International partnerships of women for sustainable watershed governance in times of climate change

This chapter describes and assesses collaborative research with women actively engaged in local and global community engagement processes for water management in times of global climate change. As an equity-focused response to climate change, the interrelated networks and initiatives described in the chapter involve organizations and individuals in Brazil, Mozambique, South Africa, Kenya, and Canada. These collaborations are focused on strengthening low-income women's voices, and legitimizing their knowledge and action within water management institutions and processes. The chapter draws from what people learned through two international projects, the Sister Watersheds project with Canadian and Brazilian partners, and a Climate Change Adaptation in Africa project with partners in Canada, Kenya, Mozambique, and South Africa. The methods and approach of the Sister Watersheds project proved to be applicable to climate change education and organizing in Canada as well as in Brazil. The chapter summarizes that women are working together on climate education and water governance, helping to inspire and generate related strategies.This research was supported by the International Development Research Centre, grant number IDRC GRANT NO. 106002-00

Differential vulnerability and adaptive responses to climate change-related hazards in informal urban settlements in Accra, Ghana

University of Technology Sydney. Faculty of Design, Architecture and Building.Current processes of informal urbanisation and marginalisation of informal dwellers, present a challenge for sustainable adaptation to climate change in cities of developing countries. At present, over half of the global population live in urban areas while much of future urban growth would be in Africa and Asia. Yet, the nature of urbanism in these continents is characterised by persistent informal settlements, where disproportionate effects of the imminent climate crisis are likely to fall. In spite of this recognition, studies that analyse the vulnerability and adaptive responses of informal settlements’ residents in Africa remain few and excessively focused on the analysis of vulnerability to flooding hazards. Moreover, by the theoretical frameworks and ontological positions often adopted in these studies, the opinions of the actors, which have the potential to provide contextual explanations for the drivers of their vulnerability, tend to be overlooked. This study partly departs from this dominant ontology, as it examines the drivers of informal settlements’ residents’ vulnerability and adaptive responses including to wider climate change-related hazards from an actor perspective. The study which used Accra (Ghana) as a case, applied a mixed-methods approach. This involved the collection of data through households’ surveys (582 households), key informant interviews (16 sessions) and focus group discussions (14 groups) with community level and state actors. Its central argument is that patterns of differentiation in vulnerability to hazards among residents of informal settlements in Accra are underpinned by socio-economic, political and institutional factors as a contextual experience. Factors associated with the respondents’ ‘perceived vulnerability’ are their tenancy status, size of household income, length of stay in a community and perception of ‘threats of eviction’ over their land. However, the residents, who are active agents, do apply their individual and collective agencies in responding to their vulnerabilities, including climate change-related hazards. This study, therefore, recommends three entry points for addressing the vulnerabilities of informal settlements’ residents and to climate change. First is the need for local authorities to address the challenge of ‘threats of evictions’ in informal settlements. Second, is the need to recognise and integrate local knowledge of climate change in vulnerability assessments, and third is to recognise and integrate the differentiated household and community capacities in the implementation of a participatory slum upgrading intervention in Accra. Doing so will require a paradigm shift in urban planning practice in Accra and similar contexts. The study thus extends the discourse of social vulnerability and adaptive capacity in the wider debates on sustainable urban development

Exploring effectiveness of disaster risk reduction strategies in rural municipalities: a case study of Ndwedwe Local Municipality.

