Facilitate Climate Change Adaptation Research Articles

Climate change adaptation at different levels of government: Characteristics and conditions of policy change

Climate change adaptation strategies that aim to minimize harm and maximize benefits related to climate change impacts have mushroomed at all levels of government in recent years. While many studies have explored barriers that stand in the way of their implementation, the factors determining their potential to mainstream adaptation into various sectors are less clear. In the present paper, we aim to address this gap for two international, six national, and six local adaptation strategies. Based on document analyses and 35 semi‐structured interviews, the 14 case studies also explore in how far the factors facilitating climate change adaptation are similar across levels of government or level‐specific. Although located at three different levels of government, we find that the 14 adaptation strategies analyzed here represent “one‐size‐fits‐all governance arrangements” that are characterized by voluntariness and a lack institutionalization. Since adaptation strategies are relatively weak coordination hubs that are unable to force adaptation onto sectoral policy agendas, they rely mainly on sectoral self‐interest in adapting to climate change, largely determined by problem pressure. We conclude that one‐size‐fits‐all governance arrangements are rarely adequate responses to complex challenges, such as climate change. Although climate change adaptation depends more on framework conditions such as problem pressure than on administrative or governance features, the findings presented here can help to understand under what circumstances adaptation is likely to make progress.

THE CRITICAL ROLE OF MARKETS IN CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION

Markets, especially land markets, can facilitate climate change adaptation through price signals. A review of research reveals that urban, coastal, and agricultural land markets provide effective signals of the emerging costs of climate change. These signals encourage adjustments by both private owners and policy officials in taking preemptive action to reduce costs. In agriculture, they promote consideration of new cropping and tillage practices, seed types, timing, and location of production. They also stimulate use of new irrigation technologies. In urban areas, they motivate new housing construction, elevation, and location away from harm. They channel more efficient use of water and its application to parks and other green areas to make urban settings more desirable with higher temperatures. Related water markets play a similar role in adjusting water use and reallocation. To be effective, however, markets must reflect multiple traders and prices must be free to adjust. Where these conditions are not met, market signals will be inhibited and market-driven adaptation will be reduced. Because public policy is driven by constituent demands, it may not be a remedy. The evidence of the National Flood Insurance Program and federal wildfire response illustrates how politically difficult it may be to adjust programs to be more adaptive.

Coordinating climate change adaptation across levels of government: the gap between theory and practice of integrated adaptation strategy processes

Policymakers at different government levels develop integrated adaptation strategy processes (ASPs), which are supposed to prepare a particular region, country or municipality for the impacts of climate change. The adaptation literature suggests that coordination of these efforts promises comprehensive climate change adaptation, because it allows making use of synergies and avoiding maladaptation. Nonetheless, we lack evidence about the coordination of multiple levels and its potential to actually facilitate climate change adaptation. Based on an examination of 14 integrated ASPs, the author asks how they interact with each other, if they reconcile the priorities of other levels, and if they are an adequate tool for coordinating climate change adaptation. The study reveals a considerable gap between theory and practice. It demonstrates that the call for coordination is not reflected in current adaptation policy and questions whether (more) coordination is what we need to be better prepared for the impacts of climate change.

Forests Policies and Programmes in India: Implications for Climate Change Adaptation

Climate change is a major global environmental and developmental challenge and climate proofing of vulnerable sectors, programmes, natural systems and communities by integrating adaptation and mitigation options into planning process are increasingly becoming an integral part of development. The basic premises on which this could happen are the national and sectoral policies that govern any programmes and actions implemented on ground. This study reviews existing policies, plans and programmes and their implications for climate change. Based on the analyses, key areas of research, policy initiatives and institutional and capacity development needs have been identified, to facilitate climate change adaptation. The forest policies formulated so far in India have been broadly aimed at conservation, reduction of pressure on forests and provisioning of biomass to the large forest dependent population for their fuel and fodder needs apart from generating revenue through production and sale of timber. However, these have not been formulated with climate change as a consideration and therefore may become less effective as climate change and its impacts become increasingly evident. The study clearly identifies that the current policies and programmes have elements/features and activities that directly or indirectly contribute positively towards adaptation, although the primary implications are towards biodiversity and to some extent ecosystem functioning. It finally highlights the need for incorporating climate change concerns in forest sector development programmes and also to address the issue of climate change.

