Tiembo (2008) _ Special issue on CBA

8/7/2019 Tiembo (2008) _ Special issue on CBA

1/28

03 the arCtiC

Community-based adaptation strategies

16 adaptation projeCt

Tea farming in South Africa

22 bangladeSh

Scaling up community-based adaptation

A bulletin on climate and development Issue 68 July 2008

#68

Sc ss cmm-s


2/28

Issue 68 July 2008.mccm.

03 a acc

Barry Smit outlines the effectsof a changing climate on Arcticpeople and describes theiradaptation strategies

07 ics sc nDinanath Bhandariand GehendraGurung describe community-based adaptation activities in awatershed in Nepal

11 Cmm c nBimal Regmidescribes threecommunity-based adaptationactivities used to combat cli-mate change impacts on agricul-ture in Nepal

16 t m SacAdle Arendse and Rosa Blaauw

describe a project helping rooi-bos tea farmers in South Africaadapt to local climatic changes

15 News20 Conferences22 Adaptation in South Asia25 From Bonn to Toyako28 Community-based adaptation

h c - acc Photo: James Ford

Cover photo: Inuit family, Greenland Jim Pire

2 Tiempo Issue 68 July 2008


3/28

T

he small communities dotting theArctic coastlines are mainly locatedin wealthy, developed countries. Yetmany of the climate change chal-

lenges they face are similar to those indeveloping countries. Arctic peoplerely on environmental services that

are being threatened. Their infrastructure isat risk, their livelihood options are limited,their traditional culture and knowledge arethreatened, and there is little institutionalcapacity to deal with changing sea levels andweather conditions, exposure to sea-level riseand ecosystem disruption.

How vulnerable Arctic residents are toenvironmental changes associated with theclimate is intimately related to local con-ditions and community sensitivity. Theseconditions, including livelihoods, economicfactors, cultural and social dynamics and in-frastructure, greatly inuence a communitysexposure to climate change and its capac-

ity to adapt. The applied research projectcaviar (Community Adaptation and Vul-nerability in Arctic Regions) is working withlocal partners to document the exposures,

sensitivities and adaptability of communitiesacross the global Arctic, encompassing eightArctic countries. Employing a vulnerabilityor bottom-up approach, this research inte-grates natural sciences and social sciencesto provide a comprehensive picture of the

implications of climate change for Arcticcommunities in a way that directly relatesto adaptation options and policies. The fol-lowing examples from the Canadian Arctic

illustrate some of the key attributes of Arcticcommunities that relate to vulnerability andinuence adaptive strategies.

rc vm-

scs

In the high Arctic, societies have evolved torely on ice. The coastal ocean waters are fro-zen for half the year so the Inuit people havecome to see the ice as an integral part of their

resource base. When Inuit go out to hunt,they do not say they are going out on the icethey say on the land. Ice is considered partof their land, because so many of their activi-ties take place on the ice, and so much of theirlivelihoods and culture depends on it.

With climate change, the behaviour of thisice is changing; the land is changing. The ice

Main pointS

t -scs how Arctic

communities are vul-nerable to climatechange, in particularto changes in ice con-ditions, sea level,storms and the wild-life on which they de-pend.

h cms cs faced by

Arctic and develop-ing country communi-ties.He briey out-s an applied re-search project that isassessing the adap-tation needs of Arcticcommunities.

Adaptation in the Arctic

Barry Smit outlines the effects of a changing climate on Arctic people and

describes their adaptation strategies

www.tiempocyberclimate.org 3


4/28

extends less distance from shore and theice free season is increasingly longer. InSeptember of 2007, the Northwest Passagethrough the Arctic waters of Canada wasice free for the first time ever recorded. Thistrend has led researchers to move up pre-dictions for a completely ice free summerto as soon as 2030. Arctic peoples are facing

new challenges because of their exposureto, and dependence on, ice.

Inuit rely on the ice for transportationto hunt, gather food, generate income,visit family, and all the various reasons wesoutherners rely on roads and highways.The thinning and contraction of the iceare bringing limitations and dangers on

movement equivalent to southerners sud-denly finding whole sections of roads orhighways collapsing.

Climate change can also influence thenumbers and location of marine and ter-restrial animals important for Inuit diet,income and culture. People are having to

adapt their resource management prac-tices, harvesting practices, hunting routesand times and diets. The residents of Tuk-toyaktuk traditionally rely on migratorycaribou herds as a major source of food.The population of caribou in the regionhas declined sharply in recent years, forc-ing the community to expand their dietto include other species as well as storebought foods.

es s-v s

The community of Tuktoyaktuk in the Ca-nadian western Arctic is built on a low-lying archipelago, surrounded by oceanthat is frozen for half of the year. Residentsof Tuktoyaktuk face the threats of sea-levelrise, changes in the frequency and intensityof storms and the loss of coastal protection.As with disappearing coral reefs in Pacific

islands, receding ice cover in the Arctic in-creases exposure to storms and can exac-erbate threats to infrastructure, coastlinesand communities.

Tuktoyaktuk is dealing with these vulner-abilities by incorporating coastal hazardsinto their community planning and avoid-ing putting new buildings close to the

acc b c Photo: Johanna Wandel



5/28

water. Tuktoyaktuk has few other options,so moving the community has become theprimary adaptation for which the commu-nity has to plan.

C ms c c-

s

The community of Arctic Bay on Baffin Is-land, Nunavut, has a population of nearly700 people. The livelihoods of this com-munity depend highly on ice conditionsand ecological resources. Arctic Bay is alsosusceptible to changes in permafrost. Tra-ditionally, buildings are fixed into the per-manent ground ice, or permafrost, whichis as hard as rock. But as the permafrost de-grades, those structures become unstable.

The main adaptive strategy employed is tochange the location of buildings or the typeof construction.

Residents of Arctic Bay are also exposedto an increased danger of slope instabilityand rock fall as a result of thawing perma-frost. The community was built betweena steep rock slope and the ocean, andmany buildings are in the path of fallingdislodged rocks and boulders, leaving few

suitable places to build. Avoiding this haz-ard has become a major factor in choosinga location for new buildings.

ts k

c

Hunting is a fundamentally important partof Inuit culture and livelihoods. The Inuit

hunt fish, birds, seals, narwhal, polar bearsand caribou, all of which are a source offood as well as income. They travel overthe ice to hunt, and hunting takes placeprimarily at the flow edge, where the landfast ice meets the open ocean. Animals suchas whales, narwhal and seals continually re-

turn to the flow edge to breath after feedingon fish under the ice, making this a primehunting location. But ice conditions havebeen changing.

In the spring, the ice retreats graduallyand huge pieces, supporting the hunters,break off at the flow edge. Hunters report

S tkkk C s acc Photo: Mark Andrachuk



6/28

that, historically, when ice blocks brokeoff, prevailing wind patterns would pushthe pieces against the land fast ice, allow-ing people to get off. Recently, the windseems to have changed, often pushing theice offshore leaving the hunters stranded.Inuit hunters are, therefore, sensitive to

changes in wind, but this attribute is notwell detailed in global climate models.Ice conditions have also been changing.Formerly safe areas are becoming thinand unstable and cracks in the ice arewider. Traditional routes are proving tobe dangerous.

acc v cm-

ms

The sensitivities of Arctic communitiesto a changing climate sea level, storms,safety and access to food and livelihoods have parallels to sensitivities in manydeveloping countries. Notwithstandingtheir home in industrialized and wealthycountries, most Arctic communities todate have tended to rely on local, relativelyshort-term adaptive strategies. As withcommunities in Bangladesh or small island

states, Arctic peoples focus on maintain-ing their living conditions and livelihoodsunder changing conditions. This includeseconomic and cultural changes associatedwith globalization. Also in common withmany developing countries, Arctic peoplesmust cope with changing environmentalconditions that are brought about largely

by the activities of rich, industrializedcountries and for which there has beenlittle outside support for adaptation. Thecommonality between Arctic peoples andsmall island states is reflected in the ManyStrong Voices collaboration outlined atthe thirteenth Conference of Parties to the

United Nations Framework Convention onClimate Change in Bali, December 2007.

