Theory and Practice of Climate Adaptation

With climate change adaptation emerging as a top priority in many developing countries, national governments and international and local organizations seek the most effective policy and governance mechanisms through which to foster progress. One avenue of keen interest is the devolution of authority for adaptation planning and implementation to the local level. To date, little research is available on the link between local governance effectiveness and progress on adaptation. To help address that need, this paper explores governance and climate change adaptation dynamics at the local level in Mali, focusing on the commune, the smallest-scale elected body. The discussion centers on a legally-mandated local planning process, for which community consultation is required, as the entry point to analyze the effectiveness of local efforts to identify and implement climate change adaptation priorities. The paper provides the results of activities undertaken by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), presenting findings from a qualitative study of five communes, together with a case study on Koro commune, which highlight lessons on integration of climate change adaption into commune level development plans. The discussion is intended to foster understanding of the opportunities and conditions that enable successful climate adaptation interventions at the local level, as well as the extent to which a decentralized system of government can confer an adaptive advantage. The key takeaway of the discussion is that even in the context of fundamental governance challenges, such as those Mali currently experiences, climate-resilient local planning is possible given adequate resources, technical expertise and commitment to engaging citizens in identifying priorities. This finding and others described here are relevant to national governments and other development actors investing in climate change adaptation at the local level.

The ecosystems of the high mountain regions of Central Asia are rich in biodiversity and provide essential services, such as the regulation and provision of water for the population of the entire region. However, inappropriate land management of these fragile ecosystems combined with their vulnerability to climate change threats (e.g. melting glaciers, changes in water flow regime, droughts) decrease their resilience and thus, the ability to provide continued services to people. A BMUB (German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety) IKI (International Climate Initiative) funded and GIZ-led (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit GmbH) consortium explores the use of an Ecosystem-based Adaptation approach to help people adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change. It aims to strengthen the provision of ecosystem services and thereby enhance the livelihoods of the population depending on them. Although the application of potential ecosystem-based measures in Central Asia is not new, typically relevant climate risk information on people and ecosystems is not considered and thus, has a higher risk of introducing maladaptive interventions. This project used a modified form of the Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation to systematically develop and test an integrated planning framework that used climate risk information to identify key vulnerabilities of people and ecosystem services under several plausible climate change scenarios and developed potential adaptation options. The framework’s guidance can contribute to a paradigm shift: moving away from business as usual approaches to climate informed adaptation processes. In addition, it constitutes a cornerstone for building a bridge between international climate finance mechanisms and climate-informed adaptation of local communities.

Climate change is driving dramatic environmental changes and posing new demands to citizens, health authorities, and policy makers worldwide. This is due to an increased frequency, intensity, and duration of associated extreme weather events. Recent calls for better understanding of how citizens adapt to such demands and the role that psychological processes’ play in that adaptation, have been put forward. We contributed in this regard by (1) applying the Biopsychosocial Model of Challenge and Threat (e.g. Blascovich 2008) to the study of human responses (psychological, physiological, and behavioural) to extreme weather events; (2) using it as the conceptual basis for a mixed methods study aimed at exploring citizens’ perceptions, beliefs, and appraisals of the demands posed by such events and available resources to cope with them. Preliminary qualitative results are presented and potential implications for stakeholders and policy makers in the climate change domain are discussed. An example of how such conceptual and methodological approaches may contribute to developing evidence-based strategies for incrementing citizens’ resilience and adaptation to climate change, will be provided. This allow a better understanding of citizen appraisals and perceptions’ role in shaping adaptive behaviour, in order to provide them with the necessary personal and social resources to cope with extreme weather events and increment future resilience.

Many studies have confirmed the diffusion of climate change adaptation mainstreaming related policies and innovations across local governments (LGs). However, it is not clear under what conditions these policies get transferred, implemented or subsequently abandoned, especially in developing countries where LGs’ capacity to mainstream adaptation barely exist. Based on retrospective literature analysis, this article adduces theoretical and empirical evidence to analyze the factors likely to influence the mainstreaming of adaptation into local governance in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The outcome of the article is expected to help policy practitioners and academics to comprehend the preconditions that enhance or frustrate the adoption of adaptation policy innovations across LGs in SSA where adaptation remains critical developmental concerns. The preponderance of literature suggests that multiple factors, including those, outside the control of LGs affect their capacity and urgency to adopt adaptation policies. The chapter concludes that it is worthwhile to adopt multiple diffusion perfectives that reflect the complex web of factors conspicuously affecting the transfer of climate policy innovations at the micro level to explain the adoption of adaptation policies. The chapter argues that, by doing so, one is able to portray the nature of climate change policy diffusion in local governance in a more sophisticated, comprehensive and logical manner. The chapter therefore makes useful contributions to the emerging field of climate policy and provides useful lessons for practitioners on the factors that influence the adoption of adaptation policies.

