Understanding the Ecosystem-based No. 01 …...Understanding the Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA)...

Understanding the Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) approach in the NDCs of Mexico & Central America

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) promotes the use of ecosystems for adaptation as a cost-effective

Nature-based Solution (NbS) to climate change. The Ecosystem based Adaptation (EbA) approach is a NbS that builds resilience on communities and ecosystems.

As the Paris Agreement was promptly ratified and entered into force on 4 November 2016, countries aim to advance on their adaptation commitments in their NDCs. To enhance the role of NbS, it is essential to identify gaps and opportunities to mainstreaming

the EbA approach towards the update of NDCs by 20201. In order to explore the role of NbS as a response for adaptation under the Paris Agreement, a policy analysis of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) submitted by five UNFCCC Parties (Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico) was undertaken. The objective of the analysis is to understand if the adaptation targets proposed in the NDCs of these countries considered the Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) approach. The examination aims to identify gaps and opportunities for EbA implementation and scaling up.

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1 Luna, M. y Martínez, L. (2019). Soluciones basadas en la Naturaleza en Mesoamérica y el Acuerdo de París. Cuadernillo 1, Serie Gobernanza. Catálogo de Adaptación basada en Ecosistemas. UICN. San José, Costa Rica.

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Table 1. Climate change adaptation categorization and typology used for the NDCs analysis

ADAPTATION CATEGORIES & TYPES DESCRIPTION

Policy & law Creation or revision of public policy and/or laws that allow flexibility and multi-sectorial arrangements to adapt to changes in the climate.

E.g. mainstreaming adaptation measures or considering climate impact in development or sectorial law/policies (water, biodiversity, forestry, agriculture, land use planning, land tenure, tourism, transport, risk, etc.) including new climate change law and policies.

Management & planning Incorporation of climate science, climatic impacts, vulnerability assessments, climatic

risks and adaptation indicators in governmental and institutional services, territorial,

coastal, marine, and socioeconomic/household plans, programmes, management

and investment criteria.

E.g. National Adaptation Plans (NAPs), risk management plans, land/coastal/marine

use planning, livelihood diversification plans.

Financing New financial strategies, mechanisms and insurance schemes to prepare for

detrimental climate impacts, as well as funding for research and adaptation actions.

E.g. Internacional funding, microfinance mechanisms, post-disaster emergency

funds, insurance schemes, payment for ecosystem services, economic incentives.

2 Convention on Biological Diversity (2009). Connecting biodiversity and climate change mitigation and adaptation. Report of the Second Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on Biodiversity and Climate Change. CBD Technical Series No. 41. Montreal, Canada: Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity.

3 Biagini, B., Bierbaum, R., Stults, M., Dobardzic, S., & McNeeley, S. M. (2014). A typology of adaptation actions: A global look at climate adaptation actions financed through the Global Environment Facility. Global Environmental Change.

The scope of this work is a policy analysis that uses countries’ NDCs documents as a main object of research. The format, structure and narrative of these documents are very diverse from one to another, so a comprehensive reading and careful disaggregation of the texts into individual “adaptation commitments” was done to build a database. An “adaptation commitment” is a pledge or statement in the NDC that mentions an adaptation action to be taken by one or several stakeholders or sectors, at the national, sub-national or local level, typically lead by the government (see some examples in table 3).

The analysis facilitates a categorisation of countries’ adaptation commitments as a first step, and as a second step, a characterization of those incorporating the EbA approach. This paper uses the most commonly accepted definition of EbA, by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which defines it as “the use of biodiversity and ecosystem services as part of

an overall adaptation strategy to help people to adapt to the adverse effects of climate change”.2

• Categorization. The adaptation typology used for the analysis was adapted from the work of Biagini et al. (2014).3 The proposed adaptation categories were informed by on-the-ground IUCN experience implementing adaptation measures in the Mesoamerican region. The results of this mixed-methods approach generated 2 overarching adaptation categories (i. Enabling conditions, and ii. Actions on the ground) and 10 adaptation types, which are described and exemplified in table 1.

• Characterization. Based on the definition of EbA, the different NDCs commitments referring to “biodiversity and ecosystems services for adaptation” are labelled in this analysis as incorporating the EbA approach.

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ADAPTATION CATEGORIES & TYPES DESCRIPTION

Capacity building &

awareness

Awareness and education campaigns, exchange of information, and community, civil

society, private sector and institutional capacity development in order to adapt to

climate variability and change.