Arctic people would, of course, preferthat climate change was not occurring andthat there was more commitment to, andevidence of, greenhouse gas mitigationby rich countries, including their own.At the same time, since stopping or slow-ing down climate change is clearly a longway off, and since the effects of climate

change are already being experienced,these vulnerable communities are alreadystretching their local adaptive capacities.The need for jurisdictions to assist withadaptation is clear.

The caviarconsortium is undertaking,in collaboration with Arctic organizationsand local representatives, assessments ofvulnerabilities to climate change in casestudy communities in eight Arctic coun-

tries. This applied research aims to iden-tify opportunities and mechanisms foradaptation in each case and to facilitate acomparison of vulnerability insights andadaptation lessons among the communi-ties.

about the author

by Sm is a professorof geography and Canada Re-search Chair in Global Envi-ronmental Change at the Uni-versity of Guelph, Canada.

ContaCtby Sm, Global EnvironmentalChange Group, Department of Geography,University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, Can-ada, N1G 2W1.fx: +1-519-837-0811em: [email protected]

further inforMation

o w: To learn more about theCAVIAR project, visit www.cicero.uio.no/

projects/detail.aspx?id=30170&lang=EN.Further information about the work of theGlobal Environmental Change Group can befound at www.uoguelph.ca/~gecg/. Informa-tion concerning the Many Strong Voices col-laboration is available at www.manystrong-voices.org. The International Polar Yearwebsite is at www.IPY.org.

aCKnowledgeMentS

This article draws on the research of Tris-tan Pearce, Mark Andrachuk, James Ford,Johanna Wandel and the residents of com-munities in the Nunavut and Inuvialuit re-gion. Adam Scott helped prepare this arti-cle.



7/28

P

oor communities in different re-gions of Nepal are vulnerable to cli-mate change-induced hazards suchas ash ooding, landslides and

drought. Such hazards have beenmore frequent and of higher magni-tude in recent years and all adversely

affect community livelihoods. Impacts differaccording to altitude, with glacial retreataffecting water availability, and glacial lakeoutburst oods of particular concern in thehigh mountains. These affect hydropowergeneration, irrigation and rural livelihoods.In the middle mountains and at lower alti-

tudes, climate impacts combine with otherfactors such as a growing human popula-tion, the expansion of agriculture onto hillslopes and deforestation to exacerbate oodrisks.

In many disasters it is hard to segregatethe share that can be attributed to climatechange and human activities. Likewise, cli-

mate change impacts can lead to other moredangerous future impacts. For example,where land is damaged by oods, familiesmay need to cultivate land elsewhere. This

damages social systems and land use pat-terns, and adds pressure on this new land,weakening its capacity to withstand futuredisasters.

Nepal has little capacity to manage dis-asters, so community-based adaptation toclimate change is the best option for futuresustainability. The issue, however, is new for

Nepal and the implications of future climatechange are hard to predict.

Since October 2004, Practical Action, Ne-pal, has been implementing a project toincrease the resilience of poor communitiesto climate change impacts. The project islocated in the watershed of Jugedi streamand its tributaries, in the Kabilash Village De-velopment Committee in Chitawan Districtin central Nepal. The region suffers climate

change-related disasters such as oods andprolonged droughts. Vulnerable less resil-ient families are affected most.

The project showed that many impacts,particularly water availability, extendedthroughout the whole watershed. For exam-ple, when a downstream bridge was dam-aged, people living upstream were also badly

Main pointS

t s x- that many cli-mate change impactsextend throughout the

project watershed.ty scseveral community-based adaptationactivities to strength-en disaster manage-ment capacity, im-prove landmanagement skills

and diversify liveli-hoods. The mostimportant of these israising community

awareness.ty cc adaptation iscontext specic but

not unique, anddene it as careful

development thatconsiders futureclimatic conditions.

Increaing reilience in Nepal

Dinanath Bhandari and Gehendra Gurung describe community-based adaptation

activities to increase resilience to climate change impacts in a watershed in Nepal



8/28

affected because the bridge was their maincrossing point for reaching the school, healthpost, administrative services and market.

lc cm c k

Local communities have been experiencingchanges in the climate in recent decades. Sum-

mers are hotter and rainfall is more erratic andharder to forecast. Ninety eight per cent ofpeople surveyed had noticed climatic changes,of which 95 per cent felt increasing droughtand erratic rainfall were the main indicators.The table below shows some of the impactsdescribed by the local community.

More than 95 per cent of survey respondentsfelt god was responsible for these changes.Group interactions at the start of the project

also suggested that communities felt that pop-ulation growth and heavy human pressure onnatural resources, for example, forest degra-

dation, had caused recent disasters alongsideintensive rainfall episodes. Although peoplehad experienced changes in the climate, theirunderstanding of how climate change affectsecosystems and peoples lives was lacking.

Cmm-s

cvsPractical Action has been working with poorrural communities in the region to strengthentheir capacity to manage disasters, improvetheir land management skills and diversifytheir livelihoods to make them more resilientto climate change impacts. Communities par-ticipated throughout all stages of the project.When helped to identify and prioritize theirvulnerabilities to climate change, ood and

drought emerged as the most important issues.Coping strategies and options were jointlyidentied based on their relevance to family

livelihoods. The following activities were im-plemented.

Raising awareness on climate change. Sincecommunity awareness on climate change andits impacts was very low, raising awarenesswas of foremost importance. Current and pro-jected climate change trends and impacts were

shared with school students, teachers, the com-munity, policy makers and other stakehold-ers. Although difcult to quantify, communityawareness levels grew. The community, its de-velopment partners and policy makers alsorealized the need for improved preparednessfor future chaotic situations.

Improving traditional irrigation systems. Be-cause of erratic rainfall and extreme weatherevents, ash oods have been more frequent

and of larger magnitude in recent years. Wa-ter availability has fallen because groundwaterrecharge is lower as a result of rainfall beingconned to a few days during the monsoon sea-son leaving the rest of the year almost dry. Theproject repaired irrigation systems damagedby the oods, thus compensating for reducedgroundwater availability. Improvements pre-vented water loss due to seepage.

Off-season cash crop planting. Erratic rainfall

has reduced cereal production and threatenedfood security. To combat this, off-season cashcrops have been grown. These produce goodyields and need little irrigation. Income gener-ated has allowed farmers to purchase grain andhas provided employment for people market-ing these crops. With these efforts the loss ofcereal crops has been recovered and sometimes

CliMate Change iMpaCtS in the projeCt area

Loss of land, houses, livestock, human life and physical infrastructure

Changes in production and, hence, food security

Hotter summers and warmer shorter winters

Weather extremes like cold waves during winter and hot waves during summer

Increasing frequency of ash oods

Changing plant habits like early blooming



9/28

there has been extra income to improve liveli-hoods and educate children.

Improved land management and forest conser-vation . Floods were exacerbated by a combina-tion of climate change and natural resourcedegradation. Project interventions, therefore,also concentrated on improving the state of

natural resources, particularly forests. Inter-ventions were conducted through existingcommunity forest groups, which are registeredat the district forest ofce according to nationalforest legislation. Orientation training, expo-sure visits, workshops and meetings were or-ganized. Support for plantations and restoringdegraded land was provided and controllinggrazing and browsing has promoted naturalforest regeneration. The illegal felling of trees

has stopped.Other inputs include technologies such as

terracing and tree planting for agriculture onsloping land, stall feeding, tree and grass fod-der production, improving livestock breedsand microcatchment improvement using veg-etation and gabion check dams.