Masters Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban.Local government is at the coalface of service delivery. One of their duties is to ensure the safety of its communities from risks that can occur at any time in their daily lives. Communities can be exposed to disaster risks that usually occur when they are least expected. Hence local municipalities should always be forearmed with effective disaster risk reduction strategies. It has always been found evident that almost all the municipalities do have these strategies in place, however, not much has been studied regarding the effectiveness of such strategies in the rural municipalities. This study will thus explore the effectiveness of disaster risk reduction strategies in rural municipalities using a case study of Ndwedwe Local Municipality. The theoretical framework of this study looks at the practices from a worldwide point of view that have been looked at in order to prepare, mitigate and most importantly to reduce the risk that disasters impose to the communities, but most importantly rural communities. The literature review delves into an insightful analysis of the models that are utilised in the other countries as well in South Africa but also takes a closer look as to which model can be most suitable for a rural municipality like Ndwedwe. The models that the study looks at are: - The Community-Wide Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment (CVCA) Model, Community-Based Risk Reduction Model and South African Disaster Risk Assessment Model. The study then further looks at the status quo of the municipality in terms of its readiness to different forms of disaster that it periodically faces. The study further explores the existing strategies in juxtaposition to their implementation and feasibility in a rural municipality. And lastly recommends the model that it can employ in order to render its disaster risk reduction strategies effective. This study employed a qualitative research design. There were 10 semi-structured interviews that were conducted as well as four focus group discussions. The participants comprised of both the administrative senior management employees as well as the political leadership of the municipality. The focus group discussions (FGDs) were conducted with the ward committee members from 4 Wards in order to get the feelings of the community members on different aspects of the research study. The face-to-face interviews which were subsequently transcribed and key themes were developed, analysed and interpreted. Secondary data was employed in this study was extracted from relevant journal articles, websites and books. The findings of this study blatantly show that rural municipalities are vulnerable to the disaster risks because of the lack of resources, both financial and human. They also show that the municipality needs to use a "bottom-up‟ approach by involving the communities in the identification of risks as well as the implementation of the municipal proposed strategies. Findings also show that rural municipalities need to undertake disaster risk assessments in order to allocate the resources accordingly. Most of all, the implementation of the strategies needs to have its own budget allocation, hence political buy-in and senior management willingness are also pivotal

Student Research Symposium Schedule 2023

Student Research Symposium Schedule 2023, including abstracts and faculty advisor information

Role of Dignity in Rural Natural Resource Governance

Dignity is “an internal state of peace that comes with the recognition and acceptance of the value and vulnerability of all living things” (Hicks, 2011, p. 1). Dignity is a crucial element in effective governance arrangements. This study applies dignity theory, and related theories of natural resource governance and environmental communication, to understand and overcome barriers to effective governance of common pool resources in rural communities. Chapter 1 reviews relevant literature on natural resource governance and develops a theoretical framework for dignity. Chapter 2 applies dignity theory to a contentious comprehensive planning process in a small Maine town in order to understand dignity is constructed and experienced in a collective governance process. Meeting minutes and newspaper articles were coded for themes related to conflict and decision-making. Results showed parts of the planning process ignored dignity considerations. Newspaper articles reported negative or exclusionary events twice as often as positive or inclusive events. Chapter 3 outlines literature relevant to improving capacity of rural communities to adapt to climate change. It then relates a case study from rural Maine in which best practices gleaned from the literature were implemented in creating climate vulnerability assessments and interactive, web-based storm surge mapping tools for use in adaptation planning. Results suggest best practices can enable proactive adaptation without sparking debate over climate science. The survey study described in Chapter 4 examined patterns of beliefs related to climate change and its impacts among people involved in municipal government in a rural Maine county. Results indicate that one-third of respondents were doubtful or unsure about the reality of climate change, but 87% reported observing phenomena related to the warming climate. The web-based survey presented in Chapter 5 examined involvement (perceived relevance and priority) in climate change and other issues affecting rural communities, as well as perceived self- and community efficacy for addressing local problems. Results indicate climate change, per se, is not a high priority, but some climate-related issues do rank highly, suggesting areas for initiating adaptation efforts. Chapter 6 concludes by placing the results of the preceding studies within the context of the dignity framework and presents recommendations for future research

Holistic Leadership: A Model for Leader-Member Engagement and Development

Dr. Candis Best explores the theory of holistic leadership and further provides the model and framework for it to be empirically tested. At present, Best opines that holistic leadership produces leadership which supports the development of self-leadership capacity while preparing participating members for the exercise of increasing levels of self-determination and participatory decision-making

Coastal cities at risk (CCaR) : building adaptive capacity for managing climate change in coastal megacities

