Abstract
While ecosystems-based adaptation (EbA) has been received with great interest, the requirements for EbA implementation and its precise benefits under future climate change are unclear. Furthermore, EbA’s overlap with environmental, and development policy agendas leads to ambiguity regarding what actions fall under the rubric of EbA. We analyze the projects identified by the UNFCCC as examples of EbA to understand how EbA is conceptualized and promoted by the international community. Addressing climate change is the primary objective of 58% of the EbA projects; the other 42% of projects provide adaptation benefits yet are not primarily driven by climate change. A project’s adaptation targeting is tied to its information needs. Projects whose primary objective is to address climate change are more likely to use detailed climate projections than projects whose primary objective is to address natural hazards, development or ecosystems degradation. A majority of projects do not address uncertainty in future climate change or in adaptation benefits, nor do they track adaptation outcomes. This prevalent lack of monitoring highlights the possibility of a gap between expected and realized adaptation outcomes. It also represents a lost opportunity for improving knowledge of the thresholds of effectiveness of EbA and of factors influencing EbA efficacy.
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Notes
A project was coded as having reported on a progress or effectiveness metric if that type of metric was available for at least 25% of the activities within a project.
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Acknowledgements
We thank the Energy and Resources Group at the University of California Berkeley, Margaret Torn, Holly Jones, Mark Wamsley, and two anonymous reviewers for their suggestions and input on this research. Sole responsibility for the content of this publication lies with the authors.
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Milman, A., Jagannathan, K. Conceptualization and implementation of ecosystems-based adaptation. Climatic Change 142, 113–127 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-017-1933-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-017-1933-0