Diversifying sources of income and livelihoods.The project promoted additional employmentopportunities like dairy and vegetable market-

ing, and provided weekly orientation sessionson farming and vegetable production for a year.Vegetable production has increased by a factorof 500 and farmers now regularly supply veg-etables and milk to local markets and furtheraeld. The employment and income generatedfrom this has substituted for the loss of grainproduction due to erratic rainfall and thereby

increased farmer resilience. Project inputs willcontinue until farmers have the condence toconduct these activities self-sufciently.

Long rotation crops, like fruits, that are moreresilient to erratic rainfall were introduced.Farmers who planted bananas now sell theirproducts at the local markets. Planting both

long and short rotation crops has helped farm-ers full long- and short-term needs. Farmershave also been able to use vertical space andtemporal gaps through intercropping. Increas-ing agricultural biodiversity has proved to be akey livelihood strategy for coping with chang-ing and more challenging environmental con-ditions.

Integrated watershed management. As a short-term response to oods, farmers were givenmaterials and technical help to lay gabiondykes and spurs along stream banks to protecttheir land and houses from small-scale disas-ters. For long-term solutions, an integrated wa-tershed management approach was applied,

under which proper management of land, for-ests, livestock, water sources and communitypractices took place. Communities prepared along-term disaster preparedness and integrat-ed watershed management plan with projectsupport. This considered future climate changeimpacts.

ts v- s k bs v, n

Photo: Martijn van de Rijdt/EC/ECHO



10/28

Community-based weather monitoring. To un-derstand changes in local weather patterns, asimple village weather station was established.This provides information on daily minimumand maximum temperatures, rainfall and hu-midity. The data will help the communityunderstand how local weather patterns are

changing over time. In a few years, communi-ties will be able to draw concrete conclusionsregarding the changing climate.

Improved disaster preparedness. A newly de-veloped ve-year disaster preparedness planhas identied a range of immediate and long-term interventions for adaptation to climatechange and risk reduction in the area. Com-munity-based organizations will implementthis plan with external support from local

government, non-government organizationsand other funding agencies.

is s

All households within the watershed havebeen organized into a community-based or-ganization, which has been registered at thedistrict administration ofce. With the helpof the project, the organization has preparedand implemented its constitution under the

current national act. This gives the communitya legal basis for getting external support andcoordinating with other stakeholders withinand outside the district. The organization ispart of the district-level disaster prepared-ness network, which will enable it to buildlinks with other institutions and organizeresources. Establishing this organization en-

sures the sustainability of project activitiesbecause it can continue with activities in thefuture, build its own skills and link to localgovernment and other service providers.

Ccss

Interventions from Practical Action have

linked environmental phenomena with com-munity experiences. Participatory analysis ofthe causes of problems and the solutions thatthe community could implement occurred.Short- and long-term strategies for copingwith climate change impacts were identiedand implemented.

Many climate change impacts, espe-cially those related to precipitation, extendthroughout the watershed. Impacts have im-

plications both upstream and downstreamwithin the watershed, and one impact canlead to another impact, which may affect otherlivelihood assets.

Adaptation measures are not unique butthey are context specic. They depend on theimpacts themselves and the vulnerabilities,resilience and power to cope with the impactsof the people affected. Adaptation is carefuldevelopment taking future climatic condi-

tions into consideration.Raising community awareness is of fore-

most importance when adapting to a chang-ing climate. Big initiatives may be neededdepending on the magnitude of impacts, buteven small activities on the ground can con-tribute a great deal to coping with adverseclimate change impacts.

about the authorS

d b is aproject manager at PracticalAction, Nepal, specializing inclimate change and disasterrisk reduction.g g is TeamLeader for work on reducingvulnerability at Practical Ac-tion, Nepal.

ContaCt

d b, Practical ActionNepal, Pandol Marga, Lazimpat, PO Box15135, Kathmandu, Nepal.fx: +977-1-4445995

em: [email protected] g, Practical Action Ne-pal, Pandol Marga, Lazimpat, PO Box 15135,Kathmandu, Nepal.fx: +977-1-4445995em: [email protected]

further inforMation

i Cyy: The Tiempo Cli-mate Cyberlibrary maintains a listing ofwebsites on mountains and climate changeat www.tiempocyberclimate.org/portal/t4445web.htm.o w: The Practical Action, Nepal,website can be found at www.practicalac-tion.org.



11/28

A

ny affect that climate change has onagriculture will affect the livelihoodsof most Nepalese people and increasethe risk of food insecurity. This in

turn could increase food prices andaffect the entire economic wellbeingof Nepal. Declining food production

could increase malnutrition and have hugeconsequences, particularly for children. Cli-mate change is already adding to problemssuch as trade, population growth, defor-estation and desertication, which alreadythreaten food security in Nepal.

Some 80 per cent of Nepalese people follow

traditional cultivation practices and dependon agriculture for their livelihoods. Thesepractices rely on rainwater and the seasons.Many mountain dwellers have observedunusually erratic heavy monsoon rains inrecent years. Farmers have noticed delaysin the monsoon season, changes in rainfallintensity and duration, reduced productivity,

changing vegetation composition and moresoil erosion. With less rainfall, rivers andsprings have dried up.

Extreme events like excessive rainfall, long-

er drought periods, landslides and oodsare increasing in magnitude and frequency.More oods and glacial lake outbursts areexpected to destroy irrigation and watersupply systems, roads, bridges, settlements

and productive land. Land degradation willreduce crop productivity and put more pres-sure on remaining fertile land. In the dry sea-son, increased evaporation will lead to water

scarcity. Soil moisture decits, droughts, reand possible pest outbreaks will decreasecrop yields.

Delays to the monsoon season in the pastthree years have affected rotational croppingsystems and, along with less rainfall, have leftthousands of hectares of farmland fallow.This has reduced production. Due to the latearrival of monsoon rains and reduced rain-fall, farmers in the Tanahun District can no

longer depend on rain-fed paddy cultivationand have been forced to cope with potentialfood shortages by increasing unsustainableslash and burn activities. Studies in the KaskiDistrict in the past three years show thatas rainfall has decreased, rice and wheatproduction have gone down while maizeproduction has increased a little. Farmers in

Main pointS

t s -sc three commu-nity-based adapta-

tion activities used tocombat climatechange impacts onagriculture in Nepal.es m- but participatoryplant breeding, in-creasing access toplant genetic re-

sources and plantinghedgerows have beenpromoted in places.t s c more proactivemainstreaming of cli-mate change consid-erations into policymaking and greaterincorporation of localknowledge into adap-tation strategizing.

Community action in Nepal

Bimal Regmi and his co-authors describe three community-based adaptation

activities used to combat climate change impacts on agriculture in Nepal



12/28

Bardiya and Kanchanpur Districts link theloss of local seed varieties to climate change.Local varieties require longer rainy seasonsso, as the rainy season has shortened, farmershave turned to hybrid varieties to increaseyields.

Communities in Nepal have been involved

in various activities to combat climate changeimpacts. Three are described here.

pc -

v -ss c

Begnas Village in Western Nepal used to bewell known for its richness of local rice varie-ties, many of which were drought resistant.Due to modernization and the introductionof improved varieties, farmers have slowly

moved towards using a few high yieldingvarieties but these are no longer suited to thelocal microclimate and need plenty of fer-tilizer. Yields have gradually decreased anddisease and pest outbreaks have occurred.In addition, these varieties grew badly underthe conditions of severe drought, unpredict-able rainfall and hailstones increasingly ob-served in Begnas Village.

The miserable farmers approached Lo-

cal Initiatives for Biodiversity, Research andDevelopment (li-bird) for help. Farmersrealized that local varieties had character-istics that, with improvement, could bettercope with adverse climatic impacts and otherproblems. li-bird, along with the NationalAgriculture Research Council and Biodiver-sity International, thus began a project us-

ing participatory plant breeding to improvethe quality and traits of local varieties. Theproject promoted on-farm conservation ofgenetic resources through community em-powerment.

