VULNERABLE COMMUNITIES: GETTING THEIR NEEDS & KNOWLEDGE INTO CLIMATE CHANGE POLICY – WOMEN

 Direct Link to Full 4-PAGE 2015 Document:

http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/17328IIED.pdf?

Poor and marginalised communities across the global South are hard hit by climate change. Their voices must be heard by policymakers, planners, researchers and donors involved in climate change negotiations and other global processes. Indeed, any deal agreed at the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate  Change (UNFCCC) will need to address vulnerable communities’ priorities and value their knowledge if viable national, regional and local adaptation strategies are to be implemented. This briefing highlights six tried and tested strategies for overcoming the barriers to community involvement and for ensuring due emphasis to poor and marginalised people’s own adaptation needs and ideas for potential solutions.

Vulnerable communities often lead their lives in a way that has value both now and in a climate constrained future. For example, pastoralists and traditional farmers spread risk over time and space to increase resilience.8 Working with nature as opposed to against it is a basic requirement of any climate adaptation action, and it is usually local communities who know how to do this best. Local approaches should form the basis of climate adaptation planning and decision making. Adaptation must start with the needs and experiences of people who depend on natural resources and develop from ‘bottom-up’ approaches through to national and international levels. Adaptation will only work if vulnerable people are included. Vulnerable communities — which are found not just in the lowest-income countries — need opportunities to build on and share their knowledge, and they need support to undertake participatory research and strengthen their own traditional knowledge systems for adaptation. Parties to any climate deal at UNFCCC COP21 should be required to ensure the active participation of their vulnerable communities, including indigenous people and women, in international negotiations and national adaptation.