Climate Change and Western Public Lands: a Survey of U.S. Federal Land Managers on the Status of Adaptation Efforts

Climate change and its associated consequences pose an increasing risk to public lands in the western United States. High-level mandates currently require federal agencies to begin planning for adaptation, but the extent to which these mandates have resulted in policies being implemented that affect on the ground practices is unclear. To examine the status of adaptation efforts, we conducted an original survey and semistructured interviews with land managers from the four major federal land management agencies in the U.S. states of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. The survey was designed to examine current planning for adaptation on public lands and how it differs from prior planning, the major challenges facing land managers in this region, the major barriers preventing managers from planning for adaptation, and the major hurdles associated with implementing adaptation plans. Our results show that some adaptation planning is currently taking place, but that few adaptation projects have made it to the implementation phase. Overall, respondents considered lack of information at relevant scales, budget constraints, lack of specific agency direction, and lack of useful information to be the most common barriers to adaption planning. Budget constraints, lack of perceived importance to the public, and lack of public awareness or demand to take action were reported to be the biggest hurdles to implementation of adaptation projects. Agencies showed differing levels of adaptation activity, and reported different barriers to adaptation and hurdles to implementation. Reasons for the differences and implications for future research and policy are discussed

Sustainable livelihood framework-based indicators for assessing climate change vulnerability and adaptation for Himalayan communities

This study evaluated the climate change vulnerability of Himalayan communities, and their potential to adapt to these changes, through assessing their perceived reactions and counter-actions to climate change. The evaluation was conducted through proposing and testing indices for vulnerability (Climate Vulnerability Index - CVI) and adaptation (Current Adaptive Capacity Index - CACI) based on the assumption that a community is an active dynamic entity and has tremendous capability to address the impacts of climate change through an ability to make adjustments based on perceived experiences. Both CVI and CACI include the five forms of capital leading to sustainable livelihood, i.e. human, natural, financial, social and physical capital, and were assessed for each of these forms of capital based on the IPCC framework of vulnerability assessment and its three dimensions (exposure, sensitivity, adaptive capacity). Data for the analysis were collected from randomly selected households located away from district headquarters (ADH) and near district headquarters (NDH). Each dimension was measured based on associated socio-environment-specific indicators for assessing vulnerability and sustainability at community level. The results showed that ADH households had higher human capital and natural capital vulnerability than NDH households. In contrast, NDH households had higher social capital and financial capital vulnerability than ADH households. Overall, ADH households had greater vulnerability than NDH households. These results improve understanding of the environmental and socio-economic changes affecting rural livelihoods and the measures needed to address their specific vulnerabilities by addressing bottlenecks in education and training facilities for skill up-grading, increasing interaction opportunities through local functions and creating opportunities for income generation and effective market and farm linkages. An attempt was made to reduce the gap between bottom-up understanding and top-down policies by suggesting precautionary and ongoing adaptation practices for the communities studied, leading to effective and efficient addressal of vulnerabilities. Vulnerability in the study context was taken to mean externally driven change leading to disturbance in the human environment that could alter internal and external livelihood settings.Scopu

Climate change adaptation in the western-Himalayas: Household level perspectives on impacts and barriers

A vast amount of knowledge and experience on coping with climatic variability and extreme weather events exists within local communities, and indigenous coping strategies are important elements of successful adap- tation plans. Traditional knowledge can help to provide efficient, appropriate and time-tested ways of re- sponding to climate change especially in far-flung communities. However, little is known about how traditional coping strategies translate into adaptation to long-term changes, and to what degree they prevent pro-active, transformational responses to climate change. This paper assesses the use of climate related information for communities in the Himalayan foothills of rural India, and reports on the barriers to adaptation planning and actions. Surveys have been carried out to analyze the current practices and the role of information in planning for climate change adaptation in the rural areas of the Nainital region of India located in Western Himalaya. Respondents perceive the local climate change, the intensity of change, and the negative impacts on the com- munity and landscape. Decreases in water quantity and changes in precipitation patterns are among the major concerns for respondents, however, communities have begun to use traditional knowledge and historical climate information for developing strategies suitable to cope with impacts of climate change. Going forward, additional information is needed to match the high priority community needs with viable adaptation strategies. Lack of money, lack of access to information, and lack of awareness or understanding are considered the three largest hurdles besides low priority for adaptation, recognized by community members as barriers to adaptation planning and actions. Adaptation plans must be integrated into both top-down and bottom-up approaches to plan for enabling sustainable development and the efficient use of information for adaptation. Finally, tradi- tional knowledge seems to be useful not only in contrasting climate change impacts, but also in recovering several ecosystem services that work all together for enanching the quality of life of villagers at local scale