Initially, an inventory of 69 local rice varietieswas made at a community seed bank. Farm-ers then selected eight varieties with bene-cial traits such as the ability to cope with lowrainfall or long droughts. For example, the

C bv v, n Photo: Martijn van de Rijdt/EC/ECHO



13/28

houSeholdS aCCeSSing Seed banK

Year

Number (and percentage) of farmers fromdifferent socioeconomic categories access-ing the seed bank

Number ofseed varie-ties ac-cessed

Seed quantityaccessed (kil-ograms)

Rich Medium Poor

2003 5 (12%) 19 (48%) 16 (40%) 11 87

2004 6 (17%) 14 (40%) 15 (43%) 13 69

2005 17 (20%) 37 (42%) 33 (38%) 23 197

mansara variety was selected because of itsdrought tolerance, early ripening, good yield,low need for fertilizer and ability to cope witha delayed monsoon. mansara, however, haslow productivity and poor taste. Participatoryplant breeding on mansaraaimed to retainits positive characteristics whilst replacing its

negative ones. Farmers selectedkhumal-4 forcrossbreeding withmansarain the hope thatuseful characteristics from khumal-4 couldreplace some ofmansaras negative traits.

Farmers were involved throughout thebreeding programme, for example, in plantselection after each generation of crossbredplants was produced, rice taste tests and mill-ing recovery tests to assess how much ricewould be recovered after each harvest. After

nine generations, a new variety called man-sara-5 emerged, which was well adapted tothe local microclimate.

Today, the villagers are continuing with par-ticipatory plant breeding activities. They aredocumenting local climate change impactsand have recently initiated a community seedbank to conserve the gene pool of local varie-ties. This could help Begnas farmers combatfuture climate change impacts.

ics ccss c -

c scs

In Kachorwa in the Bara District of Nepal,communities have established a seed bankwith the help of a community-based organi-zation to help ensure that poor farmers canaccess local genetic resources. Community

members were trained to grow useful localcultivars. They tested consistency in namingand the incidence of pests and diseases. Seedswere packed in small bags or envelopes anddistributed or sold to farmers to encouragethem to select, maintain and exchange ma-terials through their own social networks.

This practice was very effective at improvingaccess to materials and knowledge, and atconserving traditional local varieties. The ta-ble below shows that poor vulnerable house-holds accessed the seed bank much morethan rich people.

The project demonstrates one way in whichcommunities have adapted to cope with theimpact of extreme climatic stresses. It ensuresaccess to genetic resources for the sustained

production of food and conserves local varie-ties from genetic erosion.

a cs ccmm v

Shifting cultivation is still an important landuse system for some ethnic groups in Nepal.

The system involves clearing a piece of landand growing trees or crops on it until the soilloses fertility and productivity falls. The land isthen left and reclaimed by natural vegetationor used for other farming practices. Shiftingcultivation is at risk from ooding, soil erosion,landslides and other forms of land degradationresulting from heavy monsoon rains.

With nancial support from the Hill Agri-culture Research Project, li-bird designed



14/28

and implemented a project to introducehedgerows in areas where shifting cultiva-tion occurred, such as the villages of Khola-gaun and Rasauli in the Tanhun Districts. Theproject helped some of the poorest and most

vulnerable communities in Nepal, known asChepang, to develop strategies to cope withadverse climate change impacts and improvetheir livelihoods by reducing their vulner-ability. It demonstrates a community-based

adaptation technology suitable for shiftingcultivation areas on sloping land in Nepal.

Planting hedgerows in the project areashelped stabilize the soil and thus enhancefood production and income. Soil qual-ity improved markedly in project areas andmany of the plots with hedgerows are beingtransformed into terraces. Soil erosion hasdecreased by 40 per cent in the past fouryears of the project. The technology has also

reduced the workload of women who col-lect fodder by 30 per cent and has helpedother poor and marginalized communitiesgenerate income. Such conservation farmingpractices are gradually replacing traditionalslash and burn practices, thus reducing theburning of forested areas.

Ccss

Climate change poses a major threat to Hima-layan biodiversity. Habitat loss due to mas-sive changes in landscape use is also erodinggenetic resources and agricultural biodiver-

sity at an alarming rate. Farmers are alreadysuffering from these changes. The impactsare most severe for poor and marginalizedcommunities who depend solely on naturalresources for their livelihoods.

This article describes three innovative ad-aptation practices that have been promotedin the eld. Efforts, however, are limited andscattered. There is still a need for a practicaland proactive approach to mainstreamingclimate change considerations into bothcommunity-based and national level poli-cies. Greater effort is also needed to considerlocal knowledge and practices when devel-oping adaptation strategies.

planting hedgerows in the project areas helpedstabilize the soil and thus enhance food productionand income

about the authorS

bm rm, AchyutAdhikari, Gyan Sharma, IndraPoudel, Shriram Subedi,Pitamber Shrestha, SumanManandhar and P K Shresthaare all based at the non-gov-

ernment institute Local Initiatives for Biodi-versity, Research and Development inGairapatan, Nepal.

ContaCt

bm rm, Local Initiatives for Biodi-versity, Research and Development, POBOX 324, Gairapatan, Kaski, Nepal.fx: +977-61-539956em: [email protected]: www.libird.org

further inforMation

i Cyy: See the Tiempospecial edition on Nepal at www.tiempocy-berclimate.org/portal/archive/pdf/tiem-po60low.pdf.



15/28

NewsextreMe weather

n m s

ac v -fected by oods, cy-cs vs sc oc2007.

Madagascar has beenhardest hit, with almost athird of a million peoplesuffering the conse-quences of a series of ex-

treme events. The WorldMeteorological Organiza-tion (WMO) has called formore investment in weath-er forecasting in Africa,Central Asia and small is-land states.

Read more:

www.tiempocyberclimate.

org/newswatch/archive/arweek080406.htm

aSSuMptionS

t iv-m p C-

m C s v ms-c ssm , v, cs c s smsss, cc- cmm n-.

Not only is this reduc-tion unlikely to happenunder current policies, weare moving in the oppo-site direction right now.We believe these kind ofassumptions in the analy-sis blind us to reality andcould potentially distortour ability to develop ef-

fective policies, said re-port co-author, RogerPielke Jr of the Universityof Colorado.

Read more:


org/newswatch/archive/

arweek080420.htm

food priCeS

jcqs d, -c

u ns f ac o-z, s cs s m smm.

The problem is very seri-ous around the world dueto severe price rises and

we have seen riots inEgypt, Cameroon, Haitiand Burkina Faso, hesaid. There is a risk thatthis unrest will spread incountries where 50 to 60per cent of income goesto food. Food prices haverisen as a result of in-creasing oil and fuel pric-es, rising demand for food

in Asia, conversion ofcropland for biofuels,poor weather and specu-lation on futures markets.

Read more:



arweek080420.htm

energy

t cs Asia-Pacic region

c sv uS$700 2030 s csv- , uns ecmc Sc Cmms-s as Pacic (ESCAP)cs.

Heavy dependency onfossil fuels is aggravatingthe Asia-Pacic regions

economic vulnerability,Noeleen Heyzer of ES-CAP told a ministerialsummit. Without energymanagement reform, thepoor would be increasing-ly unable to afford energy,

she warned.

Read more:



arweek080511.htm

Children

t s sc m

m vcms cm c, c-c - m uns CsFund (UNICEF).

It is clear that a failure toaddress climate changeis a failure to protect chil-dren, said David Bull

from UNICEF UnitedKingdom. Those whohave contributed least toclimate change - theworlds poorest children -

are suffering the most.The reports authors esti-mate that global warmingcould be responsible for40,000 to 160,000 childdeaths a year in Asia and

sub-Saharan Africa aseconomic growth is af-fected.