The starting point of this paper is the Paris Agreement under the UNFCCC agreed in 2015 and its global temperature goal. It highlights that the current pathway of decarbonization would result in a sharp temperature increase by 2100 (see Sect. 1) that would result in unacceptable risks of climate change (see Sect. 2). Those risks cannot be properly addressed by adaptation activities as long as there are no reliable expectations of the climate changes expected over the lifetime of current projects. The paper informs about such recently published projections that suggest that global surface temperatures will increase by approximately 5 °C (9 °F) over pre-industrial temperatures by the year 2100 and discusses options to bridge the gap to the goals specified in the Paris Agreement. In this context also two main geoengineering options carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and solar radiative management (SRM) and their associated risks are considered. At the center of the paper two proposals are made on a limited use of geoengineering that should finally help meet the goals of the Paris Agreement without increasing risks of geoengineering unduly, provided that decarbonization is significantly accelerated beyond the plans included in current National Determined Contributions. One conclusion is that geo-engineering can only provide a small contribution to meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement and that the main contribution needs to come from enhanced mitigation action. The paper also highlights how recommendations of the Financial Stability Board could contribute to result in the necessary shift of investments to accelerate GHG emission reduction and informs about a recent initiative to establish the necessary governance framework to manage geoengineering.

Across all the Bretton Wood institutions, decentralization has been touted as a fulcrum of good governance. This idea has had a sweeping effect across many areas of governance including climate change adaptation. However, the emerging climate change policy literature have had less focus on how decentralization can enhance adaptation governance at the local level. In Ghana, local governments have been given adaptation responsibility, through recently passed national climate change policies (NCCPs). This chapter of the book draws on experiences from the implementation of the NCCPs at the district level in Ghana which is perceived as a luminary of decentralization in Sub-Saharan Africa. The chapter specifically assesses the extent to which decentralization of NCCPs has impacted adaptation governance at the local level. The chapter therefore aims at fostering understanding of the nuances of implementing decentralized adaptation governance in developing countries among scholars and policy practitioners. It concludes that though decentralized adaptation governance in Ghana increases the institutional space for community participation in adaptation governance it is falling far short of creating a the management regime capable of building requisite adaptive capacity as envisage by the NCCPs at the local level. Although it is extremely premature to draw reliable conclusions, the chapter identified some positive trends amidst challenges.

Cork oak (Quercus suber L.) grows in the western Mediterranean region for which the most recent climatic scenarios predict higher temperatures and lower precipitation than usual values. Cork, the tree’s outerbark, is obtained under a sustainable management system and has a considerable economic importance for forest producers and industry. Cork’s specific set of properties allows multiple usages, from cork stoppers to insulating materials. This paper presents the first results of a dendroclimatological exploratory study about the effect of a severe drought in different moments of the cork 9-year production cycle, e.g. beginning, middle or end of the cycle. The results showed that the response of the phellogen (cork cambium) to the severe drought of 2004–2006 is independent of its age. In a mitigating strategy for the impact of the forthcoming more frequent drought events, and since cork growth decreases due to the reduction of water availability, forest managers should extend cork growth cycles and/or water cork oak stands. This is a way to ensure the production of cork with enough thickness to produce stoppers, thereby contributing to the overall sustainability of the cork sector in a climate change context.

The recent years’ publications have focused on the influence of the ozone layer depletion (OLD) to the climate change (CC). Some authors suggested that the reasons for it are: (a) the ozone absorbs the solar radiation, and (b) ozone is a greenhouse gas. Hence, the variations of ozone concentration in the atmosphere and climate change are closely related. The human risks associated with ozone layer depletion are skin cancer, damage to the eyes, local and systemic immunosuppression. Some of environmental risks associated with ozone layer depletion are a changing of climatic regions; changing of land productivity, impact on plants and animals. The aims of the article are the investigation of mutual influence of OLD and CC, analysis of the regional OLD and associated risks. Presented results show that there is one more reason for the OLD influence on CC concerning with the change of the tropopause height. In addition, positive anomalies of ozone can be just as serious preconditions for climate risks, as well as negative anomalies.