GMO risks, food security, climate change and the entrenchment of neo-liberal legal narratives

ABSTRACTThis article explores the artificial nature of the neo-liberal legal narratives on GMOs, complementing Anne Saab’s analysis of the Public International Law (‘PIL’) climate change adaptation regime with a deconstruction of the hegemonic transnational legal discourse on the risks, costs and benefits of agricultural biotechnologies. The enquiry into the dominant regulatory approach to the governance of GMO risks sheds light on its specific political and socio-economic implications, lending support to the argument that GMOs are identified as a strategy to tackle food insecurity and facilitate climate change adaptation simply because their development, patenting and trade serve the profit-making goals of transnational market actors. Against this backdrop, the PIL discourse on climate resilient GMOs and the hegemonic transnational legal narrative on GMO safety and food security turn out to be two sides of the same coin.

Collaboration Across Worldviews: Managers and Scientists on Hawai'i Island Utilize Knowledge Coproduction to Facilitate Climate Change Adaptation.

Complex socio-ecological issues, such as climate change have historically been addressed through technical problem solving methods. Yet today, climate science approaches are increasingly accounting for the roles of diverse social perceptions, experiences, cultural norms, and worldviews. In support of this shift, we developed a research program on Hawai'i Island that utilizes knowledge coproduction to integrate the diverse worldviews of natural and cultural resource managers, policy professionals, and researchers within actionable science products. Through their work, local field managers regularly experience discrete land and waterscapes. Additionally, in highly interconnected rural communities, such as Hawai'i Island, managers often participate in the social norms and values of communities that utilize these ecosystems. Such local manager networks offer powerful frameworks within which to co-develop and implement actionable science. We interviewed a diverse set of local managers with the aim of incorporating their perspectives into the development of a collaborative climate change research agenda that builds upon existing professional networks utilized by managers and scientists while developing new research products. We report our manager needs assessment, the development process of our climate change program, our interactive forums, and our ongoing research products. Our needs assessment showed that the managers' primary source of information were other professional colleagues, and our in-person forums informed us that local managers are very interested in interacting with a wider range of networks to build upon their management capacities. Our initial programmatic progress suggests that co-created research products and in-person forums strengthen the capacities of local managers to adapt to change.

Collaboration between meso-level institutions and communities to facilitate climate change adaptation in Ghana

There is a growing recognition of the role of meso-level institutions that operate between the central state and communities in facilitating climate change adaptation at local and district levels. This article explores how collaborative approaches to planned adaptation by an external agent in Ghana can create linkages between meso-level institutions and communities, and examines how the actors involved have received the approach. The study is based on fieldwork in the Northern and Upper East regions of Ghana. The programme examined has been designed to reflect the need of each community instead of general adaptation strategies. Findings from the study suggest that the communities involved have achieved positive outcomes from the approach. Capacity building and advocacy training have made the involved communities more proactive, which has increased the collaboration between the communities and local governance. Climate change adaptation has now become one of the key priorities on the political agenda of the local district assemblies. However, lack of funding hinders the achievements to be expanded to the rest of the district. More funding, therefore, needs to be directed at meso-level institutions to increase adaptation.

THE ROLE OF COMPETENCY DIMENSIONS AND ORGANIZATIONAL SUPPORT IN CLIMATE CHANGE ADVISORY SERVICE DELIVERY

Agricultural sector is vital not only to the livelihood of Malaysian farmers but also to Malaysian economy. However, the sector is currently being threatened by environmental phenomenon in form of climate change. Majority of Malaysian farmers are small-holders who rely mostly on extension workers for information and advisory services. Hence, it is the job of these extension workers to facilitate adaptation among their clientele. This study assessed the factors influencing the performance of such job among the extension workers. The study sought to establish the role of relevant factors in effective performance. The factors have been tested separately previously, but this study brought them together to assess their respective contributions. The research design was quantitative cross-sectional survey of public agricultural extension personnel in Peninsular Malaysia. Data was obtained from 328 extension personnel. It was analysed using descriptive and inferential techniques. The results revealed that extension workers with higher core and adaptation-specific competencies; more work experience and younger in age are predicted to be more effective in job performance and facilitating climate change adaptation among clients.

