National Climate Change Adaptation Emerging Practices In Monitoring And Evaluation

This report draws upon emerging monitoring and evaluation practices across developed and developing countries to identify four tools that countries can draw upon in their own assessment frameworks.

Developing countries are increasingly moving towards more strategic national policies and plans, the effectiveness of which will depend upon proper assessment of a given country's vulnerability to climate change. This report draws upon emerging monitoring and evaluation practices across developed and developing countries to identify four tools that countries can draw upon in their own assessment frameworks: 1) climate change risk and vulnerability assessments, 2) indicators to monitor progress on adaptation priorities, 3) project and programme evaluations to identify effective adaptation approaches, and 4) national audits and climate expenditure reviews. The appropriate mix of tools to monitor and evaluate national climate-change adaptation will to a large extent be determined by data availability, monitoring and evaluation capacity, and the ability to bring together the producers and the users of relevant climate information. The report also examines how development co-operation providers can support partner countries in their efforts to monitor and evaluate adaptation.

Monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of climate change adaptation (CCA) poses an assortment of thorny methodological challenges. Individually, none are unique to CCA, but together they represent a very distinctive conundrum facing practitioners and policy makers. Adding to this complexity further, climate change may be global in nature but its impacts, and how we respond to them through adaptation efforts, cut across scales, sectors, and levels of intervention. As investments in climate adaptation increase, organizations are seeking to measure, assess and understand an array of adaptation initiatives, and derive learnings to inform policy and praxis. This issue presents findings from many of the most important contemporary CCA program evaluation research initiatives. The chapters represent the most coherent and current collection of CCA M&E research in this emerging and important field, written by many of its leading experts. Filled with examples and insights in formulating coherent responses to methodological challenges, it will be of interest to M&E scholars and practitioners globally. This is the 147th issue in the New Directions for Evaluation series from Jossey-Bass. It is an official publication of the American Evaluation Association.

Due to the lack of success in climate change mitigation efforts, the importance of adaptation is becoming more and more apparent and is now one of the main imperatives of international research and action. However, research on adaptation is mostly not directly applicable to adaptation policy or practice, leaving a gap between scientific results and practical advice for decision makers and planners. This book seeks to address this problem and bridge the gap and should provide readers with practical and applicable information on climate change adaptation. Following an introduction, the book is organised into four main sections, each reflecting an essential component in the adaptation process. Climate change adaptation is an emerging subject area and has gained increased political and academic attention within the last decade. Whereas most books in the field focus on adaptation in developing countries, this volume provides an examination of predominantly European policy and offers inter-disciplinary insight into cutting edge knowledge and lessons learnt in a relatively new field of implementation.

The importance of monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of climate change adaptation has been highlighted at global level, including under the Paris Agreement. Simultaneously, adaptation M&E systems are beginning to emerge at the national level in the context of national planning and budgeting processes. This technical guidance note details how to develop M&E systems for adaptation planning in agriculture sectors.

Adaptation is a process by which individuals, communities and countries seek to cope with the consequences of climate change. The process of adaptation is not new; the idea of incorporating future climate risk into policy-making is. While our understanding of climate change and its potential impacts has become clearer, the availability of practical guidance on adaptation has not kept pace. The development of the Adaptation Policy Framework (APF) is intended to help provide the rapidly evolving process of adaptation policy-making with a much-needed roadmap. Ultimately, the purpose of the APF is to support adaptation processes to protect - and enhance - human well-being in the face of climate change. This volume will be invaluable for everyone working on climate change adaptation and policy-making.

With effective climate change mitigation policies still under development, and with even the most aggressive proposals unable to halt climate change immediately, many decision makers are focusing unprecedented attention on the need for strategies to adapt to climate changes that are now unavoidable. The effects of climate change will touch every corner of the world's economies and societies; adaptation is inevitable. The remaining question is to what extent humans will anticipate and reduce undesired consequences of climate change, or postpone response until after climate change impacts have altered ecological and socioeconomic systems so significantly that opportunities for adaptation become limited. This book summarizes a National Research Council workshop at which presentations and discussion identified specific needs associated with this gap between the demand and supply of scientific information about climate change adaptation.

The publication intends to demonstrate and illustrate important steps and lessons learned to take into account when developing a climate change adaptation strategy for water management in the basin or transboundary context. It aims to compile, analyse, publish and disseminate lessons learned and good practices on water and adaptation to climate change in transboundary basins. It includes lessons learnt and good practices from the programme of pilot projects under the UNECE Convention on the Protection and Use of Tranbsboundary Watercourses and International Lakes implemented since 2010 in cooperation with partner organizations such as OSCE and UNDP in the framework of the Environment and Security Initiative. It also includes lessons and examples from numerous other organizations working on water and climate change in transboundary basins, such as the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the Global Water Partnership and many others.