Climate change has become one of the greatest challenges of the 21st century, particularly for growing cities. In places like Mozambique, the vulnerability of the cities (municipalities) is further compounded by socio-economic constraints that limit the ability of local and national governments to respond to extreme climatic events. All this means that climate change adaptation needs to be understood within a broader socio-economic and environment context. From this, we argue that adaptation interventions must be part of long lasting development plan and not a project per se. In so doing, the starting point should be to set a climate resilient development agenda that adaptation interventions will feed in. Currently indeed, most of the adaptation interventions are stand-alone initiatives based, in most of the cases, in assumptions made mainly by the international donors, NGOs and consultants that what is known globally around climate change apply to local context and can easily be replicated. Hence, pre-cooked ill locally researched interventions are proposed and implemented with very limited impacts. This trend is making adaptation less effective in developing countries despite a growing discourse of climate change adaptation. Against this backdrop, we present a different pathway. This paper addresses interventions by the Coastal City Adaptation Program (CCAP) in two municipalities in Mozambique which seek to apply action-research and use local participation (including local knowledge) to feed adaption interventions in a long lasting development agenda. The paper argues that this approach is far more effective for climate resilience because it responds to local development agenda, allows the prioritization of locally grounded interventions which are supported by a pool of local actors and, because it is locally grounded it allows the embedding of adaptation agenda in the local institution’s everyday planning practices making it sustainable over time.

Recurring heavy precipitation and flooding cause extensive loss and damage in cities like Mumbai. Among the worst affected are Micro Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), which suffer damage to physical structure and loss of business. These costs amount to millions of dollars and are borne by MSMEs in the absence of adequate insurance protection. With limited flood management services and inadequate infrastructure provided by the municipal authorities, MSMEs are implementing their own temporary measures for flood protection. These are often ineffective during heavy precipitation and create risks of maladaptation. As climate change is expected to worsen the risk of flash floods with changes in intensity, frequency and duration of rainfall, MSMEs need long-term solutions to build their adaptive capacity and resilience. This paper describes the business case for private sector engagement in flood risk reduction and climate adaptation from the perspective of MSMEs in Mumbai. Based on extensive field surveys of MSMEs located in industrial estates, the paper discusses the implications of floods for MSMEs. Moreover, the authors present a framework developed for MSMEs to make informed risk reduction and adaptation decisions and implement effective structural and non-structural measures to minimize the recurring adverse impacts of floods on their business operations.

Climate change is bringing more frequent and intense heat waves over the last years. Under this circumstance, it is important to understand whether species can tolerate stress and which mechanisms are involved in this adaptation process. Olive tree (Olea europaea L.) have been known for centuries to be drought tolerant, but less is known about the impact on the physiological response of this species to heat. To understand how young olive plants deal with heat shock, one-year-old plants (cv. ‘Arbequina’), grown at 23 ± 2 °C, were exposed to heat, 40 °C, for 2 h. Relative water content, gas exchange, carbohydrates content, cell membrane permeability and lipid peroxidation were assessed immediately after heat exposure. The heat shock treatment compromised plant water status, photosynthesis and induced stomatal closure. However, neither membrane damage nor carbohydrates contents (total soluble sugars and starch) were affected. The results indicate that young olive plants can overcome short heat shock episodes.

The frequency and geographic distribution of extreme weather events began to change as a result of global climatic changes and anthropogenic changes in urban space that influence the urban microclimate, affecting the mesoclimate and the macroclimate. This research aimed to relate the microclimatic and anthropogenic adaptations that occurred in five portions in an urban area in the Brazilian Savanna named Cerrado between the years 2011–2012 and 2016. As a methodology, the nocturnal moving transect technique was used to measure micrometeorological variables such as air temperature and relative air humidity, and the maximum likelihood classification technique to classify and quantify the types of soil cover found in the two periods studied. In this way, it was possible to observe an increase of 1.45 ℃ in the intensity of the urban heat island and a decrease in relative air humidity of 3.32%, associated to areas with up to 17.173% of impervious materials such as concrete and asphalt, and decrease of up to 22.20% of vegetal cover. Evidenciating the importance of several studies on the use of materials with low thermal diffusivity and application of mitigating measures as an increase of vegetated areas, thus making the public awareness of the impacts of unplanned urbanization.

