficient, the actions are a necessary part of the route to effective use of climate information. In both our case studies, considerable investment in time, resources and expertise went into the process of stakeholder engagement and joint design of information and decision support models/heuristics to create useful and useable information
Summary
Making climate-resilient planning and adaptation decisions for effective climate risk management is, in part, contingent upon the use of climate information (Jones et al, 2015). Significant efforts have led to the increasing availability of climate information at a range of temporal and spatial scales (Dinku et al, 2014; Hewitt et al, 2020) – and such information is steadily becoming more accessible (Hewitson et al, 2017). This has, often not translated into more effective adaptation (Lemos et al, 2012). Even when information is available, there remain obstacles to its access and effective use in decision-making, termed a “valley of death” (Buontempo et al, 2014), or “usability gap” (Lemos et al, 2012). We illustrate its application with examples from sub-Saharan Africa
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