Policy options for climate change loss and damage: A case study from Fijian agriculture

Anthropogenic climate change loss and damage (L&D) includes adverse consequences of climate change due to sudden and slow-onset events despite the implementation of adaptation and mitigation measures. Given this context, this thesis aims to identify institutional and policy gaps in the understanding of L&D and critically evaluate opportunities for policy, planning, and funding mechanisms for anthropogenic climate change L&D within the sugar industry of Fiji. Through a grounded theoretical lens, qualitative research was used to gain in-depth insights into climate change L&D from cyclones and droughts in the Fijian sugar industry. In-depth semi-structured interviews (n=68) were conducted with farmers from two Indo-Fijian sugarcane communities, Barotu and Toko settlements in Western Viti Levu, Fiji, and with key stakeholders from government ministries, academia, and climate change experts at the national level. Additionally, policies at the national strategic level and the Ministry of Sugar Industry were examined to understand the degree to which climate change information has been mainstreamed into policy and action in the sugar industry. Vulnerability analysis in both Barotu and Toko settlements revealed a high vulnerability to cyclones and droughts. Cyclone and drought adaptation measures were implemented in Barotu and Toko settlements and by the Ministry of Sugar Industry. Adaptation measures ranged from bearing the effects of cyclones and droughts, reactive coping measures, incremental measures, and systems adaptation. Despite implementing adaptation measures, Fiji’s sugar industry has faced severe L&D from droughts and cyclones. L&D included loss of property, crops, and income. Farmers classified loss of homes and livestock as both economic losses and non-economic L&D (NELD) due to economic and sentimental significance. Other NELD included loss of place of worship, heightening of uncertainty, fear, and trauma. Cascading and flow-on effects included food insecurity risks and impact on children’s education. The severity of L&D experiences suggests that the communities have approached social and ecological limits and are living with intolerable risks and irreversible L&D. The findings also indicate that L&D, including NELD, are highly context-specific and depend upon local value systems, how people experience L&D, and how they deal with L&D. The Fijian Ministry of Sugar Industry lacks the capacity to respond to and address L&D. The lack of capacity is primarily due to insufficient climate change policies, lack of human resource capacity, limited adaptation technologies, lack of L&D data and tools, and lack of access to sufficient climate finance. This research highlights that to facilitate adequate adaptation that moderates or avoids harm and implementation of mechanisms to address L&D, attention must be paid to broader social, economic, and political processes at the international, national, sectoral, and community levels. The systematic documentation of L&D within vulnerable communities should improve understanding of L&D, including NELD, and assist to facilitate the mobilisation of urgent support and action to address L&D in countries that lack the capacities to respond independently. Therefore, this research recommends critical policy interventions to avert and minimise L&D such as livelihood and product diversification with access to new markets, developing risk profiles, mainstreaming climate change and disaster risk reduction issues into existing policies, as well as addressing L&D through enhancing institutional capacity to access climate finance.Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Social Sciences, 202

Values must be at the heart of responding to loss and damage

As climate change worsens, loss and damage will rapidly accelerate, causing tremendous suffering worldwide. Conceptualising loss and damage based on what people value in their everyday lives and what they consider worth preserving in the face of risk needs to be at the centre of policy and funding. This study in three Pacific Island countries utilises a local, values-based approach to explore people’s experiences of climate change, including intolerable impacts, to inform locally meaningful priorities for funding, resources, and action. What people value determines what is considered intolerable, tolerable, and acceptable in terms of climate-driven loss and damage, and this can inform which responses should be prioritised and where resources should be allocated to preserve the things that are most important to people. Given people’s different value sets and experiences of climate change across places and contexts, intolerable impacts, and responses to address them are place-dependent. We call on policy makers to ensure that understandings of, and responses to, loss and damage are locally identified and led

Policy Brief 2: Building Community Resilience

Building resilience in Ocean Cities of the Pacific region is key to converting challenges and risks communities face into opportunities for systemic transformation toward sustainable development. Island settlements at the nexus of ocean health, climate change and urban development will need to build anticipatory, adaptive, absorptive and transformative capacity in the face of complex stressors. The interlinked challenges and resource constraints in rapidly growing Ocean Cities in the Pacific means that the ability to absorb shocks and bounce back relevant partners and stakeholders to promote equitable opportunities for all people in urban communities to access resources and use them sustainably, and to apply standardized methods contextualized for the Pacific to assess the relative vulnerability of communities in Ocean Cities. It also recognizes the importance of promoting stronger governance regimes within urban communities, aligning these with the policies of local government, and encouraging partnerships between urban and rural communities. This second policy brief in the Ocean Cities series offers guidance in this direction

Evaluation of decision support system for agrotechnology transfer SUBSTOR potato model (v4.5) under tropical conditions

Decision Support System for Agrotechnology Transfer (DSSAT) SUBSTOR Potato model (v4.5) was calibrated using Desiree variety. DSSAT SUBSTOR Potato model simulates on a daily basis the development and growth of potatoes using inputs such as climate, soil and crop management. The experiment was conducted in Banisogosogo, Fiji Islands, during the potato growing season of 2012. Fresh and dry weights of belowground plant component (tubers) were taken during progressive harvests. The DSSAT SUBSTOR Potato model was calibrated using experimental field data, soil and weather data of the growing season. The manual calibration steps involved recalculation of soil water content and the adjustments of genetic co-efficient to suit the temperature and daylength regime similar to the experimental conditions. Tuber dry weight was used as the main parameter to evaluate the model. The R2 values of the observed and simulated model outputs before calibration for replicate plot 1, replicate plot 2 and replicate plot 3 were 0.52, 0.49 and 0.61 respectively. After calibration, the R2 values for tuber dry yield for replicate plot 1, replicate plot 2 and replicate plot 3 were 0.88, 0.66 and 0.92 respectively indicating a strong positive relationship between the simulated and the observed yield

