Toolkit for Integrating Climate Change Adaptation into Development Projects

Organizational

General Information:

Author: CARE, International, Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD)

Year of publication: 2010

Available languages: English, Spanish

Details of Assessment:

Type of assessment: Comprehensive impact and risk assessment

Details: Toolkit set out to aid integration of adaptation, disaster risk reducition mesasures into the policy or project cycle

Format of assessment: Guideline

Details: The toolkit proposes two tools (Policy Cycle & Project Document Checklist) to incorporate considerations for risk management and adaptation into their policy or project

Estimated costs for conducting: No information

Estimated duration of assessment: No information

To be carried out by whom: Multiple actors

Details: Policy-makers and project planners in either the political sphere and/or within development practice

Institutional scale of use: Multiple (see details)

Details: Global, national, local, regional or sectoral

Assesment to be used by which target audience: State level decision makers

Output: Others (see details)

Details: Reports, case studies, vulnerability analysis, project cycle diagram

Methodological

Coverage & Methodology:

Region of origin: Europe, North America

Developed by which sector: Science, Development cooperation

Applied in practice: Yes

Geographic coverage in analysis: Worldwide

Potential geographic coverage: Worldwide

Sectors covered: Agriculture, Livelihood sector, Water sector, Financial sector, Biodiversity, Forestry, Fishery, Infrastructure, Not sector specific

Details: Climate-sensitive development policy and practice (incl. all related sectors, e.g. WASH, agriculture, transport, infrastructure, etc.)

Method used: Other (see details)

Description of methodology: Project planners are given two options on how to use the toolkit, either they use the step-by-step guideline for the project cycle if still at the beginning of the agenda-setting of the project or a Project Document Checklist. These are qualitative measures. The former is based on a project cycle diagram.

Risk framework used: No explicit use of risk framework

Risk components incorporated: Vulnerability, exposure, hazard

Hazards and impacts considered in the assessment: Changing precipitation patterns, Changing temperature patterns, Loss of biodiversity, Extreme temperatures, Extreme rainfall, Drought, Flood, Wildfire, Vulcanic eruption, Earthquake, Tsunami

Source of required data: Secondary (available data is used)

Details: All relevant (incl. historical, local) climate data depending on data availability; the toolkit offers also a "climate context monitoring tool" to regularly review changes in the climate context during the lifecycle of a project

Temporal scale: Forward looking

Participatory elements: Partly

Details: This toolkit requires policy makers and project planners to implement climate-sensitive development projects; and uses an extensive set of case studies and participatory fieldwork in which they have implemented/analysed different adaptation measures undertaken in the Global South.

Consideration of interconnectedness and -dependencies of risks: Yes

Details: All climate-related risks, but also risks related vulnerability to climate change, including poverty, gender and marginalisation

Adressing uncertainty: Yes

Details: Consideration of uncertainty in climate projections and prioritization of win-win options; monitoring of uncertainties over project implementation

Scope of assessment: Identification of risks, assessment of impacts, identification of adaptation options

Details: Once risks are assessed, project planners can integrate adequate risk-management and adaptation measures into their policy/project. The toolkit offers a guideline, case studies and recommendations in this regard.

Relevance for losses and damages:

Economic/Non-Economic losses incorporated: Both

Details: Economic factors are referred to as a needed 'variable' in analysis, but economic losses are not specified further. Stronger focus on non-economic losses.

Applicability for entire risk spectrum (from extreme weather events to slow onset processes): Yes

Applicability

Recommendations for Adaptation measures included in Climate Risk Assessment: Yes

Usefulness for political purposes: NAPs, local action plans, etc.

Applied by whom: CARE, IISD

Open access: Yes