E.g. training, outreach and education programs to create awareness and develop skills

in governmental officials, the private sector and civil society (including communication

campaigns).

Information systems

& research

Systems and methods that collect and communicate relevant information to prepare

for climate impacts and increase resilience (excluding early warning systems) as well

as research initiatives for climate change adaptation.

E.g. climate and risk databases, weather forecast, climate scenarios, remote

communication technologies with climate data, indigenous/local knowledge,

research on vulnerability, climate impacts, and adaptation options, inventory of on-

going investments and projects related to adaptation, etc.

Grey

infrastructure

Human-made constructed physical assets, new or improved, developed with the aim

of providing direct or indirect protection to the adverse impacts of climate change.

E.g. sea walls, dikes, water storage tanks, water supply and drainage systems,

bridges, etc.

Natural

infrastructure

Restoring, maintaining or improving structure, function and composition of

ecosystems to deliver ecosystem services for climate change adaptation.3

E.g. wetlands (mangroves, rivers, lakes, peatlands, salt marshes, seagrasses, coral

reefs); oyster beds; trees; forests; cultivated land, etc.

Sustainable production

practices & behaviour

Sustainable production practices (in agriculture, forestry, fisheries/aquaculture, and

tourism) based on an understanding of the ecological services, as well as behavioural

changes taken to fight the adverse impacts of climate variability.

E.g. soil conservation techniques, seed conservation practices, use of climate resilient

crops (against increased heat, cold, drought, flood, or salinity) agroforestry, livelihood

diversification, indigenous and local practices, relocation, etc.

Adoption of

technologies

Revision, development, or adoption of technologies that increase resilience to face

climate change detrimental impacts.

E.g. solar energy, technologies to improve water use, water purification, use of

biogas, local technologies, etc.

Early warning

systems

Implementation of new or improved procedures for immediate climate-related risks

communication at the local level.

E.g. monitoring and early warning systems for storms, flooding, heatwaves, wildfires,

and climate-related disease outbreaks.

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3 Smith, M., Welling, R., Van Ham, C. (2016). ‘Green infrastructure and natural infrastructure approaches’. En: E. Cohen-Shacham, G. Walters, C. Janzen, and S. Maginnis. (Eds.) Nature-based Solutions to address global societal challenges, pp. 20-22. Gland, Switzerland: IUCN.

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Results Categories and types of adaptation commitments identified

The following graph presents the aggregated number of adaptation commitments by type identified in the NDCs of the aforementioned countries. In table 2 the commitments are presented by country, category and type for a more detailed understanding of the general trends. A summary of this preliminary results are:

• A total of 100 adaptation commitments were identified and classified from these 5 countries.

• 67% of adaptation commitments refer to enabling conditions, and 33% refer to actions on the ground.

• Most enabling conditions are related to management and planning; policy and law; and information systems respectively.

• Sustainable production practices as well as natural infrastructure are the most common actions on the ground, followed by grey infrastructure.

ENABLING CONDITIONS

ACTIONS ON THE GROUND

Adaptation categories & types

Grey infrastructure

Sustainable production practices

Information systems Policy & law

Management & planning

Financing

Capacity building

Natural infrastructure

Early warning systems

Adoption of technologies

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Table 2. Number of commitments per country, by category and type.

CATEG. ENABLING CONDITIONS ACTIONS ON THE GROUND

Country/Type Policy & law


Financing Capacity building & awareness

Information systems & research

Grey infrastructure


Sustainable practices & behaviour



EbAexplicit

MEXICO 0 13 2 4 1 0 3 0 0 1 YES

GUATEMALA 5 4 0 1 2 0 0 0 0 1 NO

EL SALVADOR 7 5 0 0 0 2 1 1 0 0 NO

HONDURAS 2 3 1 1 3 0 1 16 1 0 NO

COSTA RICA 1 5 3 1 3 1 3 1 1 0 YES

35

2530

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7 6

18

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10

5

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Sustainable production practices


Grey infrastructure




Policy & law

Information systems

Capacity building

Financing

I. ENABLING CONDITIONS II. ACTIONS ON THE GROUND

Aggregated number of adaptation commitments identified in the NDCs of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico by type: i. Enabling conditions; ii. Actions on the ground

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Table 3. Examples of adaptation commitments in NDCs considering ecosystems or their services.