Read more:



arweek080511.htm

newS



16/28

T

he winter rainfall areas on the westcoast and adjacent inland areas ofSouth Africa are home to two uniquebiomes of global signicance: the

Cape Fynbos, which is the smallestof the worlds oristic kingdomsand is spectacularly diverse, and the

Succulent Karoo, which is the worlds mostdiverse desert biome. Both are internation-ally recognized biodiversity hotspots andhost a vast array of drought-tolerant plants,well adapted to summer drought and lightwinter rains.

The Suid Bokkeveld is part of the north-

ernmost extreme of the Fynbos biome, andis home to many endemic plants, includinga locally adapted sub-species of Aspalathuslinearis, known locally as rooibos. Rooibos isused to make a herbal tea that is increasinglypopular in local and international markets.It is naturally restricted to the northwesternregion of the Fynbos biome, and only grows

in South Africa. A particularly long-lived anddrought- and re-resistant variety of Aspal-athus linearis occurs naturally in the area andthe tea it produces has been valued medici-

nally and culturally since pre-colonial times.

Cmc c mcs

The Suid Bokkeveld experienced severedrought between 2003 and 2006. Later onsetof autumn rains during the critical rainfallseason, a decrease in average annual rain-

fall and unusually mild temperatures duringwinter led to drought conditions during thehot, dry summers. In 2003, all signicantwinter rains fell in one dramatic event dur-

ing August, with little rainfall before or afterthis event, making preparing the land andallowing crop establishment after plant-ing difcult. The low humidity associatedwith the drought contributed to unusuallylow overnight temperatures in the winterof 2003. Rooibos crops died of black frostin the northern parts of the Suid Bokkeveld.Combined with the summer drought thatfollowed, small-scale farmers of the Heiveld

Co-operative suffered yield losses of 40 to100 per cent.

Future climate change scenarios for thearea indicate the possibility of increased vari-ability of precipitation, and a possible 20 percent increase in the length of dry spells withdelays in the onset of the winter rainfall sea-son. The number of rain days per year could

Main pointS

rs s c-v in dry areasalong the western in-terior of South Africato make a herbal tea.Cm cs ky to make roo-ibos growing areaswarmer, dryer andless hospitable for

cultivation, with sub-

sequent impacts onthe livelihoods ofsmall-scale rooibostea farmers.t s -sc a project aim-ing to help farmersadapt to predictedclimatic changes.

Tea farming in south Africa

Adle Arendse and Rosa Blaauw describe a community-based adaptation project

helping rooibos tea farmers in South Africa adapt to local climatic changes



17/28

decrease with likely reductions in average an-nual precipitation. More warming and dry-ing and increases in wind velocity are likely.

The increased aridity projected by most cli-mate models will severely affect many speciesin the Succulent Karoo and Fynbos biomes.Only the hardiest plants of the Succulent Ka-

roo biome will be able to survive. The abilityof rain-fed crops, such as commercially har-vested rooibos tea, to survive will be greatlyreduced.

Farming activities in the Suid Bokkeveldare inextricably linked to rainfall patterns.Changes in the amount, distribution andonset of rainfall beyond the conventionalrange of variability hold serious implica-tions for rooibos production management

and thus, the livelihoods of small-scale farm-ing communities in the area. The table belowdescribes some of the direct and indirect im-

pacts of climate change in the Suid Bokkeveldalready identied by the small-scale farm-ers.

Sc, c cmc c-

No villages exist in the Suid Bokkeveld, al-

though a number of small settlements occur.Coloured farm workers and their familieswork seasonally or permanently as labour-ers and domestic workers on mostly white-owned farms. Most small-scale farmers workfor between one and six months tending theirown crops and livestock on land that theyown or, more commonly, lease. The rest oftheir time is spent labouring seasonally onneighbouring farms or further away.

Small-scale farmers have historically beenmarginalized socially, economically and po-litically. Despite the political changes in post-

Apartheid South Africa, their situation hasnot greatly changed. Land tenure amongstsmall-scale farmers in the Suid Bokkeveldremains highly variable, despite well-formu-lated government land redistribution poli-cies. A system of social arrangements existsamongst landowners, managers and harvest-

ers around access to and control of naturalresources.

Most small-scale farms are situated in thesouthernmost parts of the Suid Bokkeveldregion. Rooibos tea production is a primarysource of income for these small growers. Thisincludes both the cultivated Nortier varietyand the wild variety. The prolonged droughtconditions from 2003 to 2006 resulted in dra-matic declines in agricultural production,

mortality of crops and livestock and the dry-ing up of most water sources, which severelyaffected the livelihoods of these small-scalefarmers and their households. The area haslimited arable land and small-scale farmershave very few alternatives to low-input sub-sistence and crop farming.

The anticipated adverse effects of climatechange will add to existing economic pres-sures affecting farmers in the area. Oppor-

tunities for small-scale farmers to engage inenvironmental monitoring and climate ad-aptation activities in partnership with scien-tists, non-government organizations, localauthorities and conservation agencies are anessential part of transforming their role andenabling them to become more inuentialand environmentally responsible actors.

direCt and indireCt iMpaCtS of CliMate Change

dc mcs

Increasing variability in the onset and duration of win-ter rainfall

Effects on cultivated and wild rooibos production

Greater variability in the precipitation regimes associ-ated with different seasons A notable decrease in average annual rainfall

Drying up of perennial and other important water

sources Increases in the numbers of pests and pathogens and

changes in their timing affecting crops and livestock Increased risk of uncontrolled res

ic mcs

Worse condition of dirt

roads, thus affectingtransport

Pressure to managequality control and ma-chine maintenance costsfor rooibos production

Limited availability of

external employment op-portunities



18/28


19/28


20/28

33 gscc w Css e Sysm Scc: f Ss dvm

os, ny:06-08-2008 14-08-2008Jointly organized by the InternationalUnion of Geological Sciences and theNational Committees of Norway, Den-mark, Finland, Iceland and Sweden.Programme will include a GeoExpo ex-hibition, poster awards and a number ofregional excursions. Workshops andseminars will cover issues regardingthe major geoscience programmes,interdisciplinary symposia and specialregional symposia.Details: Asgeir Knudsen, Congress Con-ference, PO Box 2694, Solli, Oslo 0204,Norway.Fax: +47-22560541Email: [email protected]: www.33igc.org/coco

2008 aCeee Smm Sy e-gy Efciency in BuildingsC, uSa:17-08-2008 22-08-2008Working theme of the 2008 study courseis Scaling Up: Building TomorrowsSolutions. Main panel areas of workwill include: residential buildings anddesign, technologies and trends; com-mercial buildings and design, evalua-tion, implementation and trends; strate-gies for appliances, lighting andelectronics; energy and environmentalpolicies; sustainable communities; andnew ideas for energy efciency.Details: Rebecca Lunetta, ACEEE Sum-mer Study Ofce, PO Box 7588, Newark,

DE 19714-7588, USA.Fax: +1-302-2923965Email: [email protected]

Web: www.aceee.org

Cm C & bsss C-c 2008ack, n Z:18-08-2008 20-08-2008The 4th annual Australia-New ZealandConference. Focus will be on risks andopportunities facing business resultingfrom climate change with an emphasison emissions trading. Discussion ses-sions include risk management, volun-tary carbon markets and other markets.There will also be a number of special-ized workshops with advice on busi-ness opportunities available to specicsectors.Details: Fiona Driver, Climate Changeand Business Centre, PO Box 95152,Swanson, Waitakere City 0653, New Zea-land.Fax: +64-9-3601242Email: [email protected]: www.climateandbusiness.com

2 i SsyCc: C Vs Ss dvmbs, Sz:21-08-2008 22-08-2008Intends to bring together water and cli-mate scientists from a broad range ofsectors to discuss and share knowl-edge and expertise in order to improveunderstanding of the impact of climateand development on groundwater re-sources in Africa.