ClimAdaPT.Local’s goal was the development of 26 Municipal Adaptation Strategies for Climate Change (EMAAC). The project aimed to increase the capacity of these municipalities to incorporate adaptation to Climate Change (CC) in their planning instruments. To do so, several methodologies and tools were specifically developed. One of these, the local stakeholder engagement strategy, constitutes an innovation as far as the development of these strategies in Portugal is concerned. This paper focuses on this stakeholder engagement process and its achievements. ClimAdaPT.Local’s stakeholder engagement was workshop based. These were put in place in order to understand perceptions of CC, its impacts, local risks, but also survey potential inputs into the ongoing EMAAC development. Each session comprised several discussion tables, intending to: (i) obtain a global reference framework on perceptions and sensitivity to CC at the local level; (ii) complement the vulnerabilities assessment made by the technical staff from each municipality; (iii) inform, adjust and optimise the local adaptation strategies. In addition, stakeholders were asked to share their visions of the future, namely how CC and local territorial identity will be articulated in the near, and not so near, future. The analytical findings encompassed in paper refer to point (i). All in all, in Portugal, there is a widespread perception that CC is happening, in particular among social groups that engage in activities such as agriculture and fishing. And despite being considered to pose a threat, CC is, at the same time, broadly perceived as a window of opportunity to put in place measures that improve local living conditions.

Split-incentives of non-domestic building tenure that divide the benefits of implementing energy efficient technologies and behaviours between property owners and users are generally recognised to act as a financial barrier to the adoption of energy efficient interventions in UK non-domestic properties. Despite the extensive availability of cost effective energy efficient interventions that could overcome financial spilt-incentives for UK non-domestic building owners and users, widespread energy inertia prevails. This suggests the barriers presented by split-incentives of ownership exert an influence beyond financial decision making. Rethinking the impact of split-incentives may therefore assist in unlocking energy inertia and contribute to the mitigation of climate change. This paper reports the findings of a qualitative survey undertaken to investigate the impact of non-domestic building ownership on the owners’ and users’ ability and willingness to adopt energy efficient and conservation technologies and behaviours. It explores the impacts of ownership beyond the reach of financial disincentives to adopt energy efficiency improvement and identifies four types of constraint affecting non-domestic building owners’ and users’ energy behaviours; ownership constraints, financial constraints, knowledge constrains and regulatory constraints. The paper extends the understanding of the scale and scope of split-incentives of non-domestic building ownership for energy performance improvement within non-domestic buildings and presents a wider scope of the split of incentives of ownership than previously established. It also explores the opportunity this new understanding offers for reforming UK energy policies. Findings suggest the impacts of tenure are influential beyond monetary considerations for non-domestic building owners and users and include practical and attitudinal barriers from relationships, contractual constraints and ownership concerns which drive energy inertia through the Owner-User Stalemate.

The latest surveys show the importance of Environmental Justice in order to guarantee the rights of marginalized parts of society to live in a healthier environment and to provide equal treatment for people regardless of race, nationality, gender or income. Following the context of risk society, this article provides a literature review that aims to identify the importance of environmental justice in achieving climate change adaptation. Through a qualitative and interdisciplinary approach, the research illustrates how interconnected climate change adaptation, risk societies and environmental justice are, in the interest of drawing attention of stakeholders and decision-makers to the distinct levels of impact that climate change has on the various sectors of society. Overall, the study emphasize that climate change adaptation strategies can often be discriminatory. By having parts of the society vulnerable to climate change impacts, the pathway towards adaptation will never be fully reached. The course to prevent those issues from being even more aggravated is to address climate change adaptation in a way that enables to benefit all groups of society by providing the information and resources for the adaptation of those living in the margins.

Perception is the bed rock to really apprehend the assertiveness and interpretations of the farmers which are the grass root receptors or benefactors of the effects of climate change. Individual perception and knowledge on climate change varies according to geographical location, occupation, political and socio-economics, ecological, cultural background of the entity. Empirical observations and climate models both indicate that global climate and ocean conditions have been changing over the last 100 years and will likely change more rapidly in the future. Fish production and supply in Africa could not meet up with the demand of the consumers as a result of financial constraints, low capital investment, high cost of fish stocking and feeding, dry season, pollution and climate change. This research therefore, assesses the fish farmers’ perceptions, impacts and adaptation on/of/to climate change in Africa, using Egypt and Nigeria as archetypal examples. It also annotates the precautionary measures taken by the fish farmers to ameliorate the negative impacts of climate change in the continent. KoboCollect method was used to design relevant questions and analyzed the fish farmers’ responses. The results revealed that climate change has both positive and negative impacts on African aquaculture and it is believe that aquaculture is a way of adapting to the adverse effect of climate change on fisheries. 93% of the fish farmers in Africa have the ideal of climate change, 64% believe that the change will linger and persevere in the next 10–20 years. In Nigeria, 61% of the respondents relied on stream and river while in Egypt, 99% of the fish farmers cultured their fish on earthen ponds and depend on the use of agricultural drainage water. Fish production could not meet up with the demand of the consumers in Nigeria as a result of pending constraints unlike Egypt which has achieved the scale of aquaculture expansion compare to other African countries. It is therefore, expedient that efforts should be geared towards regional and continental integration in order to encourage aquaculture practices in other part of Africa and climate change investment should be encouraged.

