Transcript Adaptation to climate change and sustianble development: Some

Adaptation to climate change and
sustainable development:
some concepts
Saleemul Huq
Director
Climate Change Programme
International Institute for
Environment and Development
Impacts of climate change
• Impacts will occur in most parts of the
planet and have to faced
• Both developed and developing countries
will feel the impacts
• The rich will be able to better cope with the
impacts than the poor (both in developed as
well as developing countries)
Vulnerable countries (and
communities)
• All developing countries are particularly
vulnerable to impacts of climate change (due to
both their location as well poverty)
• Amongst the most vulnerable developing
countries are the small island developing states
(SIDS) and least developed countries (LDCs)
• Within developing countries the most vulnerable
people are the poor communities living in the
climate risk zones
Adaptation and development
• The adverse impacts of climate change can be
reduced (but not eliminated) by planned
adaptation
• Activities related to adaptation are most effective
in a number of development related sectors
• The main sectors for adaptation are water
management, agriculture,coastal zone
management,mountain ecosystem management
and climatic hazard management (e.g. floods,
droughts and cyclones)
Adaptation Planning
• Within (developing) countries
• Focusing on the most vulnerable
communities (and ecosystems)
• Mainstreaming into development planning
(based on existing development knowledge)
• Building Adaptive Capacity
• Raising awareness
• Examples are NAPAs (in LDCs)
Role of UNFCCC
• All signatories have accepted responsibility
to assist the most vulnerable countries to
adapt
• New Funds have been created for this
purpose (e.g. LDC Fund, Special Climate
Change Fund)
• Promoting awareness, knowledge
generation and capacity building
Concluding remarks
• In the real world some level of unavoidable
climate change impacts are very probably going to
happen within the next few decades and all
countries and communities will have to cope with
them (whether they like it or not)
• Signatories to the UNFCCC have the power to
reduce those impacts by (first) ensuring maximum
mitigation and (second) by assisting the
developing countries to adapt