Policies

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Description: "The Support to Rural Livelihoods and Climate Change Adaptation in the Himalaya (Himalica) initiative aims to support poor and vulnerable mountain communities in the Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH) to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Our initiative is supported by the European Union. Himalica is an integral part of ICIMOD?s Regional Programme on Adaptation to Climate Change, which has dual objectives to enhance resilience and support adaptation by vulnerable communities in the HKH. Its expected key results are: To enhance the capacities of national and regional stakeholders for improving livelihood development through more sustainable and efficient use of natural resources and the protection of the environment in the HKH. To reduce poverty among mountain people through increased resilience by unlocking new livelihood opportunities, and promoting more equitable approaches to development..."
Source/publisher: ICIMOD
Date of entry/update: 2017-12-09
Grouping: Websites/Multiple Documents
Category: Policies
Language: English
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Individual Documents

Description: Executive summary: "• Failure to move away from fossil fuels, especially coal, may damage the international reputation of the ASEAN countries. Counter to the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) which the ASEAN countries themselves have formulated under the Paris Agreement, the region?s coal-based electricity generation capacity has been expanding rapidly. This may also lead to a large number of stranded coal assets in the future. • All the ASEAN member states have ratified the Kyoto Protocol and signed the Paris Agreement, and nine out of ten have also ratified the Paris Agreement. At least half of the ASEAN member states reacted publicly to President Donald Trump?s announcement that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Agreement, criticizing it and/or reiterating their own country?s commitment to climate action. ASEAN has identified climate change as a priority issue since the 2007 ASEAN Summit in Singapore. This declared commitment of ASEAN and its member states to international climate policy can provide a good foundation for joint regional climate policy formulation and action. • However, despite their positive stances on climate change, most ASEAN countries have not taken on prominent roles in international climate policy. As a result, they remain takers rather than makers in international climate politics. ASEAN as an organization stands to gain or lose status by following up or not following up its member states on climate issues, and by member states succeeding or failing to meet their NDCs. The ASEAN Secretariat can fulfill an important function by promoting a team spirit around this status drive. • ASEAN could formulate a regionally determined contribution (RDC) for ASEAN by adding up the nationally determined contributions of the ASEAN member states. This could help create a team spirit related to the NDCs, as well as possible peer review/pressure. • ASEAN could implement several other concrete measures to energize its work on climate change: maintain a focus on the NDCs of its member states under the Paris Agreement; ensure that current and future initiatives under the ASEAN Plan of Action for Energy Cooperation (APAEC) are ambitious and detailed as to the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions; highlight the vulnerability of Southeast Asia to climate change by publishing and sharing relevant analysis; advocate improved disclosure and reporting of the financial risks of climate change to governments and investors; put climate change high on the agenda of every ASEAN summit; involve and connect relevant civil society and academic organizations across Southeast Asia; facilitate regional electricity trade through the expansion of the ASEAN Power Grid for better handling of the intermittency of renewable energy; promote the accelerated phase- out of fossil-fuel subsidies—which is also a prerequisite for developing trans-border electricity trade in Southeast Asia. • To be successful, climate-related initiatives will need to consider the ASEAN way of conducting business, with its emphasis on national sovereignty, non-interference and consensus in decision-making. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has set an example of common but differentiated capabilities and responsibilities, further developed with the Paris Agreement?s concept of nationally determined contributions, which are precisely that—nationally determined. This approach is highly compatible with the traditional ASEAN approach to interstate cooperation. • ASEAN may be experiencing a problem of collective action on international climate policy: the member states are looking to ASEAN to adopt a stronger role, whereas the ASEAN Secretariat looks to the member states to take the lead and give clear signals. A first step towards solving this conundrum could be for the ASEAN Secretariat to further expand and strengthen its climate policy staffing—which will require funding and capacity enhancement."
