An assessment of the influence of CCAFS' climate data and tools on outcomes achieved 2010-2016

These four volumes comprise an evaluation report commissioned by the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS). The evaluation was undertaken by the independent evaluators Kornelia Rassmann and Tonya Schuetz and supported by the CCAFS internal evaluation team led by Philip Thornton and Laura Cramer. It mainly used Outcome Harvesting (OH) but also elements from Impact Pathway thinking and Contribution Analysis to describe and analyze ‘development outcomes’ that were directly or indirectly influenced by one of three CCAFS’ climate products – the GCM Climate Portal, MarkSimGCM, and the Climate Analogues tool. Volume 1 is the main evaluation report. Volume 2 presents survey results and user perspectives. Volume 3 contains outcome stories. Volume 4 has definitions of terms and the coding book used during the evaluation

Assessing the influence of CCAFS’ climate data and tools: findings from an Outcome Harvesting evaluation

The CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) integrates climate change research across all CGIAR Research Centres and Research Programs. Some of CCAFS’ work since 2010 has involved the development of high quality, accessible and easy-to-use climate data and tools. With an increased focus on achieving development outcomes influenced by such data and tools, a study was carried out starting in 2016 to evaluate the development effectiveness of some of CCAFS’ climate products: the GCM Climate Portal, MarkSimGCM, and the Climate Analogues tool (Box 1). The study was designed to explore whether use of these three products has led to development outcomes, and if so, what type of changes have been observed and how exactly the products have contributed to such changes. Outcomes here are defined as behavioural changes in individuals, groups or institutions doing something differently with respect to climate-change-related knowledge, attitude, capacity, policy or practice. Outcome Harvesting (Box 2) was used for the evaluation, along with some elements from Impact Pathways thinking (Douthwaite et al. 2008) and Contribution Analysis (Mayne 2008). We started the harvest by collecting outcome leads from project documents and an online survey. These leads provided the basis for selecting those cases that appeared promising to be turned into SMART outcomes (Box 3). A majority (70%) of the 30 cases investigated that employed CCAFS’ climate products were new in the sense that they were not directly related to the CCAFS program. Results from the survey indicated that the data and tools frequently were employed in countries not directly targeted by the CCAFS program and that users often discovered the tools via web search. These observations suggest strongly that CCAFS’ climate data and tools are widely used even without specific promotion, which is consistent with CCAFS’ mandate as a provider of international public goods (IPGs). After email exchanges and phone interviews, we identified a total of 14 cases with a plausible linkage to one of the tools and sufficiently detailed information to qualify as SMART outcomes (Box 4). Of these 14 SMART outcomes, eight related to the GCM Climate Portal and six to the use of the Climate Analogues tool. We found several MarkSimGCM leads, but no SMART outcomes at this stage. One SMART outcome was developed into an extended outcome story (“Farms of the Future, Africa”, Box 5) and one (“Seeds for Needs, India”, Box 6) was unpacked in considerable detail

Exploring and developing effective evaluative approaches for evidencing the contribution of CCAFS climate data and tools towards development outcomes

Do CCAFS’ climate data and tools contribute to development outcomes? The production of International PublicGoods (IPGs) – such as high quality, easy to use climate data and tools – is part of CGIAR CCAFS’ delivery promise. With CCAFS’ transition to a results-based management approach there is an increased focus on achieving development outcomes. Hence, resources have to be balanced between i) IPG development, maintenance & support, ii) programs aiming to deliver development outcomes employing these IPGs, and iii) monitoring and evaluation efforts to assess such programs

Genetic Impact of a Severe El Niño Event on Galápagos Marine Iguanas (Amblyrhynchus cristatus)

The El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is a major source of climatic disturbance, impacting the dynamics of ecosystems worldwide. Recent models predict that human-generated rises in green-house gas levels will cause an increase in the strength and frequency of El Niño warming events in the next several decades, highlighting the need to understand the potential biological consequences of increased ENSO activity. Studies have focused on the ecological and demographic implications of El Niño in a range of organisms, but there have been few systematic attempts to measure the impact of these processes on genetic diversity in populations. Here, we evaluate whether the 1997–1998 El Niño altered the genetic composition of Galápagos marine iguana populations from eleven islands, some of which experienced mortality rates of up to 90% as a result of El Niño warming. Specifically, we measured the temporal variation in microsatellite allele frequencies and mitochondrial DNA diversity (mtDNA) in samples collected before (1991/1993) and after (2004) the El Niño event. Based on microsatellite data, only one island (Marchena) showed signatures of a genetic bottleneck, where the harmonic mean of the effective population size (Ne) was estimated to be less than 50 individuals during the period between samplings. Substantial decreases in mtDNA variation between time points were observed in populations from just two islands (Marchena and Genovesa). Our results suggests that, for the majority of islands, a single, intense El Niño event did not reduce marine iguana populations to the point where substantial neutral genetic diversity was lost. In the case of Marchena, simultaneous changes to both nuclear and mitochondrial DNA variation may also be the result of a volcanic eruption on the island in 1991. Therefore, studies that seek to evaluate the genetic impact of El Niño must also consider the confounding or potentially synergistic effect of other environmental and biological forces shaping populations