The role of spatial planning in reducing exposure towards impacts of global sea level rise case study: Northern coast of Java, Indonesia

Spatial planning is expected to facilitate climate change adaptation by directing future spatial and infrastructure developments away from zones that are exposed to climate-related hazards. This study attempts to confirm this understanding by mapping the effects of the various spatial plans on the northern coast of Java, Indonesia. First, the study maps the extent of coastal hazards for the baseline year of 2010 using a GIS-based inundation model. An overlay in GIS demonstrates the influence of spatial plans for the projection year of 2030. This allows for calculating the economic losses of the planned developments. The case study shows that the current provincial spatial plans direct land use conversions along the northern coast of Java to continue to occur in the future. This could significantly decrease the regional capacity in dealing with the exposure to coastal inundation. The analysis also demonstrates that a total area of 55,220 ha of land prone to inundation, consisting of protected area (1488 ha), fishponds (32,916 ha) and agricultural land (20,814 ha), is planned to be converted into industry (13,399 ha) and settlements (41,821 ha). Thus, these areas will be also prone to inundation in 2030. This change would potentially lead to an economic loss of 246.6 billion USD. The spatial plans issued by the national and provincial governments for regulating the future land use on the northern coast of Java have not integrated measures against hazards related to global sea level rise. Meanwhile, many existing developments have already been affected by coastal inundation. Rather than reducing the exposure towards coastal flood hazards, the case study shows that spatial plans could even increase the risk of climate-related hazards and cause higher economic losses. These findings provide a different perspective on the role of spatial planning for climate change adaptation than what is stated in the literature.

Insurance sector management of climate change adaptation in three Nordic countries: the influence of policy and market factors

The insurance industry is important for facilitating climate change adaptation. Insurance companies’ involvement is, however, influenced by national adaptation policy. The literature suggests that especially policy factors – government interventions, political priorities and public–private cooperation – and market factors – cost offset, cost mitigation, planning flexibility and business opportunities – shape private actor approaches. To increase the understanding of insurance company involvement in adaptation, this study examines how insurance companies’ approaches are influenced by policy and market factors in three countries: Denmark, Norway and Sweden. The study found that the policy factors tested significantly shaped the approaches of the companies assessed, while market factors currently appear less influential. This is likely due to the absence of climate risk and adaptation in political debates and among insurance policyholders. The study discusses the potential role of the insurance industry in adaptation governance and suggests how barriers facing insurance companies could be overcome.

Climate Change Attitudes of Southern Forestry Professionals: Outreach Implications

Greater climate variability may profoundly impact southern forests, requiring climate-resilient management strategies to sustain them into the future. Foresters design and implement these strategies, and their perspectives on climate change may influence their receptivity to outreach on climate science and adaptation. To effectively engage this audience, communicators such as Extension agents must understand their views. We surveyed southern forestry professionals to address that need, identifying opportunities and obstacles for education about climate-resilient forestry. Demographic characteristics, particularly political ideology, correlated highly with acceptance of climate change. We also found significant relationships between climate change attitudes, experiences, perceptions, and management responses. Foresters who accept climate change are more likely to observe it in the environment, feel concerned about its impacts on forestry, and agree that it will require different management strategies. We explored multiple outreach options and ultimately recommend connecting climate change to forestry by emphasizing forest health and productivity concerns. Management and Policy Implications The scientific literature generally recommends that foresters facilitate climate change adaptation by managing for (1) resistance to the forces of climate change, (2) resilience to climate change to absorb impacts without losing function, (3) responding to climatic transitions to minimize negative impacts, and (4) realigning altered forests to current climatic conditions through restoration (Vose et al. 2012). Specific management actions recommended to help southern forests adapt to climate change, such as thinning to reduce water stress, vary, depending on each site's unique management objectives, stand characteristics, and climate change impacts. This study is not designed to refine the climate-resilient management toolkit, but rather to enhance educators' understanding of foresters' climate change attitudes. The results indicate that demographic characteristics shape climate change attitudes in ways comparable to those for the general public. Further, foresters' climate change attitudes, personal observations, concerns about impacts to forestry, and management actions are closely intertwined. This observation suggests that outreach aimed to implement climate-resilient adaptive management strategies will require a nuanced approach to effectively reach all foresters. We conclude that communicators should avoid emphasizing climate change to doubting foresters and instead lead with potential impacts to forest health and productivity (such as drought and pests), continuing to outline and encourage appropriate management solutions.