Creator/author:
Source/publisher: Norwegian Institute of International Affairs and Myanmar Institute of Strategic and International Studies
2017-11-06
Date of entry/update: 2018-03-09
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language:
Format : pdf
Size: 3.74 MB
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Description: Abstract: "Global economic change and policy interventions are driving transitions from long-fallow swidden (LFS) systems to alternative land uses in Southeast Asia?s uplands. This study presents a systematic review of how these transitions impact upon livelihoods and ecosystem services in the region. Over 17 000 studies published between 1950 and 2015 were narrowed, based on relevance and quality, to 93 studies for further analysis. Our analysis of land-use transitions from swidden to intensified cropping systems showed several outcomes: more households had increased overall income, but these benefits came at significant cost such as reductions of customary practice, socio-economic wellbeing, livelihood options, and staple yields. Examining the effects of transitions on soil properties revealed negative impacts on soil organic carbon, cation-exchange capacity, and aboveground carbon. Taken together, the proximate and underlying drivers of the transitions from LFS to alternative land uses, especially intensified perennial and annual cash cropping, led to significant declines in pre-existing livelihood security and the ecosystem services supporting this security. Our results suggest that policies imposing landuse transitions on upland farmers so as to improve livelihoods and environments have been misguided; in the context of varied land uses, swidden agriculture can support livelihoods and ecosystem services that will help buffer the impacts of climate change in Southeast Asia." Keywords: *Alternative land uses *Ecosystem services * Livelihood security *Shifting cultivation *Southeast Asia
Creator/author: Wolfram H. Dressler, David Wilson, Jessica Clendenning, Rob Cramb, Rodney Keenan, Sango Mahanty, Thilde Bech Bruun, Ole Mertz
Source/publisher: The Royal Swedish Acadamy of Sciences, Crossmark
2016-10-01
Date of entry/update: 2016-11-20
Grouping: Individual Documents
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 1.78 MB
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Description: Description: This report presents the methodology and lessons learned from a climate change adaptation study conducted under the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) Core Environment Program. The study yielded a framework and methodology for assessing climate vulnerability and adaptation options for rural communities in the GMS. It was conducted in biodiversity conservation corridors in the Lao People?s Democratic Republic, Thailand, and Viet Nam during 2011?2012. The report introduces the framework, describes how it was applied, presents major results, and makes recommendations for future improvement... Recommendations: This study contributes to building understanding of the risks that Greater Mekong Subregion rural communities face with changing climatic conditions and of appropriate adaptation options. Lessons from this study can inform future research. The following eight recommendations suggest ways in which the study approach and methodology can be improved and scaled up. * Strengthen socioeconomic analyses * Apply multiple climate scenarios * Integrate community-based adaptation and ecosystem-based adaptation approaches * Improve participatory approaches * Integrate site specific crop model simulations where possible * Integrate an economic analysis * Analyze the broader policy and planning environment * Upscale to regional studies... Contents: Executive Summary; Introduction; Agriculture, Rural Communities, and Climate Change in the GMS Study Sites; Framework for Assessing Climate Change Vulnerability and Adaptation in Rural Communities; Synthesis of Study Results; Recommendations; Next Steps; Appendixes.
Source/publisher: Asian Development Bank (ADB)
2014-05-00
Date of entry/update: 2014-06-16
Grouping: Individual Documents
Category: Policies
Language: English
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Description: Report on the Experts Regional Consultation for Transboundary Biodiversity Management and Climate Change Adaptation.....Foreword: "The Brahmaputra-Salween Landscape (BSL) is a biodiversity-rich transboundary landscape that stretches across China, India, and Myanmar in the eastern Himalayas. Located at the confluence of Indo-Malayan, Palaeoarctic, and Sino-Japanese realms, this landscape harbours a rich mixture of floral and faunal elements from the three bio- geographic regions and thus has a high degree of endemism. The landscape hosts several well-known protected areas such as Namdapha National Park and Tiger Reserve (Arunachal Pradesh, India), Hkakabo Razi National Park (Kachin State, Myanmar), and Gaoligongshan National Nature Reserve (Yunnan Province, China) that share the contiguous habitat of several plant and animal species of global conservation significance. Besides harbouring an extremely rich biodiversity, this landscape is home to diverse ethnic communities with unique socio-cultural traditions. However, there are numerous environmental and socioeconomic discrepancies impacting the existence of both the region?s biodiversity and its people. Striking a balance between traditional resource use patterns, globalization, sustainable development, and biodiversity conservation in the region is the challenge at hand. While there are global policy instruments such as the CBD to guide national biodiversity strategies and action plans, it is imperative for the countries in the region to join hands and combine individual efforts, resources, expertise, and knowledge to produce a regional outcome for the shared landscape. Landscape complexes, like the BSL and several others across the Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region, should be viewed as platforms to instigate cumulative regional action towards the long-term sustainability of entire landscapes and the environmental and socioeconomic elements within them. In addition, the BSL even creates an opportunity to establish strategic landscape connectivity between the HKH and the Greater Mekong region further east. The regional Experience-Sharing Consultation on the Landscape Approach to Biodiversity Conservation and Management in the Eastern Himalayas, held in Tengchong County, Yunnan Province, China, in 2009, laid the groundwork for a dialogue on a regional conservation initiative for the BSL. The second consultation on the BSL organized in Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar, 21-23 December 2011 again brought together ICIMOD and partner institutions from the three member countries to reflect on the outcomes of the consultation in Tengchong and to work out a framework for future programmatic action. The consultation was successful in producing a draft framework to define the long-term vision, goals, objectives, and a strategic action plan to facilitate both national and regional biodiversity management in the BSL. The strategic framework is intended to build the capacity of national institutions and individuals for research and knowledge development and for knowledge sharing as well as for designing management interventions on the ground to help communities enhance their socioeconomic resilience to climate change and other drivers of change."
Source/publisher: ICIMOD (International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development)
2011-12-23
Date of entry/update: 2014-06-12
Grouping: Individual Documents
Category: Policies
Language: English
Format : pdf
Size: 858.43 KB
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