Environment, migration and asylum are among the most socially constructed issues of the 21st century. The intersection of these issues has recently gained institutional recognition in diverse UN frameworks and conventions. Despite the reiterated importance to research and develop policies on environmental migrations, the identification of “environmental/climate refugees/migrants” has been discouraged (IPCC, Foresight), considering the difficulty of isolating the environmental factor within mobility drivers, and the non-identification with such labels by some of the people which could be paradigmatically affected by environmental and climate changes. This paper brings into discussion the results of qualitative Ph.D. research work (the author benefited from a Ph.D. grant by FCT from 2011 to 2015 (SFRH/BD/68730/2010). This article was made with the support of CICS. NOVA—Interdisciplinary Centre of Social Sciences of the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, UID/SOC/04647/2013, with the financial support of FCT/MCTES through National funds) developed with Ethiopians and Eritreans in Italy and Cape Verdeans in Portugal. The aim is to explore the reflexivity of migrants and refugees from countries with environmental risk, observing their representations of environmental factors in the countries of origin, interrelated with other drivers of mobility (mainly economic and political), and the framing within their experiences of mobility towards Southern Europe. Putting these issues into perspective can be useful for the reflection about policies addressed to environmental migrations, which will be reviewed in this paper, highlighting some gaps between global political aims and meanings of mobility and the environment for migrants and refugees.

Inundation due to sea level rise is among the most expensive and deadly coastal hazards that can gradually impact small island coastal communities. The intent of this research is to look at ways how coastal island communities can be convincingly informed about the impacts of sea level rise; an understanding of these potential impacts is critical for people to engage in related adaptation actions. Effective climate communication may require more than just using language; the use of virtual reality, 3D spatial technology, and digital elevation models can prove equally or even more powerful to enable the portrayal of risks and dangers posed by climate change. Using a case study in Malta, we mapped impacts of the effects of sea-level rise on valuable real estate, critical public infrastructure, and natural resources. Coastal communities were then asked for their views on sea level rise after looking at precise but different modes of visualization of the same impact at specific coastal locations. Results showed a general preference for 3D over 2D visualizations, for various reasons, including a perception that these better reflect reality; 3D visualisations were also shown to be more effective in convincing respondents about the significance of sea level rise impacts. The results of this study provide valuable insights for local authorities to understand what may be needed to communicate messages related to climate change in an effective manner, ultimately contributing to enhancement of coastal resilience and climate adaptation.

Climate change is the biggest threat of the 21st century. Perception of the climate change risk is an important step towards coping with and adaptation to it. The perception of risk is influenced by numerous factors among them-risk communication. Successful communication of climate change risk, like any other environmental risk, hinges on many factors. Careful consideration of these factors when planning risk communication initiatives is crucial particularly in developing countries steeped in cultures, customs, traditional ecological knowledge, and poverty. This theoretical paper uses a traditional literature review and backward snowballing techniques to highlight the important factors that need to be considered when planning and implementing climate change risk communication exercises in rural communities in a developing country context. This chapter is crucial in the context of scientific findings that climate change adaptation tools-a form of decision support tool-are poorly designed to engage rural communities in adaptation efforts. A well designed climate change risk communication initiative represents an entry point for scientists and practitioners to engage with rural people on climate change adaptation.

The increasing pressure on water resources is due to continuously growing consumption, which itself results from demographic and economic developments and the effect of expected climate change. Therefore, action to encourage the more efficient and productive use of water is urgent. Water management needs to focus on regulating the use of this limited resource by multiple users; the allocation of water to non-agricultural users, in particular, is increasing steadily. Moreover, increased variability in climate regimes is expected to modify the volume, temporal and spatial distribution of water storage and fluxes, and therefore to affect the distribution, availability and sustainability of regional water resources. Irrigated agriculture is one of the sectors also facing new challenges. Given that water scarcity is expected to worsen in large agricultural production areas, one such challenge is how to maintain or increase sustainable agricultural production under growing water use restrictions. Improvements in agricultural water management should seek to conserve not only water but energy and soil, too, while still satisfying society’s relentless demand for high quality food and fiber crops, and livestock, aquatic and forest products. This work addresses the main problems related to this topic, illustrated with case studies from Europe and Asia.