Urban Drainage System Improvement for Climate Change Adaptation

Recently, urban areas have experienced frequent, large-scale flooding, a situation that has been aggravated by climate change. This study aims to improve the urban drainage system to facilitate climate change adaptation. A methodology and a series of mitigation strategies are presented to efficiently improve the urban drainage system in light of climate change. In addition, we assess the impact of climate change and predict the scale of potential future flood damage by applying the methodology and mitigation strategies to urban areas. Based on the methodology presented, urban flood prevention measures for Gyeyang-gu (Province), Incheon, Korea, was established. The validity of the proposed alternatives is verified by assessing the economic feasibility of the projects to reduce flood damage. We expect that the methodology presented will aid the decision-making process and assist in the development of reasonable strategies to improve the urban drainage system for adaptation to climate change.

Smallholder Farmers and Climate Smart Agriculture: Technology and Labor-productivity Constraints amongst Women Smallholders in Malawi

Climate change and variability present a major challenge to agricultural production and rural livelihoods, including livelihoods of women smallholder farmers. There are significant efforts underway to develop, deploy, and scale up Climate-Smart Agricultural (CSA) practices and technologies to facilitate climate change adaptation for farmers. However, there is a need for gender analysis of CSA practices across different farming and cultural systems to facilitate adoption by, and livelihood improvements for, women smallholder farmers. Climate change poses challenges for maintaining and improving agricultural and labor productivity of women smallholder farmers. The labor productivity of many women smallholders is constrained by lack of access to labor-saving technologies and the most basic of farm tools. Poorer smallholders face a poverty trap, due to low agricultural and labor productivity, from which they cannot easily escape without access to key resources such as rural energy and labor-saving technologies. In Malawi, the agricultural system is predominantly rainfed and largely composed of smallholders who remain vulnerable to climate change and variability shocks. Despite the aspirations of women smallholders to engage in CSA, our research highlights that many women smallholders have either limited or no access to basic agricultural tools, transport, and rural energy. This raises the question of whether the future livelihood scenarios for such farmers will consist of barely surviving or “hanging in”; or whether such farmers can “step up” to adapt better to future climate constraints; or whether more of these farmers will “step out” of agriculture. We argue that for women smallholder farmers to become more climate change resilient, more serious attention to gender analysis is needed to address their constraints in accessing basic agricultural technologies, combined with participatory approaches to develop and adapt CSA tools and technologies to their needs in future climates and agro-ecologies.

Amplification or suppression: Social networks and the climate change—migration association in rural Mexico

Increasing rates of climate migration may be of economic and national concern to sending and destination countries. It has been argued that social networks—the ties connecting an origin and destination—may operate as “migration corridors” with the potential to strongly facilitate climate change-related migration. This study investigates whether social networks at the household and community levels amplify or suppress the impact of climate change on international migration from rural Mexico. A novel set of 15 climate change indices was generated based on daily temperature and precipitation data for 214 weather stations across Mexico. Employing geostatistical interpolation techniques, the climate change values were linked to 68 rural municipalities for which sociodemographic data and detailed migration histories were available from the Mexican Migration Project. Multi-level discrete-time event-history models were used to investigate the effect of climate change on international migration between 1986 and 1999. At the household level, the effect of social networks was approximated by comparing the first to the last move, assuming that through the first move a household establishes internal social capital. At the community level, the impact of social capital was explored through interactions with a measure of the proportion of adults with migration experience. The results show that rather than amplifying, social capital may suppress the sensitivity of migration to climate triggers, suggesting that social networks could facilitate climate change adaptation in place.

Facilitating climate change adaptation through communication: Insights from the development of a visualization tool

Climate change communication on anticipated impacts and adaptive responses is frequently presented as an effective means to facilitate implementation of adaptation to mitigate risks to residential buildings. However, it requires that communication is developed in a way that resonates with the context of the target audience, provides intelligible information and addresses perceived barriers to adaptation. In this paper we reflect upon criteria for useful climate change communication gained over a three year development process of a web-based tool – VisAdapt™ – aimed at increasing the adaptive capacity among Nordic homeowners. Based on the results from continuous user-testing and focus group interviews we outline lessons learned and key aspects to consider in the design of tools for communicating complex issues such as climate change effects and adaptive response measures.

Genomic evidence for role of inversion 3RP of Drosophila melanogaster in facilitating climate change adaptation.

