In the President of Malawi’s state of the nation address to the parliament on the 8th of February the President re-confirmed Malawi’s commitment to integrating climate change mitigation and adaptation into development planning and reinforced the significance of the PEI supported National Environment and Climate Change Communication Strategy (NECCCS) in raising awareness around the issue among Malawians. To illustrate this commitment the president has supported the creation of a new Ministry solely responsible for climate change and environment management and the development of a new climate change policy to commence soon to guide stakeholders in climate change impact, adaptation and mitigation measures.
Mainstreaming adaptation into development planning has been promoted as an effective way to respond to climate change. The expected benefits include avoided policy conflicts, reduced risks and vulnerability, greater efficiency compared with managing adaptation separately, and leveraging the much larger financial flows in sectors affected by climate risks than the amounts available for financing adaptation separately. This report reviews the main approaches proposed and lessons learned from relevant experiences in the Asia-Pacific region. A regional forum convened by the Adaptation Knowledge Platform and its partners, held at the United Nations Conference Centre in Bangkok in 2010, provided the starting point for this analysis.
The project development objective is to enhance adaptation to climate change in agriculture and irrigation water management practices through awareness-raising, institutional and capacity strengthening, and demonstration activities in the 3H basin. The reallocation is necessary to adjust for the appreciation of the Chinese currency over the US dollar since the time of project effectiveness, and to shift resources away from slow progressing activities towards faster moving activities.
To prepare for PEP 15, this ‘mapping’ exercise aims to survey what environmental mainstreaming (EM) activities are being undertaken or being planned by PEP members, to facilitate exchange information, ideas and experiences.
The results of the survey will also help to identify possible sources of information and materials for the development of a “Sourcebook on EM” being prepared collaboratively by IIED, UNDP-UNEP PEI, the CBD Secretariat, AusAID, and potentially a number of other PEP members.
Download the survey report (275 KB, PDF)
Adaptation to climate change has become an important policy priority in the international negotiations on climate change in recent years. However, it has yet to become a major policy issue within the developing countries, especially amongst the LDCs (who will be amongst the most vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change). The experience cited in this report on two LDC countries, namely Bangladesh in Asia and Mali in Africa, shows that although much has been achieved in terms of describing and analysing vulnerability to climate change and identifying potential adaptation options, there remains much more to be done in terms of mainstreaming adaptation to climate change within the national policy making processes in those countries.
This key sheet is part of a series of awareness raising tools developed by Irish Aid to accompany its Environment Policy for Sustainable Development. Key strategies for implementing the policy are:
i) mainstreaming, where the environment is recognised as a critical part of sustainable development and is taken into account in all policies, programmes, activities and funding decisions; and
ii) partnership, where Irish Aid works with national governments, multilateral organisations, international agencies and civil society organisations to contribute to sustainable development.
The PEI delivers financial and technical support for sustained capacity building to governments and other actors who take on the challenge of mainstreaming poverty-environment linkages into national development processes. For example, the PEI assists planning agencies to consider poverty-environment linkages, including climate change, in formulating economic and development policies, and helps environment agencies to engage with these policy processes more effectively. The PEI also supports civil society to engage in planning processes, making sure the voice of the poor is heard.
As part of its contribution to the Environment for Europe meeting in Belgrade in October 2007, the World Bank has undertaken a review of the Europe and Central Asia Region with the objective of raising awareness among policy makers of the need to accelerate and enhance implementation of environmentally sustainable practices in the agricultural and forestry sectors in SEE and EECCA, and to provide recommendations for doing so. The process of incorporating considerations of environmental sustainability and resource conservation into sector policies, strategies, programs, and investments will be referred to as integration or mainstreaming.
This report represents Volume I of the study and provides a synthesis of major regional issues and trends, with broad recommendations for future directions and priorities. It is based on an original set of 21 in-depth Country Reviews prepared by the team with the support of local specialists in each country.
A four-day regional workshop on Mainstreaming Climate Change Adaptation into Developmental Planning was held at ADBI, Tokyo from 14 to 17 April 2009 to discuss mainstreaming opportunities in the most vulnerable sectors of agriculture and water, with the focus on developing countries and small island states.
Making the Economic Case: A Primer on the Economic Arguments for Mainstreaming Poverty-Environment Linkages into National Development Planning
This new primer provides guidance on presenting evidence about the economic, development and poverty reduction benefits of the environment to public sector decision-makers, so as to justify and promote “environmental investment.” This primer is designed to help interested countries and governments engaged in the environmental mainstreaming challenge to succeed in making their case, ensure that they have the evidence to back it up, and identify entry points to engage the attention of economic and development decision-makers and to enter into meaningful dialogue with them.