Adaptation to climate change and sustainability encompasses several strategies as the agronomic by-products valorisation, transforming waste into resources, contributing to a most efficient use of land and resources and, simultaneously, to circular economy. This work aimed to study the effect of the rice husk (RH) incorporation on substrates in petunia, Petunia x hybrid, yield. The bioassay was carried out in 13 cm in diameter pots, randomly arranged, under greenhouse conditions, for 10 weeks. Four treatments were studied: (1) control, substrate without RH; (2) substrate with 10% RH; (3) substrate with 25% RH; and (4) substrate with 50% RH. There were four replicates, each consisting of five plants. Number of flower buds, aerial part diameter and length were evaluated weekly. At the end of the bioassay, aerial part and root weights, and substrate water retention capacity were evaluated. Results were submitted to One-Way ANOVA followed by the Tukey test, when significant differences were present. The obtained results suggest that the incorporation of a low-cost by-product of the rice processing industry—RH in soils with low drainage capacity may be a recommended practice promoting simultaneously the increase of crop production and the use of a low cost and widely available bio-waste, contributing this way to the circular economy premises, reducing wastes and targeting as well a more adapted agro-industry to a changing climate.

The impacts of climate change and climate variability on the water and agriculture sectors in Malawi prompted the Government to implement in 2005 an adaptation program, the Farm Input Subsidy Program (FISP), to support the production of maize, the staple food crop. This program has subsidised maize seed and fertilizer to support dryland smallholder maize production. This paper provides a robust, spatially explicit, analysis of the dependence of observed maize yield on climate and uses it to assess the significance of the impact of FISP on yields in Malawi. The analysis was conducted across three maize varieties by applying the GROWEST plant growth index model to monthly climate for eight agricultural production zones. The analysis shows that FISP has made a significant contribution to increased yield beyond the impact of variations in climate. This addresses the misconception that the increases in maize yield after 2005 were due only to favourable climate conditions. This misconception has fuelled debate about the efficacy of FISP and its eligibility for continued government financial support. It is envisaged that this analysis could assist the Government of Malawi in assessing the impacts of projected climate change on maize production and the viability of ongoing investment in FISP to support improvement in food security under a changing climate.

Agriculture has changed significantly during the last 30 years in Portugal. One of the main changes is related to agricultural abandonment, mainly driven by demographic dynamics on areas that are marginal in terms of productivity. Such trend affects mainly rainfed agriculture, and was significant in the inland Norte and Centro regions of Portugal between 1990 and 2010. By contrast, irrigated areas dedicated to agriculture are increasing. Considering a predicted reduction on water availability under future climatic scenarios, determined by the decrease in the amount of annual precipitation, it is necessary to set strategies to adapt agriculture to a new climatic context, considering both production and consumption/dietary trends. To do so, and using as case study the Centro Region of Portugal, this work aims to evaluate how the suitable area for agriculture might change under future climatic scenarios (RCP 4.5 and 8.5 scenarios for the two time-windows of 2041–2070 and 2071–2100), and identify measures that contribute to adapt agriculture to a new context. Such assessment is based on a modelling approach that aims to evaluate suitability to agriculture, which is set from soil properties (soil type and texture), topographic parameters (such as slope and land morphology), and climatic conditions (water deficit). The expected reduction on water availability under future climatic scenarios, combined with recent trends on agriculture, namely the reduction of rainfed agriculture and the increase of irrigated agriculture areas, points to an unsustainable situation. This is of great concern, once there is a match between areas where water deficit is predicted to increase more and areas where irrigated area is expanding today. Thus, specific adaptation strategies/policies are needed to revert/cope with such trends, which must be spatially explicit and locally meaningful. The implementation of such approaches might be oriented by results from assessment of predicted changes in terms of suitable area for agriculture, but also consider economic and dietary aspects, an exercise that we try to validate based on the conditions of the Centro Region of Portugal.