Climate change vulnerability in urban slum communities: Investigating household adaptation and decision-making capacity in the Indian Himalaya

© 2018 Elsevier Ltd Climate change is predicted to have severe impacts on mountainous regions, including urban settlements, and livelihoods of the urban poor. Adaptive capacity for marginalized groups is largely determined by household-level resources and decision-making capacity. This study investigated the vulnerability status and prevalent adaptation strategies of urban slum dwellers in Dehradun, Indian Himalayas, using a pre-tested questionnaire covering household characteristics and indicators of vulnerability, in face-to-face interviews with the head of 122 randomly selected households in four slums. We found that overall vulnerability was very high, with very low absorptive and coping capacity for potential impacts of climate change. Moreover, vulnerability and coping strategies were socially differentiated in terms of the decision-making capability and resource capacity of households. Two groups per category (good and bad decision makers; poor and poorer households) were distinguished. The exposure dimension of vulnerability differed significantly by resource capacity and decision capability. However, the sensitivity dimension of vulnerability did not differ between the groups, while the adaptive capacity dimension of vulnerability differed depending on decision-making capability. In designing appropriate strategies for long-term disaster mitigation for urban slums, it is thus important to address slum socio-ecology and the capability and capacity of slum dwellers

Ecosystems, Climate Change and Development Scenarios, Vanuatu

illustrations; mapsPort Vila is the capital and largest city of the Melanesian island nation of Vanuatu, and is situated on the southern coast of Efate, the third largest island in Vanuatu. Metropolitan Port Vila is where more than a quarter of Vanuatu’s total population live. In 2016 the population of the city was approximately 75 000 and current growth rates are as high as 8% per annum. Population growth in Port Vila is much higher than in other provinces and the city is attracting internal migrants from all other islands in Vanuatu. Most new internal migrants reside in outer urban or peri-urban settlements where they do not generally have formal access to housing or land for growing food. Tropical Cyclone Pam (TC Pam) in March 2015 was one of the most severe cyclones in living memory, causing at least 16 fatalities and more than US$360 million worth of damage. Efate was one of the worst affected islands by TC Pam because of the infrastructure and population concentration in Port Vila. Vanuatu’s experience of TC Pam, followed immediately by a severe El Niño-Southern Oscillation drought which caused widespread food shortages, highlighted the vulnerability of Vanuatu to natural hazards and other risk factors. The Pacific Ecosystem-based Adaptation to Climate Change (PEBACC) Project responds to these vulnerability challenges. The five-year Project (implemented by the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP)) explores and promotes Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) options for adapting to climate change in the Pacific region. EbA is the practice of strengthening ecosystems to increase people’s ability to adapt to the impacts of climate change. It draws upon knowledge of ecosystem services and is based on the premise that if ecosystems are protected, remediated, or regenerated, this leads to healthier ecosystems, more ecosystem services, and therefore greater human well-being and resilience to the impacts of climate change. The current study continues the PEBACC project in Vanuatu. It builds on an earlier PEBACC study that undertook a baseline ecosystem and socio-economic resilience analysis and mapping appraisal of the Port Vila Metropolitan area. The methodology approach adopted provided for mainly desk-top review work, supplemented by four key workshops (including one in Port Vila), interviews with Port Vila stakeholders, and brief field inspection in Port Vila." (From Executive Summary