Details: Yvonne Scherrer, Conference Co-ordinator, University of Basel, ProgramSustainability Research, Klingbergstrasse

50, CH-4056 Basel, Switzerland.Email: [email protected]: www.isc2008.ch

i Cc a- fss & fs M-m C Cm em-ss fs hum, S:25-08-2008 28-08-2008Sub-title of the conference is A reviewof science, policies and practices. Co-organized by the Food and AgricultureOrganization, the Swedish Universityof Agricultural Sciences and the Inter-national Union of Forest Research Or-ganizations (IUFRO). Conference willfocus on the current state of knowledgeof ongoing changes in climatic condi-tions in different regions of the world.Details: Alexander Buck, IUFRO Secre-tariat, Mariabrunn (BFW), Hauptstrasse7, A-1140 Vienna, Austria.Fax: +43-1-877015150Email: [email protected]: www.iufro.org

13h word wr CorssMopr, frc:25-08-2008 o 28-08-2008Aim of the Congress is to enhance in-ternational awareness and knowledgeof the impact of global changes onwater resources. Working theme isConfronting the expanding and diver-sifying pressures. Will include de-bates, open dialogue sessions, pres-

entations and exhibitions. Topicsinclude: climate change and disas-ters; water availability and use and

management; governance and securi-ty; capacity building; and developmentof infrastructure.Details: Water Congress Organizer,Domaine de Lavalette, 859 rue Jean-Francois Breton, 34093 Montpellier,France.Fax: +33-4-67522829Email: [email protected]: wwc2008.msem.univ-montp2.fr

i Cc Coastal Engineering (ICCE2008)hm, gmy:31-08-2008 05-09-2008Conference will focus on the theory,measurement, modelling and practiceinvolved in coastal engineering. It is in-tended that there will be presentat ionsof practical papers detailing design,construction and performance of casestudy coastal projects. Topics includecoastal processes, ports, harbours andwaterways, coastal risks, coastal devel-opment and the coastal environment.Details: ICCE2008 Secretariat, HolgerSchuttrumpf, Bundesanstalt furWasserbau (BAW), Wedeler Landstasse157, 22559 Hamburg, Germany.Fax: +49-40-81908373Email: [email protected]: www.icce2008.hamburg.baw.de

bey amcsbs as, a:09-09-2008 10-09-2008This event will feature high-level de-

CoNfereNCes

eVentS



21/28

bate, discussion and analysis from aselect ion of leading players in gov-ernment, industry and others involved

in the regions biodiesel market. Thisyear the event will include discussionand debate on biofuels, biomass andbiopower generation.Details: Conference Organizer, Gre en-power Conferences, ShakespeareHouse, 168 Lavendar Hill, London SW115TF, UK.Fax: +44-20-79001853Email: [email protected]: www.greenpowerconferences.com/biofuelsmarkets/bioenergy_amer-

icas.html

ws 2008wck, uK:16-09-2008 17-09-2008Working theme of the conference isWaste and Resource Management: aShared Responsibility. Innovationand research contributing to the im-plementation of this strategy will bethe focus. Broad range of topics in-clude: encouraging waste prevention;development of waste management

policies; integrated waste manage-ment; encouraging resource recovery;and emerging technologies.Details: Waste 2008 Conference Ofce,Attenborough House, Browns LaneBusiness Park, Stanton-on-the-Wolds,Nottingham NG12 5BL, UK.Fax: +44-115-9371100Email: [email protected]: www.waste2008.com

5 i Cc l db, iy:

18-09-2008 22-09-2008Working theme of the conference isMoving ahead from assessments toactions: Could we win the strugglewith land degradation? Focus will beon examples showing that when localpeople are the authors and actors ofthe development process it is possi-ble to make real change in reversingthe trend to land degradation. Keywords and phrases in discussion top-ics are: multidisciplinary assessment;interaction; participatory mangement;

and impacts of mismanagement.Details: Pandi Zdruli, CIHEAM-Istitu-to Agronomico Mediterraneo, Via Ceg-lie 9, 700010 Valenzano, Bari, Italy.Fax: +39-80-4606274Email: [email protected]: www.iamb.it/5ICLD

4 i Cc bmss eyKv, uk:22-09-2008 24-09-2008Conference is dedicated to the 90th

anniversary of the Nat ional Academyof Sciences of Ukraine. Working lan-guages will be Ukrainian, Russianand English. Main topics include: bio-mass resources and its pretreatment;strat egy and policy issues; economicand environmental issues of bioener-gy technology; research and develop-ment of bioenergy technologies; anddemonstrations of biomass-to-energy.Details: Tetyana Zhelyezna, Inst itute o f

Engineering Thermophysics, NAS ofUkraine, 2a Zhelyabov Str., 03057 Kiev,Ukraine.

Fax: +38-44-4566091Email: [email protected]: www.biomass.kiev.ua/conf2008

C Mks iMm, i:29-09-2008 30-09-2008Working theme is Migrating busi-ness to a low carbon economy forsustainable economic growth. Paneldiscussions and themes will include:business incentives for reducing car-bon footprints; greener production;

trading and pricing Certied Emis-sions Reductions in India; new marketdevelopments; Clean Deve lopmentMechanism (CDM) as an additionalrevenue source for industry; and anupdate on the Indian CDM market.Details: Conference Organizer, Green-power Conferences, ShakespeareHouse, 168 Lavendar Hill, LondonSW11 5TF, UK.Fax: +44-20-79001853Email: [email protected]

Web: www.greenpowerc onferences.com/carbonmarkets/carbonmarkets_india_2008. html

Ss Cs & Cmmsgv, Sz:30-09-2008 01-10-2008This will be an inaugural conferencejointly organized by WWFs OnePlanet Living and Greenpower Con-ferences. Intended to be a high-power

event aimed at architects, urban plan-ners, mayors, nanciers and sustain-ability professionals. Discussion will

focus on cutting-edge campaigns,regulations and possibilities for citiesand communities. A 2-day pre-confer-ence workshop will cover the launchof WWFs global One Planet initia-tive.Details: Conference Organizer, Green-power Conferences, ShakespeareHouse, 168 Lavendar Hill, LondonSW11 5TF, UK.Fax: +44-20-79001853Email: [email protected]

Web: www.greenpowerconferences.com

Vy C Mksl, uK:14-10-2008 15-10-2008Sponsored by Eco Securities andFirst Climate. The third forum in a glo-bal series, this event will emphasizeintegrated solutions of brand posi-tioning, business development andopportunities for face-to-face net-working with senior decision makers.Details: Santosh Sarma, Greenpower

Conferences, Shakespeare House, 168Lavendar Hill, London SW11 5TF, UK.Fax: +44-2079001853Email: [email protected]: www.greenpowerc onferences.com/carbonmarkets/vcm_2008.html

eVentS



22/28

I

n Bangladesh, the internationalnon-government organization (ngo)Practical Action is conducting severalcommunity-based adaptation projects,

which have been selected with commu-nity input. Floating vegetable gardens al-low for seedlings to be grown when land

is ooded, so that they are ready to plant outwhen the oodwater recedes. Fish are rearedin cages, which are anchored in ponds creat-ed by monsoon rains when the river is too fastowing for shing boats to go out. A varietyof rice has been planted that matures beforethe monsoon rains, and ponds are used for

rearing ducks and sh. Ducks provide eggsfor the market and are more resilient tooods than chickens.

These activities have been conducted un-der Practical Actions Strengthening Resil-ience of Communities to Cope with ClimateChange project. This project has three ob-jectives: (1) to strengthen the capacity of

communities and supporting institutions toprepare and respond effectively to climateinduced emergencies; (2) to develop and pro-mote practical interventions to strengthen

peoples livelihoods and natural resourceassets; and, (3) to promote engagement ofvulnerable communities in decision mak-ing processes on climate change adaptation

strategies. The project was designed to runfrom 2004 to 2007 in four South Asian coun-tries: Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Paki-stan. It was funded using 400,000 from the

Allachy Trust in the United Kingdom.The project was designed using experience

gained from helping communities adapt toclimate change under several programmesoperating over the past ten years in Asia.These include a livelihoods-based approachto disaster risk reduction in ve Asian coun-tries, programmes for disaster preparednessplanning in Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh,programmes to strengthen food security and

food production in Bangladesh and researchon consensus building to strengthen liveli-hoods, also in Bangladesh.