ADAPTATION CATEGORIES & TYPES EXAMPLES FROM ANALYZED NDCs

Policy & law Implementation of the National Policy for Integrated Coastal Zone Management (Guatemalan NDC)


For the period 2021–2025 the country will support the protection and restoration

- through appropriate management plans - of 70% of the main water recharge

areas identified in the National Plan for Integrated Water Resources Management

(NDC of El Salvador).

Financing Payment for environmental services (PES) for adaptation (Costa Rican NDC).

Capacity building & awarenessStrengthen the capacity of agricultural producers on sustainable production

practices (Costa Rican NDC).

Information systems & researchTo develop agriculture, livestock, and food security monitoring systems

(Guatemalan NDC).

Natural infrastructure Reach a rate of 0% deforestation by the year 2030 (Mexican NDC).

Sustainable production

practices & behaviourImplementation of the “Quesungual”4 agroforestry system (Honduran NDC).

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3.2 The EbA approach in countries’ adaptation commitments

Different commitments analysed refer to the use of biodiversity and ecosystems services for adaptation, and therefore are considered as part of the EbA approach. All countries include the use of ecosystems for adaptation in their NDCs documents, and two explicitly include the term EbA. On one hand, the EbA approach can be supported by different enabling conditions that contribute to the use of biodiversity and ecosystems for adaptation. On the other hand, two of the actions on the ground directly incorporate the EbA approach: natural infrastructure and sustainable production practices. Table 3 provides examples of different adaptation types incorporating the EbA approach.

4 This agroforestry farming system was tailored by FAO and local small-scale farmers to the biophysical and socio-economic conditions of the region of Lempira, in southwestern Honduras.

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Mesoamerican countries have incorporated the EbA approach into their NDCs, through enabling conditions of existing policies, plans, financing mechanisms, capacity building and information systems. Mexico and Costa Rica explicitly mentioned EbA in their NDCs. The EbA approach has been incorporated into specific commitments for actions on the ground, specifically on sustainable production practices and natural infrastructure. EbA can generate synergies with other adaptation actions, most noticeable with grey infrastructure in “hybrid” adaptation solutions, but also with technologies (e.g. water efficient crop irrigation systems) and early warning systems (EWS) (e.g. forest management that complements wild fires EWS).

As countries get ready to raise their ambition with the new round of NDC commitments by 2020, this analysis provides some overarching conclusions. Countries need to raise their overall ambition in order to translate the legal, policy, and managerial frameworks into concrete actions on the ground. National commitments in the region also need to put more attention on how to scale-up the EbA approach at the appropriate landscape level, and to increase financing mechanisms for adaptation, which are vital for successful adaptation actions that incorporate the EbA approach.

Conclusions

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AuthorsMauricio Luna Rodríguez & Marta Pérez de Madrid Utrilla.

About proyect AVEThe project AVE: Adaptation, Vulnerability & Ecosystems seeks to scale the Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) approach, through the strengthening of capacities to face climate change, the articulation of political, legal and institutional frameworks and the gathering of evidence on their multiple benefits to increase resilience and reduce the vulnerability of people and nature. Its implementation has been carried out since 2015 in six Mesoamerican countries (Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Costa Rica and Panama) with the support of the Federal Ministry of the Environment, Nature Protection and Nuclear Safety (BMU) of Germany, and executed by the Environmental Law Centre (ELC) and the Regional Office for Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and in coordination with member organisations and partners such as the Fundación VIDA, Unidad Ecologica Salvadoreña (UNES), Historia Natural del Soconusco, Asociación del Corredor Biológico Talamanca Caribe y la Comisión Trinacional Plan Trifinio.

More information: https://www.iucn.org/node/594 - [email protected]

About IUCNIUCN is a membership Union composed of both government and civil society organisations. It harnesses the experience, resources and reach of its more than 1,300 Member organisations and the input of more than 10,000 experts. IUCN is the global authority on the status of the natural world and the measures needed to safeguard it.

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International Unionfor Conservation of Nature (IUCN)

Regional Office for Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean (ORMACC) San José, Costa [email protected]

www.iucn.org/ormacc

Environmental Law Centre (ELC)Bonn, Germany

[email protected]

www.iucn.org/law

Understanding the Ecosystem-based No. 01 …...Understanding the Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA)...

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