Mainstreaming climate adaptation into development: a policy dilemma (original) (raw)
Related papers
2016
Climate change might be seen as a remote issue compared with more urgent problems, as poverty, disease and economic stagnation. However, it can directly affect the efficiency of resource investments and eventually hinder the achievement of many development objectives. There is therefore a need to link climate change considerations with development priorities. Considerable research has already been done on climate change mitigation but much less attention has been paid to make development strategies more resilient to climate change impacts. Lack of awareness of climate change within the development community and limitations on resources to implement response measures are the most frequently cited explanations. Mainstreaming climate policies could also prove difficult to carry out because of direct trade-offs between development priorities and the actions required to deal with climate change. Governments and donors confronting pressing challenges, such as poverty and inadequate infras...
FINANCING CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES
Climate change is the key issue confronting humanity today. In addition to raising the specter of looming ecological disaster, it is also the fundamental human development issue of our time. The impacts of climate change will be transferred to human communities in lopsided proportions with the maximum costs transferred to the poorest and the most vulnerable. Evidently then, fighting poverty and fighting the impacts of climate change have a strategic linkage which needs to be explored for effective policy making. Climate change and human development are locked in dialectic, with changes in one affecting the other. Thus many adverse effects of climate change can be forestalled by focusing on development, and this focus can reciprocally help fighting the causes of climate change. The global climate change regime overseen by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is a complex governance mechanism, with responsibility to coordinate climate change action among states. The global solution to the perils of climate change has crystallized in the form of two competing strategies, mitigation and adaptation, with the former aimed at the causes and the latter at addressing the effects of climate change. Since the developed countries have a disproportionately large carbon footprint, mitigation would not succeed without a cooperative framework involving commitments from all advanced industrialized countries. Meanwhile, the socioeconomic costs will continue to be borne by the less developed countries who must adapt to alleviate the impacts. Closer analysis suggests that current global efforts are biased in favour of mitigation at the cost of adaptation which is more germane to human development. Understanding the reasons for this bias is the key to understanding the mystery surrounding global inaction on adaptation and thus development. This article critically explores the history and functioning of the international climate regime to discover these reasons. The second component of a critical analysis is of course the exploration of alternatives towards positive action. Therefore, an evaluation of the potential of 'microfinance' as a strategy for financing adaptation is also a part of this study. Finally, the employment of microfinance as a strategic approach for adaptation efforts at the societal level is conceptualized with the dual aim of creating employment opportunities and thus poverty alleviation, as well as mobilizing the vast human resource currently neglected in the global discourse on climate change. 2
Mainstreaming climate change adaptation into development planning
2012
Mainstreaming adaptation into development planning has been promoted as an effective way to respond to climate change. The expected benefits include avoided policy conflicts, reduced risks and vulnerability, greater efficiency compared with managing adaptation separately, and leveraging the much larger financial flows in sectors affected by climate risks than the amounts available for financing adaptation separately. This report reviews the main approaches proposed and lessons learned from relevant experiences in the Asia-Pacific region. A regional forum convened by the Adaptation Knowledge Platform and its partners, held at the United Nations Conference Centre in Bangkok in 2010, provided the starting point for this analysis. Mainstreaming adaptation is a multi-level process. Planning at the national level provides the overall framework within which sectoral and other sub-national levels operate. The national level is where the policy goals from long-term visions and national devel...
Sustainability
Worldwide only about four percent of the estimated $500 billion-plus in public and private climate finance in 2017 was destined for adaptation. However, institutions like the World Bank are positioning themselves for a transformation in adaptation finance, seeking to provide substantially more adaptation finance as distinct from financial support for greenhouse gas mitigation. This article explores the recent emergence of adaptation as a higher priority and how a longer-term time horizon is necessary if a transformation in climate change governance is to occur which places greater emphasis on sustainable development goals relating to improvement of circumstances of citizens in the most climate-vulnerable nations, mostly in the Global South. The article also considers the important debate in the climate change policy literature over the extent to which funds supporting adaptation are going to lower-income nations or people, as might be anticipated given the view that the poor are mor...
Mainstreaming , accessing and institutionalising finance for climate change adaptation
2018
ACT (Action on Climate Today) is an initiative funded with UK aid from the UK government and managed by Oxford Policy Management. ACT brings together two UK Department for International Development programmes: the Climate Proofing Growth and Development (CPGD) programme and the Climate Change Innovation Programme (CCIP). The views expressed in this paper do not necessarily reflect the UK government's official policies.
Climate change adaptation as a global public good: implications for financing
Climatic Change
Beginning as an afterthought in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, adaptation as an agenda has come a long way since 1992. With no ambitious mitigation, recent years have witnessed an increasing frequency of extreme climate events, including cross-border or borderless climate risks. Accordingly, the Paris Agreement frames adaptation as a global goal and global responsibility. However, financing for adaptation continues to remain extremely poor, relative to the estimated needs, even though the regime has obligatory provisions for support by developed countries. Why is this so? Why should the majority of the countries, with an insignificant contribution to causing the problem, suffer from increasing climate impacts? How can adaptation finance be enhanced at scale? As a response to these queries, the paper substantiates three claims: (1) that poor funding can be attributed to the territorial framing under the regime that conceptualizes adaptation largely as a local or national public good and, hence, the inefficacy of market mechanisms, (2) that it makes conceptual and political sense to consider adaptation as a global public good, and (3) that such a reframing should make a difference in boosting adaptation finance. In a multi-polar world with different views on adaptation finance, multilateral agencies should lead in promoting the proposed framing.
Integrating mitigation and adaptation into climate and development policy: three research questions
Environmental Science & Policy, 2005
The potential for developing synergies between climate change mitigation and adaptation has become a recent focus of both climate research and policy. Presumably the interest in synergies springs from the appeal of creating win-win situations by implementing a single climate policy option. However, institutional complexity, insufficient opportunities and uncertainty surrounding their efficiency and effectiveness present major challenges to the widespread development of synergies. There are also increasing calls for research to define the optimal mix of mitigation and adaptation. These calls are based on the misguided assumption that there is one single optimal mix of adaptation and mitigation options for all possible scenarios of climate and socio-economic change, notwithstanding uncertainty and irrespective of the diversity of values and preferences in society. In the face of current uncertainty, research is needed to provide guidance on how to develop a socially and economically justifiable mix of mitigation, adaptation and development policy, as well as on which elements would be part of such a mix. Moreover, research is needed to establish the conditions under which the process of mainstreaming can be most effective. Rather than actually developing and implementing specific mitigation and adaptation options, the objective of climate policy should be to facilitate such development and implementation as part of sectoral policies. Finally, analysis needs to focus on the optimal use and expected effectiveness of financial instruments, taking into account the mutual effects between these instruments on the one hand, and national and international sectoral investments and official development assistance on the other. #