Policy Brief 1: The Ocean and the City

Ocean Cities are where landscapes and seascapes meet, where human behaviour and urban development have a profound impact on marine health and climate change. Marine and coastal ecosystems are the largest carbon sink in the world and a vital source of livelihood, employment, nutrition and economic growth in cities and islands. Yet, the capacity of these ecosystems to balance our climate, protect our coastlines, and sustain human development is acutely threatened. Marine pollution and urban run-off, unsustainable coastal development and poor marine governance, rising sea levels, ocean warming and acidification endanger the health of our ocean and erode the very foundation Ocean Cities are built on. For Pacific island settlements, the nexus between urban development, climate change and the ocean is of critical importance since most island communities are coastal, with some smaller island and atoll nations under five meters of elevation. Together with their regional partners, Ocean Cities of the Pacific islands can pioneer ocean-focused, climate resilient solutions for sustainable development. Recognizing and understanding the interconnections and interdependent futures between cities and the ocean will catalyse integrated responses to increase resilience, protect ecosystems, and meet the challenges of rapidly urbanizing island societies. This policy brief outlines the challenges of unplanned rapid urban expansion and deteriorating ocean health, urban resilience and climate impacts on Ocean Cities. Associated opportunities for ocean friendly climate responsive urban development in Pacific islands are discussed in policy briefs two and three of this series. Even if global warming is limited to 2°C, sea levels could continue to rise by over 5 meters over the following centuries, posing a serious threat to low-lying Ocean Cities of the Pacific islands as most urban areas are located ≤5 meters above sea level

Food security: best practices for the Pacific

This report presents selected good practices and techniques that may contribute to improving food security and building community resilience to the impacts of climate change and other factors on agriculture, livestock, fisheries and aquaculture, forestry, and natural resources in the Pacific region. The objective of this report is to provide a summary of best practices that can improve people’s livelihoods for policy-makers, teachers, researchers, and communities. It is non-prescriptive as food security is complex and multi-dimensional. All countries in the Pacific experience different levels of food security issues so solutions to their challenges are not the same. The intent is to cover a wide range of food security issues, best practices, techniques, and methods so that each country may choose relevant interventions which suit their needs. The report highlights the importance of the traditional knowledge held by early Pacific settlers. It considers the importance of links between food, water and energy, and defines food security as ‘having the social, economic and physical access to nutritious and safe food at all times leading to healthy life’. The report highlights that there is more involved with food security than the problem of hunger. There are diseases such as non-communicable diseases (NCD) and HIV/AIDS, and vitamin and mineral deficiencies (VMD) and malnutrition issues that affect food security. The challenges highlighted include growing populations, changing diets, price increases, and local foods being affected by environmental and climatic factors. The links between global, regional and national instruments and frameworks are all part of providing an enabling environment for food security. At the global level, FAO summarises the important global themes as: the right to food; nutrition; poverty; resilience; social protection; climate change; biodiversity; energy; fisheries; forestry; land and soil; sustainable agriculture; tenure rights; and water. In the Pacific, the regional framework highlights seven important themes: 1. building national and regional partnerships to address challenges of food security; 2. developing effective legal instruments that ensure food control systems are in place; 3. having access, availability, stability and uses of locally produced food; 4. the consideration of infants and vulnerable groups by all actors; 5. provision of good information for making informed decisions; 6. provision of good food indicators for effective monitoring and evaluation; and 7. addressing several cross-cutting areas in appropriate and practical ways. At the national level, most countries have legal frameworks in place that have links to food security but few countries have developed food security policies. The need to incorporate DRR in policy-making is highlighted. The report provides background on the use of different tools and methods relating to food security for assessment and monitoring purposes. These tools or methods are options that policy-makers may choose to adopt or modify as relevant to their needs. These include vulnerability guidelines (CFSVG); emergency food security analysis; indicators of food security; crop models; participatory models and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Case studies are presented on project and programme interventions that build adaptive capacity and community resilience in terms of food security that have positive effects on health and livelihoods. These include the Safe Food Awareness Campaign; tracking progress in maternal and child survival; improving child nutrition; the ‘Towards A Food Secured Pacific Strategy’; a mixed gardening project in Kiribati; restoring sustainable livelihoods and seaweed farming in Fiji; traditional crops and sponge culture in the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM); revival of ‘sup sup’ gardens and aquaculture in the Solomon Islands; community-based fisheries management in Tonga; and pearl oyster farming in the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI). Case studies on food security adaptation and mitigation interventions are given including: the use of traditional knowledge; improving drainage and farming of climate resilient crops; ‘ridge to reef management’, and seed banks in Fiji; adaptation to drought; best performing crops - sweet potato and taro in FSM; developing a nursery of drought-tolerant crop seeds in PNG; testing taro for salt tolerance and piloting aquaculture for mangrove crabs in Palau; introducing drought resilient varieties of cassava and sweet potato and fish pond farming in Vanuatu; agroforestry in Vanuatu, Tonga and Solomon Islands; and ‘keyhole’ gardening in Timor-Leste. Examples of mitigation measures include: REDD+ in Fiji; agroforestry in the Pacific; trees for protection and shelter in Kiribati; sustainable fishing schemes; climate proofing fisheries assets; demersal fish management, pond aquaculture, and post-harvest processing; protecting fish stocks, habitats and breeding grounds; promoting ecosystem based management; and improving soil health and minimising polluted runoff