The project used Practical Actions exten-sive experience with community-based de-velopment to take a very practical approachto community-based adaptation. It under-took the following processes and activities:

Main pointS

t s -sc community-based adaptation ac-tivities in Bangladesh

conducted by Practi-cal Action under itsStrengthening Resil-ience of Communitiesto Cope with ClimateChange project.pjc cvsv knowledgeon how to help poor

communities copewith climate changeand have also inu-enced international

policy processes.t s c-c with a proposalfor scaling up com-munity-based adap-tation activities inBangladesh over thecoming years.

Adaptation in south Aia

Rachel Berger and Mohammad Ali describe a proposal to scale up community-

based adaptation activities in Bangladesh using experiences from South Asia



23/28

explaining to local communities what ishappening to the climate and why;

nding out how communities cope withand adjust their lives in the face of climatevariability;

working to strengthen these coping strate-gies, linking external knowledge with local

knowledge; building links with local government and

other stakeholders to improve communityaccess to information and resources; and,

using project experience as the basis forinuencing government.

l m c

Despite modest funding, the StrengtheningResilience of Communities to Cope with Cli-

mate Change project has brought togetherlearning and experience from four SouthAsian countries to develop practical ap-proaches to community-based adaptationto climate change. It is contributing to thedeveloping body of knowledge on how toenable poor communities to cope betterwith climate change. The project has alsohelped inuence international policy proc-esses through workshops and side events at

the United Nations Framework Conventionon Climate Change Conference of Parties inNairobi and Bali.

The project is only three years long sodoes not provide enough evidence that thetechnologies adopted by the communitieswill enable them to adapt to climate change.Nevertheless, many approaches and tech-

nologies based on improved natural resourcemanagement and livelihood strengtheningoffer win-win outcomes of great benet tocommunities. The real test for project successwill depend on whether it can be scaled up.

a s sc b-

sPractical Action has developed a bottom-up approach to scaling up that will betested, particularly in Bangladesh, in thecoming years. Links with local governmentand other stakeholders must be made toimprove access to information and resourc-es and ensure continuity of support afterprojects end. Raising awareness on climatechange and its local impacts amongst lo-

cal ofcials and politicians is importantsince local government knowledge is oftenlimited. Experience shows that providing

information and guidance that is relevantto peoples regular work means it is morelikely to be used. A further key aspect toscaling up is sharing information and expe-rience through district- and national-levelnetworks. Such networks are already activein Nepal and Bangladesh, and embryonic in

Pakistan and Sri Lanka.Practical Action is beginning to imple-

ment a new ve-year strategy and in Bang-ladesh this includes an ambitious plan toinvolve other institutions in scaling upcommunity-level livelihood strengtheningbased on sustainable agriculture. Thereare two principal stages. The rst involveschanging government policy on communi-ty-based extension, which currently favours

a top-down approach with government ex-perts sent out to farmers. Rather, a com-munity-based extension system should be

wm bs Photo: UNESCO (Bangkok)



24/28

built up, supported by government linedepartments who commit to update tech-nical skills and by private agricultural serv-ice providers who would channel in inputssuch as seeds, fish fry and other materials.

This new policy approach requires com-mitment from local government to listen to

small farmer groups and facilitate imple-mentation of plans made by community-based organizations. Local ngos need to

support community-based organizations

and link up with government line de-partments, research institutes and privateservice providers. Practical Action aims toestablish Rural Technology Centres to actas a local source of traditional and scien-tific knowledge and skills.

For this policy approach to be effective,it is crucial that national and internationalngos and donors work with Practical Ac-tion to critically examine the community-

based extension system described above.They must be in agreement regarding itseffectiveness, and adopt and promote itthrough funding and other resources.

Changing policy is the first stage; thesecond is changing practice. First, nationalresearch institutes must take up the re-search needs of smallholder farmers on

food production, processing and market-ing. For example, the International Rice Re-search Institute in Bangladesh should takeup farming systems, going beyond purelyrice research and adopting a livelihoodsapproach to its research programme.

Research institutes should run training

courses for local ngos to update theirskills, since climate change is ongoingand will require continuous review of ap-

propriate technologies for adaptation. It is

intended - and hoped - that local govern-ment will support the new Rural Technol-ogy Centres, and that donors will agreeto finance projects following this model.Government and ngos will need to allo-cate resources to promote exchange visitsand farmer-to-farmer extension work toencourage sharing and learning.

Finally, local ngos and community-based organizations will need to work

together with the target beneficiaries tomake decisions, and design and imple-ment projects.

The authors welcome comments on theproposal for scaling up in Bangladesh out-lined here, and any sharing of similarexperiences.

about the authorS

rc b joined Prac-tical Action in 2001. Afterworking to support pro-grammes to strengthen liveli-hood security, she is now cli-mate change policy advisor.Mmm a leads thePractical Action, Bangladesh,programme on reducing vul-nerability. He is a developmentprofessional with 30 years ex-perience in smallholder inte-

grated agriculture and non-farm incomegeneration.

ContaCt

rc b, Practical Action, TheSchumacher Centre for Technology and De-velopment, Bourton on Dunsmore, Rugby,Warwickshire, CV23 9QZ, United Kingdom.fx: +44-192-6634401em: [email protected] a, Practical Action Bang-ladesh, House 32, Road 13A, DhanmondiR/A, Dhaka 1209, Bangladesh.fx: +880-02-8113134em: [email protected]

further inforMation

o w: Visit www.practicalaction.org for more information on Practical Ac-tions community-based climate change ac-tivities.

this new policy approach requires commitment

from local government to listen to small farmer

groups



25/28

newS

fm b tkCliMate Change talKS

t b Cm C tksk c j 2-13, 2008. Mck

K S gc

s m

vms.

The Bonn Climate Change Talks consisted

of sessions of the Ad Hoc Working Groupon Long-term Cooperative Action, of the AdHoc Working Group on Further Commit-ments for Annex I Parties under the KyotoProtocol and of the two Subsidiary Bodiesof the United Nations Framework Conven-tion on Climate Change. Over 2,000 peopletook part.

Movement along the road to Copenha-gen, where agreement on a follow-up to

the Kyoto Protocol is to be achieved in late2009, is essential, said Yvo de Boer, execu-tive secretary of the Framework Conventionon Climate Change, opening the talks. Theworld is expecting a Copenhagen deal toreach the goal set by science without harm-ing the economy. Parties will need to makereal progress towards this goal. A critical

issue would be financial engineering: howto generate sufficient financial resourcesthat will drive the technology into themarket that allows developing countriesto act, both to limit their emissions and toadapt to the impacts of climate change,he continued.

China, Brazil and Ghana have called fordeveloped nations to create a fund to buy

rights for them to use new climate-friendlytechnologies. Technology transfer fromNorth to South should not promote trans-fer of old aged and inefficient technolo-gies, the Bangladesh delegate told themeeting.

There was continued opposition to WorldBank control of climate funds. With theirlong-term record of massive fossil fuel fi-nancing, the World Bank is spectacularly

unqualified to control climate funds, saidKaren Orenstein of Friends of the EarthUnited States.

According to a new report from the In-stitute of Policy Studies in Washington DC,the Banks role in carbon markets is dan-gerously counterproductive. The WorldBank is playing both sides of the climate

crisis, concludes Janet Redman, main au-thor of the report. It is making money offof causing the climate crisis and then turn-ing around and claiming to solve it, shesays. Instead of encouraging clean energyinvestors, the Bank is lending much of its fi-nancial support to the fossil fuel industry.