Chromosomal inversion polymorphisms are common in animals and plants, and recent models suggest that alternative arrangements spread by capturing different combinations of alleles acting additively or epistatically to favour local adaptation. It is also thought that inversions typically maintain favoured combinations for a long time by suppressing recombination between alternative chromosomal arrangements. Here, we consider patterns of linkage disequilibrium and genetic divergence in an old inversion polymorphism in Drosophila melanogaster (In(3R)Payne) known to be associated with climate change adaptation and a recent invasion event into Australia. We extracted, karyotyped and sequenced whole chromosomes from two Australian populations, so that changes in the arrangement of the alleles between geographically separated tropical and temperate areas could be compared. Chromosome-wide linkage disequilibrium (LD) analysis revealed strong LD within the region spanned by In(3R)Payne. This genomic region also showed strong differentiation between the tropical and the temperate populations, but no differentiation between different karyotypes from the same population, after controlling for chromosomal arrangement. Patterns of differentiation across the chromosome arm and in gene ontologies were enhanced by the presence of the inversion. These data support the notion that inversions are strongly selected by bringing together combinations of genes, but it is still not clear if such combinations act additively or epistatically. Our data suggest that climatic adaptation through inversions can be dynamic, reflecting changes in the relative abundance of different forms of an inversion and ongoing evolution of allelic content within an inversion.

Extension′s role in disseminating information about climate change to agricultural stakeholders in the United States

The U.S. Cooperative Extension Service was created 100 years ago to serve as a boundary or interface organization between science generated at the nations land grant universities and rural communities. Production agriculture in the US is becoming increasingly complex and challenging in the face of a rapidly changing climate and the need to balance growing crop productivity with environmental protection. Simultaneously, extension budgets are diminishing and extension personnel are stretched thin with numerous, diverse stake- holders and decreasing budgets. Evidence from surveys of farmers suggests that they are more likely to go to private retailers and consultants for information than extension. This paper explores the role that extension can play in facilitating climate change adaptation in agriculture using data from a survey of agricultural advisors in Indiana, Iowa, Michigan and Nebraska and

“Climate change is the least of my worries”: stress limitations on adaptive capacity

The wine industry in southern Australia faces potential threats from climate change. This article examines how grape growers in this region perceive and prioritize climate change adaptation as an issue for their industry. Analysis of a survey of 50 growers reveals themes contributing to stress and worry overshadow planning for climate change. Growers are constrained by current economic, social and environmental stresses, not climate change. We relate these findings and the literature on stress to the adaptive capacity and general wellbeing of individual farmers. Projected future climate change means stress in the farming community is likely to worsen and practitioners working with farmers need to recognize the complex causes of stress, in addition to the practical need to facilitate climate change adaptation. A useful approach is to understand both the types and causes of stress, and the way individuals cope.

ICT for sustainable development: an example from Cambodia

Can telecentres get a new lease of life, facilitating climate change adaptation and mitigation? Having been widely promoted as an innovative way of bringing information and communication technologies (ICTs) to developing countries since the 1990s, the efficacy of and need for such centres has been questioned more recently, with the attention of ICT for development (ICT4D) shifting towards market-led mobile services. But it is doubtful that sufficient account has been taken of the many, non-ICT roles played by such centres, whether in fostering education, empowerment, or greater environmental awareness. Through a conceptual framework informed by the capability approach, research discovered that iREACH, a Cambodian telecentre initiative had encouraged farming practices compatible with sustainable development. The paper suggests that telecentres might hold some promise in this area, and calls for greater focus on this potential function of such facilities, both in research, policy and implementation

Burrow‐dwelling ecosystem engineers provide thermal refugia throughout the landscape

AbstractEcosystem engineers play fundamental ecological roles by modifying habitats in ways that affect a multitude of other species and by creating refugia with novel microclimates. We hypothesize that burrow‐creating organisms may facilitate climate change adaptation by providing refugia from extreme and fluctuating temperatures found aboveground. We support this hypothesis by showing that large burrow‐dwelling tortoises, Gopherus polyphemus, likely depend upon burrows for thermoregulation. By exploiting the varied thermal conditions within burrows, tortoises avoided lethal temperatures and extreme fluctuations in body temperature, maintained moderate and stable body temperatures on hot days, and maintained relatively warm temperatures overnight. Climate change is predicted to increase maximum air temperatures throughout the geographic range of this species, with impacts most severe in Florida, US, where the range of future conditions could be above that of current maxima. This implies that environmental temperatures will be above lethal thermal limits more often, highlighting the importance of refugia from extreme conditions. Large burrowing animals (e.g. aardvarks, pocket gophers, rabbits, seabirds, tortoises, wombats) are widely distributed globally and could provide similar thermal refugia for countless commensal taxa. Burrows and the animals that create them are in urgent need of conservation, which will help ensure the widespread availability of refugia that offer protection from extreme temperatures under climate change.