Photo: Basri Marzuki/Nurphoto via Getty Images.
A volunteer ties a newly-grown mangrove to a stake on Teluk Palu Beach, Indonesia. A science writer asks, Is international funding shortchanging nature-based climate solutions like this?
Here’s something to think about. As we try to remedy damage to the environment, are we overlooking the power of small steps that add up and instead favoring big-deal engineering approaches?
Fred Pearce at YaleEnvironment360 suggests we are indeed. “On the low-lying northern shore of the Indonesian island of Java,” he writes, “the sea has invaded a kilometer inland in places in recent years, engulfing whole communities and vast expanses of rice paddy. But villagers are fighting back against further advances by erecting brushwood barriers in the mud to help the natural regeneration of mangroves.
“This innovative nature-based response to rising sea levels and worsening storms, sponsored by the Indonesian government and the Dutch-based environmental group Wetlands International, could be scaled up across Asia. Within a decade it could be helping at least 10 million people in similar situations to protect and restore their denuded coastlines — all at a fraction of the cost of sea walls, says Jane Madgwick, CEO of Wetlands International.
“But it can do that only if local projects are developed and the financing secured. And so far, she says, progress has been slow. …
“There are a ‘growing number of analyses and reviews of the effectiveness of habitats as natural defenses,’ writes Siddharth Narayan, now of East Carolina University. Hundreds of local projects to restore ecosystems on coastlines and mountains, in river valleys, forests, and grassy plains, have proved their worth in using restored nature to boost the resilience of millions of people to the ravages of onrushing climate change. Most are cheaper and more effective than any engineering alternatives, with more spinoff benefits for ecosystems and fewer downsides.
But the political will and funding that could turn pilot projects for nature-based climate adaptation into policy norms benefitting hundreds of millions more people are still largely absent.
“Most nature-climate activities ‘are currently not funded,’ says Ebony Holland, climate researcher at the London-based International Institute for Environment and Development. …
“Nature-based climate adaptation remains the poor relation of climate finance. First, that’s because private investors, philanthropists, aid agencies, and development banks are usually happier to pay for climate ‘mitigation’ projects that curb emissions of planet-warming gases than for helping communities adapt to climate change. Overall, adaptation of all kinds has so far attracted less than a quarter, and by some measures only 5 percent, of international climate funding, according to Barbara Buchner of the Climate Policy Initiative, a San Francisco-based think tank.
“And second because policymakers and funders still mostly prefer engineering solutions. Holland found that less than 10 percent of funding for climate adaptation in the least-developed nations — which are usually the most vulnerable — went into projects that harnessed nature. The remaining 90 percent ‘poured concrete.’ …
“Overall, the UN Environment Programme and the Global Commission on Adaptation, an international body set up by the Dutch government, both estimate that about 1 percent of total climate finance has so far gone toward such nature-based adaptation projects.
“Governments in Glasgow promised to close the funding gap between adaptation and mitigation by doubling adaptation funding. [In April] climate finance chiefs from leading funding governments met in Lahti, Finland, to discuss how to achieve this. But official reports of the meeting record little discussion of the need for more nature-based projects. Instead, the main topic was to ‘seek ways to give the private sector a bigger role in adaptation finance.’
“This could be a step back for nature since, in the past, private financiers have been even less keen on nature-based solutions than public-sector donors, says Madgwick.
“The casebook of successful nature-based adaptation is growing fast. Perhaps best documented are the benefits from restoring coastal ecosystems such as mangroves to protect coastal communities from storm waves, tidal surges, and rising sea levels, which are all increasing as climate change gathers pace.
“The world has lost half its mangroves along shorelines, but those that remain are protecting some 18 million people and several tens of billion dollars’ worth of property from flooding every year, says Michael Beck, a marine scientist at the University of California Santa Cruz. Their importance can only grow. Unlike sea walls, mangroves appear to keep pace with rising sea levels, self-seeding inland to maintain their barriers against storms and tidal surges and nurturing marine fisheries.
“The island nations and river deltas of Asia would benefit most from their restoration, but a study by the World Bank and The Nature Conservancy found great potential too in African countries, including Guinea, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Madagascar, and Guinea-Bissau.
“The restoration of other coastal ecosystems can be equally effective. A review by Narayan of 52 such projects around the world found that salt marshes, sea grasses, and coral reefs all reduced the height of storm waves at typically between a half and one-fifth of the cost of sea walls. Yet scaling up is failing to keep pace with the success of pilot projects. …
“In parts of the Panchase mountain region of Nepal, a favorite with foreign trekkers, the restoration of wetlands and community ponds is protecting local communities against both worsening floods and droughts, while improving soils, revitalizing biodiversity, and encouraging tourism. It is part of a three-nation project known as the Mountain Ecosystems-based Adaptation Program devised over a decade ago by UN agencies and implemented in remote corners of Nepal, Uganda, and Peru.
“But despite ambitious plans for new projects in neighboring Bhutan, Kenya, and Colombia, scaling up remains elusive. Communities in most mountain regions stressed by climate change are plagued by dam projects that extract their water for use downstream, rather than being helped to conserve their water and improve their climate resilience. …
“[Nathalie Seddon of the Nature-Based Solutions Initiative, an interdisciplinary research center at the University of Oxford] says nature-based adaptation can simultaneously help meet the three great challenges of our time: responding to climate change, protecting biodiversity, and ensuring human well-being. But right now, the opportunities for delivering these synergies are still going begging.”
More at YaleEnvironment360, here. No firewall.
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