Were not at the moment seeing theleadership from industrialized countries

which I think is essential, warned deBoer, midway through the meeting. Asthe talks ended, he described the task ofreaching agreement by the end of 2009 asdaunting. It could well be said that wehave been beating around the bush, saidChandrashekhar Dasgupta, Indias repre-sentative. The United States, Canada andAustralia, in particular, were accused byenvironmentalists of limiting progress.

On a positive note, we are seeing ahuge willingness on the part of developingcountries to engage in working out a newpact in return for aid and technology, deBoer observed.

In a workshop on investment and fi-nancial flows, the Philippines, on behalfof the G-77/China, identified basic prin-



26/28

newS

ciples, including equity and direct accessto funding by recipients. Barbados, forthe Alliance of Small Island States, saidthat new resources should be channeledthrough the climate treaty process andproposed a Convention adaptation fund,an insurance mechanism and a technol-

ogy fund. Mexico favours a world climatechange fund on mitigation, adaptationand technology transfer, with participa-tion of all countries and contributionsaccording to greenhouse gas emissions,population and gross domestic product.Switzerland suggested a global carbondioxide levy of US$2 per tonne on all fossilfuel emissions, with an exception for lessdeveloped countries.

In a workshop on advancing adaptationthrough finance and technology, topicsfor discussion included various aspects ofthe National Adaptation Programmes ofAction (napas), such as the napa guide-lines and coordination with nationalcommunications, the private sectors rolein adaptation, funding sources for localadaptation policies and the use of vulner-ability indices. India argued that promot-

ing development can be one of the bestadaptation strategies. South Africa sup-ported both mainstreaming adaptationinto development and individual adapta-tion actions. China proposed establishinga climate change adaptation committeeunder the Convention to assist work onadaptation, focused on developing coun-

tries, with regional adaptation networksto serving as a regional arm.

The latest Major Economies Meeting onEnergy Security and Climate Change washeld June 21st-22nd in Seoul, South Korea.This series of meeting stems from an initia-tive launched by the Bush administration

in the United States and provides an alter-native forum for intergovernmental dis-cussion of the climate issue to the UNFCCCprocess. The Seoul meeting was chargedwith drafting a declaration for considera-tion at the Group of Eight (G8) summit ofthe major industrialized nations held inToyako, Japan, July 7-9th.

de Boer called on the G8 leaders to reachagreement on mid-term greenhouse gas

targets at the summit, as well as adoptinga long-term goal. While it was importantto define the final destination of the jour-ney, de Boer said, he was also very inter-ested in what the first stop on that journeyis going to be. The European Union hascalled for a specific mid-term goal to beset for the year 2020.

In the event, the G8 leaders agreed towork towards the adoption of a goal of at

least halving greenhouse gas emissions by2050. They also acknowledged that mid-term goals would be needed to achievethis target. But the declaration was heavilycriticized as not going far enough. The G8are crawling forward on emissions cuts ata time when giant leaps and bounds areneeded, said Peter Grant of Tearfund.

Brazil, India, China, South Africa andMexico attended the G8 summit. Luis In-cio Lula da Silva, president of Brazil, hasurged developing countries to join the in-dustrialized nations in setting greenhousegas emissions targets. All participants,including our country, should set a reduc-

tion target in accordance with their ownemissions of greenhouse gases, da Silvasaid ahead of his attendance at the sum-mit. Indias position is that industrializedcountries should meet their own com-mitments rather than pointing fingersat countries like India and asking devel-oping countries to limit their emissions,according to principal climate negotiatorShyam Saran.

The next major stop on the road to Co-penhagen will be in Accra, Ghana, in Au-gust 2008. There is concern about the hu-man cost of the intense meeting schedulein the run-up to the Copenhagen deadline,with three months out of the next eighteendevoted to negotiating meetings.

f m: Earth NegotiationsBulletin at www.iisd.ca/climate/sb28/ has pro-

duced daily reports from the Bonn ClimateChange Talks and an overall summary of themeetings outcome. News of the climate ne-gotiating process and related issues is up-dated hourly in the Tiempo Climate Cyberli-brary at www.tiempocyberclimate.org/newswatch/newsfeed.htm.



27/28

Issue 68 July 2008ISSN 0962-7030

e m:Saleemul Huq, Hannah Reid,Sarah Granich, Mick Kelly,

Johan KuylenstiernaEditorial ofce:Tiempo, Internat ional Insti-tute for Environment and De-velopment, 3 Endsleigh St,London WC1H 0DD, UK.Fax: +44-20-73882826Email: [email protected] [email protected]

ds: Tiempo isavailable f ree on request.Write to: Tiempo Editorial,

PO Box 4260, Kamo,Whangarei 0141,New Zealand.Email:[email protected]

tm s s :the International Institute forEnvironment and Developmentand the Stockholm Environ-ment Institute, with nancial

support from the SwedishInternational Development

Cooperation Agency (Sida).

pc m:Erik Willisl: Richard Claypmm c:Johan Kuylenstiernads: A4p :Bracken Hill Design

a gaunt View 2008 lrc Moor


28/28

Issue 68July 2008 Visit www.tiempocyberclimate.org/newswatch/ for the latest news and debate

Climate change impacts disproportion-ately affect the poor. Impacts will in-tensify yet poor communities alreadystruggle to cope with current climateshocks. Helping them adapt to cli-mate change is vital but daunting.Some international funding is avail-

able, but giving poor country

governments money does notmean that it will reach the mostvulnerable.

One approach to the problemthat deserves greater support iscommunity-based adaptation(CBA). This begins by identi-fying the communities mostvulnerable to climate change.These communities are gener-

ally very poor, depend on natural resourcesand occupy areas already prone to shockssuch as oods or droughts. CBA eldwork todate reveals that outsiders must then gainthe trust of the communities they want tohelp. This can mean spending time with thecommunity, or working through trusted lo-cal intermediary organizations. Identifying

appropriate adaptation options should thenfollow, building on information about ex-isting community capacity, knowledge andpractices used to cope with climate hazards.

Climate change is initially a confusingconcept to many. Communicating climatechange requires translating scientic texts

into local languages and, im-

portantly, using art, theatreand video.

Once established, an adapta-tion project is like any stand-ard development project. Thedifference lies not in what theintervention is but in the inputsto the intervention. The adap-tation element introduces thecommunity to climate risk and

factors this into activities.Lessons from CBA so far reveal that it is

impossible to learn the theory of CBA in a uni-versity or training workshop and then applyit in the eld; learning comes from practiceitself. Whilst CBA theory and practice arein their infancy, both are likely to grow. TheGlobal Environment Facility Small Grants

Programme already supports several CBA ac-tivities (sgp.undp.org/web/focalareas/adapt/climate_change_adaptation.html). Practi-cal Action also has several projects work-ing with local communities to help themadapt to climate change (practicalaction.org/?id=climatechange_adaptation).

Sharing experience and knowledge from

pilot activities amongst practitioners, policymakers, researchers, funders and the com-munities at risk is essential. In view of this, theSecond International Workshop on CBA washeld in Dhaka, Bangladesh, in February 2007(www.bcas.net/2nd-cba/index.html). Thosepresent also formed the CBA Exchange (CBA-X) to promote knowledge sharing on CBA ac-tivities (www.cba-exchange.org). CBA is alsodiscussed at the annual Development and

Adaptation Days event (www.dcdays.org).

Cmmuy-bs p

the final wordSmu huq -scbs ky cmp-

s succssu

cmmuy-bsp

ssss m-

pc sg

sss

Smu huq is a Tiempoeditor and Climate ChangeGroup Head at the InternationalInstitute for Environment andDevelopment in London, UK.em: [email protected]

Documents

Tiembo (2008) _ Special issue on CBA