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Mauritania has launched its National Adaptation Plan (NAP) process, followed by a two-day capacity building workshop held by the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development.

Climate Change & Security

Humanity faces major challenges, be it war, poverty or disease. The special characteristic of climate change is that, by making ecological and economic systems more fragile, it makes all these problems harder to solve. For this reason, climate change has been described as a ‘threat multiplier’.

“Farmers always think with their eyes,” goes the saying. For communities living according to when, or whether, the rains come, it is practical solutions — not words — that count.

Practicality certainly counts in Darfur, a region of Sudan where reduced rainfall has produced a steady southward march of the Sahara desert. The reduced rainfall is itself a product of erratic and varied weather patterns caused by climate change.

When the ports of Mozambique come to a standstill, the whole country pays a price. In the city of Nacala on the eastern coast, new weather extremes are eroding shorelines and washing mud into the harbor, bringing all activity to a standstill.

“Climate change is now a reality. It’s not the past. It’s the present and the future,” said Momade Amade, an advisor to the city’s mayor.

Abu Dhabi, UAE –The Global Adaptation Network held its 2nd Forum last March. Convened in UAE, the event brought to light various issues in adaptation and constituted the first event to contribute to the Talanoa Dialogue, an ongoing global discourse on climate change. Since then, the Forum has been feeding into climate policy on a global scale, and last month, the UNFCCC’s Bonn Climate Conference used findings from the event to enrich its own discussions and negotiations. 

Bonn, Germany - The UN’s latest round of climate negotiations took place last month, and the international adaptation community has been watching closely. 193 governments came together in Bonn, Germany, to reinforce their ambitions to fight climate change. In preparation, the Global Adaptation Network (GAN) hosted a critical expert meeting on adaptation.

During the Bonn Climate Conference last November, the audience were captivated by the words of Timoci and Shalvi, Fiji's youngest climate ambassadors. Their stories brought to life the devastating effects of climate change, and urged leaders to take ambitious climate action to ensure a sustainable and prosperous future. 

The Global Adaptation Network has been working to expand the Talanoa Dialogue, a form of participatory and inclusive discussion on climate change, aiming to share experiences, ideas and skills through storytelling. 

• Scientists say reducing carbon emissions is no longer enough to stem the effects of climate change.

Climate change adaptation in Indonesia will in large part focus on flood and drought prevention, and food and water security in relation to this. Some of the adaptation strategies that will be of most benefit to Indonesia include infrastructure reinforcement to gain resilience and robustness when faced with floods or droughts, the establishment of early warning systems, sustainable and adaptive farming practices and disaster insurance.

Bangladeshi farmers are preventing their lands from flooding by building floating gardens made of water hyacinth and bamboo, a new documentary shows. The film won the prestigious Best Short Film award at the New York WILD Film Festival last week. Mongabay interviewed Alizé Carrère, the cultural anthropologist behind the film, and the transcript can be found here. See the trailer below:

Rotterdam, 10 May 2016 – The cost of adapting to climate change in developing countries could rise to between $280 and $500 billion per year by 2050, a figure that is four to five times greater than previous estimates, according to a new United Nations Environment (UNEP) report.

Marrakech, 15 November 2016 - Developed countries should do all they can to increase and accelerate their support to developing nations trying to adapt to the damaging impacts of climate change, UN Environment said today during the latest round of climate talks.

Under the Paris Agreement, wealthy nations have pledged to mobilize $100 billion a year by 2020 to help developing countries reduce greenhouse gas emissions (mitigation) and adapt to rising temperatures, and to boost that figure from 2025.

Keith Alverson, Chief of Climate Change Adaptation and Terrestrial Ecosystems at UNEP talks about the organisation's work on climate change adaptation. He talks about several of the projects UNEP has focused on adaptation including their Global Adaptation Network which aims to assist countries to share best practices and their work assisting countries to attain funding for adaptation. He also talks about the importance of ecosystem-based adaptation and the role it can play in increasing the effectiveness of some of the more concrete adaptation methods -- such as dams or sea walls.