The CCaR project has contributed significantly to the development of strategies and methodologies for climate change adaptation (CCA). In cities, assistance in the development of disaster risk reduction (DRR) strategies based on knowledge generated from the project has been provided. In Vancouver region, information for adaptation planning in municipalities was provided; contributing to the flagship Adaptation Strategy formulated by the City of Vancouver and passed by Council. Working groups have been established in Vancouver and Bangkok Metropolitan Administration. In Metro Manila, systems thinking about climate change adaptation have been mainstreamed in national and local government processes through specific policy instruments in collaboration with the all-levels of government, the military, regional scientific groups like UNISDR-ASTAAG and private sector partners such as the Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation and Partnerships for Climate and Disaster Resilience. The development of the City Resilience Systems Dynamic Model (CRS) over the course of the project is providing a new methodology for quantifying the relationships between climate impacts, socio-economic implications, and the development of adaptation strategies that will be applied to all case study cities, now and in future

Involvement of the cortico-basal ganglia-thalamocortical loop in developmental stuttering

Stuttering is a complex neurodevelopmental disorder that has to date eluded a clear explication of its pathophysiological bases. In this review, we utilize the Directions Into Velocities of Articulators (DIVA) neurocomputational modeling framework to mechanistically interpret relevant findings from the behavioral and neurological literatures on stuttering. Within this theoretical framework, we propose that the primary impairment underlying stuttering behavior is malfunction in the cortico-basal ganglia-thalamocortical (hereafter, cortico-BG) loop that is responsible for initiating speech motor programs. This theoretical perspective predicts three possible loci of impaired neural processing within the cortico-BG loop that could lead to stuttering behaviors: impairment within the basal ganglia proper; impairment of axonal projections between cerebral cortex, basal ganglia, and thalamus; and impairment in cortical processing. These theoretical perspectives are presented in detail, followed by a review of empirical data that make reference to these three possibilities. We also highlight any differences that are present in the literature based on examining adults versus children, which give important insights into potential core deficits associated with stuttering versus compensatory changes that occur in the brain as a result of having stuttered for many years in the case of adults who stutter. We conclude with outstanding questions in the field and promising areas for future studies that have the potential to further advance mechanistic understanding of neural deficits underlying persistent developmental stuttering.R01 DC007683 - NIDCD NIH HHS; R01 DC011277 - NIDCD NIH HHSPublished versio

Mobilizing a CGIAR Agricultural Insurance Research Community

This report summarizes the proceedings of the workshop; “Mobilizing a CGIAR Agricultural Insurance Research Community,” held in Washington, D.C., January 20-22. 29 participants representing 14 CGIAR Centers (AfricaRice, CIAT, CIMMYT, ICARDA, ICRAF, IFPRI, ILRI, CCAFS, IWMI, IRRI) came together to participate in the workshop. The CCAFS Regional Programs of East and West Africa, and South and Southeast Asia were also represented. The workshop aimed to mobilize a community of practice on weather-related insurance for agricultural development and adaptation, take stock of relevant expertise and approaches across the CGIAR, and inform the development of funding proposals under CCAFS Flagship 2: Climate Information Services and Climate-Informed Safety Nets. Three opening keynote speakers provided background on index insurance and some of the successfully scaled projects, creating a context for the broader ideological discussions to follow. Some topics discussed included the use of index insurance as a development tool and as part of a greater risk management strategy; how agricultural research can engage the insurance industry; and index insurance data challenges. The second workshop day involved a mapping activity, to take stock of the activities of the CGIAR around the world in agricultural insurance as well as capture the methods, innovations, tools, and gaps and challenges of these projects. The third day supported workshop participants to explore synergies, and take advantage of writing a proposal for a funding opportunity through CCAFS. This workshop guided participants to share ideas, knowledge, approaches and resources, fostering a stronger community of practice across the CGIAR centers. Outputs from this workshop include a more populated community of practice website, several projects on index insurance approved for funding through CCAFS, and plans for a journal special issue