IPCC’s predicted rise in mean temperatures, increase in the frequency of summer heat waves and decrease in soil water availability for the Mediterranean regions will have an impact on foliar and fruit photosynthesis. But mitigation measures aiming reducing radiation absorption by the vine canopy may pose light limitations to grape berry photosynthesis. This work focused on the influence of the light level of the canopy microenvironment where clusters develop on the photosynthetic competence of grape berry tissues (exocarp and seed integument) throughout fruit growing season by imaging PAM fluorometry. Clusters from low (LL), medium (ML) and high light (HL) microclimates were sampled from green to mature stages. Both tissues showed high maximum quantum efficiency (F_v/F_m) and photosynthetic capacity (ETR_m) at the green stage, exocarp extending to mature stages while seed photosynthetic activity was more restricted to green stage. The light microclimate had a significant effect on the photosynthesis of both tissues but also in their photosynthetic phenotypes along the season. In LL, both tissues showed lower activity in all stages, higher susceptibility to photoinhibition and lack of response to short-term light acclimation; ML and HL grapes adjust their activity peaking at different light intensities, were more responsive to light changing conditions, recover better from high light. Overall, our results suggest that not only light/temperature stress conditions imposed by climate changes but also viticulture practices causing changes in canopy light microclimates may have significant impacts on grape berry photosynthesis and hence in fruit development and quality.

The adaptation of agriculture has been a priority since the advent of studies on climate change at the end of the last century. Today agriculture faces two concurrent challenges: adapting to the impacts of climate variability and change and feeding a growing world population. But responses to these issues generally do not coincide with the goal of climate change mitigation at global scale and ecosystem sustainability efforts at the local scale. This is analyzed in this article through a case study on adaptation to droughts in one of the main agricultural areas of the world, central Pampas in Argentina. Results from the analysis show that current adaptation practices do not eliminate yield variability especially to climatic extremes. Therefore, extra measures for reducing the agricultural productivity gap is not always justified against the possible social and environmental costs of such actions, reinforcing the necessity for new approaches on the adaptation of agriculture to climate variability and change and to provide, at the same time, for healthy food and environments for humanity. Here, a focus on the resilience of the socio-ecological systems to climatic shocks is considered as complementary to more conventional adaptation practices when attempting to increase agricultural production but within the limits of the sustainable development goals.

Climate variability strongly determines agricultural productivity, further causing important economic and social impacts. In a context of global climate changes, the continuous enhancement of agricultural production in the coming years is a major challenge for plant science research. Coffee, one of the most important agricultural commodities worldwide, is grown in more than 80 countries in the tropical region. Several estimates point to a strong reduction on both coffee yields and suitable areas in a near future, mostly related to predicted rising temperature, but also due to changes in intra- and inter-annual rainfall amounts and distributions. Nonetheless, recent findings from our team has shown that the coffee plant is more resilient that usually accepted, and that the negative impacts of rising temperature, at physiological and biochemical levels, were strongly mitigated by enhanced air [CO₂], which is considered one of the promoting agents of temperature rise. Also, the identification of ecophysiological and molecular traits that can promote plant acclimation to warming, in particular those related to the C-assimilation pathway, would foster the selection of more adapted/tolerant genotypes. In this context, this work aims at envisage leaf physiological responses in Coffea spp. subjected to supra-optimal temperatures, increased [CO₂], and water shortage conditions, contributing to this crop sustainability.

Many insect species are able to cause important damage in agriculture, forestry and human health due to their ability to feed on plants and animals tissues or transmit fungi and other diseases. Entomologists have long recognised that periods of atypical weather conditions, such as drought, excessive precipitation or unusually hot or cold weather, have great impact on insect development. Understanding the effects of climate on ecological processes has become increasingly important in entomological research as a result of global warming, which appears to be affecting their geographic ranges and population dynamics. In Mediterranean ecosystems, pine shoot beetle, Tomicus destruens Woll, and pine processionary moth, Thaumetopoa pityocampa (Denis & Schiff), are examples of species that origin problems to man. Tomicus destruens is a phytophagus insect responsible for several damages on maritime pine (Pinus pinaster Aiton) stands during its feeding on needles and its capacity to inoculate fungi and other decaying biotic agents. Thaumetopoea pityocampa is also responsible for damages in P. pinaster stands and can provoke strong allergic reactions due the presence of urticains hairs. Both species have a physiological response to the temperature variation, which is observed in the life cycle duration and in the mortality rate. The present study aims to highlight the effect of global change/global warming in the bioecology of those Mediterranean species and their implication in forest productivity and human health.

Urbanization has become one of the main challenges of modern societies. Therefore, transforming urban areas to sustainable environments is strategic for mitigating and adapting to climate change. Florianópolis—the case of this study—is a South American city that in the next 30 years will double its population, the city already suffers from bad urban management, therefore solutions that combine social, environmental and economic aspects are necessary for achieving sustainable development. The city has begun some programs for urban agriculture and greater efforts are possible. Today, urban agriculture can provide ways of increasing community integration, decreasing greenhouse gases emissions, improving the urban waste management and revitalizing the local economy. This paper highlights urban agriculture practices applied in different cities of the world and how they relate with the Sustainable Development Goals, promoting an exchange of ideas and experiences among researchers, the community and the local government.

