How climate compatible are livelihood adaptation strategies and development programs in rural Indonesia?

AbstractAchieving climate compatible development (CCD) is a necessity in developing countries, but there are few examples of requisite planning processes, or manifestations of CCD. This paper presents a multi-stakeholder, participatory planning process designed to screen and prioritise rural livelihood adaptation strategies against nine CCD criteria. The process also integrated three principles of adaptation pathways: interventions should be (1) ‘no regrets’ and maintain reversibility to avoid mal-adaptation; (2) address both proximate and underlying systemic drivers of community vulnerability; and (3) linked across spatial scales and jurisdictional levels to promote coordination. Using examples of two rural sub-districts in Indonesia, we demonstrate the process and resulting CCD strategies. Priority strategies varied between the sub-districts but all reflected standard development interventions: water management, intensification or diversification of agriculture and aquaculture, education, health, food security and skills-building for communities. Strategies delivered co-benefits for human development and ecosystem services and hence adaptive capacity, but greenhouse mitigation co-benefits were less significant. Actions to deliver the strategies’ objectives were screened for reversibility, and a minority were potentially mal-adaptive (i.e. path dependent, disproportionately burdening the most vulnerable, reducing incentives to adapt, or increasing greenhouse gas emissions) yet highly feasible. These related to infrastructure, which paradoxically is necessary to deliver ‘soft’ adaptation benefits (i.e. road access to health services). Only a small minority of transformative strategies addressed the systemic (i.e. institutional and political) drivers of vulnerability. Strategies were well-matched by development programs, suggesting that current interventions mirror CCD. However, development programs tackled fewer systemic drivers, were poorly coordinated and had a higher risk of mal-adaptation. We conclude that the approach is effective for screening and prioritising no regrets CCD, but more extensive learning processes are necessary to build decision-makers’ capacity to tackle systemic drivers, and to scrutinise potentially mal-adaptive infrastructural investments

Detecting an environmental impact of dredging on seagrass beds with a BACIR sampling design

The impact of maintenance dredging an access channel to a canal estate in Deception Bay, Australia, on the nearby seagrasses was monitored over 18 months with a Before/After, Control/Impact, Repeated measures (BACIR) sampling design. Three seagrasses were collected in the study area; Zostera capricorni Aschers., Halophila ovalis (R.Br.) Hook. f. and Halophila spinulosa (R.Br.) Aschers. All seagrasses were found less than 700 m offshore. The biomass of Z. capricorni, the numerically dominant seagrass, was significantly lower in the access channel border compared with the control area before dredging, which was attributed to direct or indirect effects associated with the channel. There was no significant effect of maintenance dredging statistically detected for Z. capricorni biomass in the access channel border even though seagrass was absent in the access channel 14 months after dredging. This was due to the high background variability of seagrass biomass in the control area. In contrast the biomass of H. ovalis declined at a significantly higher rate in the control area than in the access channel border but had also disappeared from the access channel border 14 months after dredging. Without a control we may have concluded that the disappearance of seagrass from the access channel border was due to the effects of dredging, whereas with a BACIR sampling program there remained a possibility that the decline in seagrass was due to larger scale changes in the bay

The Asset Drivers, Well-being Interaction Matrix (ADWIM): A participatory tool for estimating future impacts on ecosystem services and livelihoods

Building an effective response for communities to climate change requires decision-support tools that deliver information which stakeholders find relevant for exploring potential short and long-term impacts on livelihoods. Established principles suggest that to successfully communicate scientific information, such tools must be transparent, replicable, relevant, credible, flexible, affordable and unbiased. In data-poor contexts typical of developing countries, they should also be able to integrate stakeholders’ knowledge and values, empowering them in the process. We present a participatory tool, the Asset Drivers Well-being Interaction Matrix (ADWIM), which estimates future impacts on ecosystem goods and services (EGS) and communities’ well-being through the cumulative effects of system stressors. ADWIM consists of two modelling steps: an expert-informed, cumulative impact assessment for EGS; which is then integrated with a stakeholder-informed EGS valuation process carried out during adaptation planning workshops. We demonstrate the ADWIM process using examples from Nusa Tenggara Barat Province (NTB) in eastern Indonesia. The semi-quantitative results provide an assessment of the relative impacts on EGS and human well-being under the ‘Business as Usual’ scenario of climate change and human population growth at different scales in NTB, information that is subsequently used for designing adaptation strategies. Based on these experiences, we discuss the relative strengths and weaknesses of ADWIM relative to principles of effective science communication and ecosystem services modelling. ADWIM’s apparent attributes as an analysis, decision support and communication tool promote its utility for participatory adaptation planning. We also highlight its relevance as a ‘boundary object’ to provide learning and reflection about the current and likely future importance of EGS to livelihoods in NTB