Climate change and increased floods events are a major challenge for cities in the developing world. African cities face greater challenges having to deal with fewer management capacities simultaneously with increased intensity of climate related events. This paper presents an assessment of measures employed in construction of residential buildings and the impact of recurrent flooding events. Floods adaptation strategies take a central role here and they are assessed through empirical analysis of adaptation practices at household levels in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The emphasis is on key features of adaptation such as: knowledge of building technicians and technocrats, regulatory bodies, forms of buildings’ contract and the relationship between different key actors. The paper highlights several recommendations to improve the quality of buildings in flood-prone areas, these include forming binding contracts among parties, recognition of informal actors and processes, appropriate building construction as well as storm water drainage systems, buildings’ retrofitting as well as identifying maladaptive approaches. The paper concludes with the significance for urban design and policies in climate change adaptation in rapid growing urban environments and calls for guiding fragmented and adhoc practices to increase the robustness of different forms of settlements in East Africa.

Water resources management in the Yellow River basin, China, is facing a paradigmatic change in consequence of an unbalanced supply and demand due to an increased demand for water from non-agricultural sectors and a reduced supply due to climate change that reduced precipitation and increased climatic demand. The problem is aggravated by low equity of spatial water allocation in the basin. A supply reduction in the upstream basin area aims to control the water scarcity conditions occurring in the middle and lower reaches of the basin. Forecasted scenarios on water resources allocation and use for agriculture in the upper reaches of the Yellow River basin point out for the need to reduce irrigation water withdrawal and increasing land and water productivity. This paper focus on the Hetao Irrigation District, Inner Mongolia, in upper reaches of Yellow River, where sustainable water saving irrigation is being implemented in response to global changes occurring in the Yellow River basin. That implementation requires technological adaption referring to modernization of canal water conveyance and delivery, which refers to upgrading the hydraulic regulation and control structures, reducing operational runoff wastages, and improving system management. At field level, modern irrigation technologies adapted to local conditions are under implementation. The paper focus on an application to Dengkou area.

At present there are 18 emission trading schemes (ETS) operating in the world. At the COP21 in Paris a clear path for climate and energy policies has been outlined over the coming decades: states have committed themselves to reach zero net emissions by the second half of this century and to maintain the average global temperature rise well below 2 °C, with an additional effort to stay within 1.5 °C. 191 countries, whose emissions cover 98.9% of global greenhouse gas emissions, have already submitted their INDCs/NDCs. The contribution of this paper is twofold. First, it presents a review of the existing ETS and the incumbent ones, like the Chinese national scheme. The ETS currently existing are summarized in a table and than described. Moreover, an overview of the countries which are planning to start new cap-and-trade systems is provided, as well as a table showing which countries included a reference to an ETS in their INDC/NDC. Second, it offers a comprehensive overview about what the countries included in their NDCs about national ETS and international carbon markets. In fact, many developing countries are now considering to access carbon finance to fulfil part of their commitments. But in order for them to receive this kind of finance, and therefore to be able to achieve their climate targets, there has to be a demand for credits. For this reason, understanding whether there will be this match between demand and offer for carbon credits will lead to more efficient choices in policy making, for both sides of the market and thus contribute to the achievement of the Paris Agreement.

According to the Paris Agreement, the global including both developed and developing countries has responsibility not only to mitigate greenhouse gas emission but also to enhance capacity of climate change adaptation. For the response to climate change, developing countries have requested technical and financial support to developed countries. Water resource management is one of the crucial issues on adapting to climate change. A number of developing countries have suffered from water shortage for agricultural and domestic withdrawal, asking for technology assistance to improve water quality and water supply at local level. In this paper, adaptation technologies in water sector demanded by developing countries were provided by reviewing Technology Needs Assessment (TNA) reports that 79 developing countries submitted to the UNFCCC. Considering national indicators such as GDP growth rate and the Human Development Index (HDI), technology needs from developing countries were analysed. Moreover, this paper identified technology groups in water sector developed by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in South Korea that could be transferred and implemented to developing countries. By comparing technology needs from developing countries with the number of associated SMEs and carrying out expert survey, promising technologies in water sector that SMEs in South Korea have relatively high competitiveness in technology transfer to developing countries were determined.