Smallholder farmer cropping decisions related to climate variability across multiple regions

A long history of household-level research has provided important local-level insights into climate adaptation strategies in the agricultural sector. It remains unclear to what extent these strategies are generalizable or vary across regions. In this study we ask about three potential key factors influencing farming households’ ability to adapt: access to weather information, household and agricultural production-related assets, and participation in local social institutions. We use a 12-country data set from sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia to explore the links between these three potential drivers of agricultural change and the likelihood that farmers made farm-associated changes, such as adopting improved crop varieties, increasing fertilizer use, investing in improved land management practices, and changing the timing of agricultural activities. We find evidence that access to weather information, assets, and participation in social institutions are associated with households that have reported making farming changes in recent years, although these results vary across countries and types of practices. Understanding these drivers and outcomes of farm-associated changes across different socio-economic and environmental conditions is critical for ongoing dialogues for climate-resilient strategies and policies for increasing the adaptive capacity of smallholders under climate change.     

Harnessing scientific and local knowledge to face climate change in small-scale fisheries

Small-scale fisheries in developing regions are particularly vulnerable to climate change, but the assessment of climate-induced changes and impacts are often hampered by the data poor-situation of these social-ecological systems. Based on 40 years of scientific and local ecological knowledge, we provide a coherent narrative about the effects of a marine hotspot of climate change on a small-scale fishery across different geographical and temporal scales. We applied a mixed-methods approach to assess biophysical changes, social-ecological impacts, and the incremental spectrum of actions implemented at multiple levels to increase the adaptive capacity of a small-scale clam fishery. The warming hotspot here analyzed was the fastest-warming region in the South Atlantic Ocean. Long-term changes in wind intensity and direction were also noticeable at a regional scale. Both sea surface temperature and winds showed a clear shifting pattern in the late 1990 s. These climate-related stressors determined ecosystem and targeted population changes (e.g. clam mass mortalities, slow stock recovery rates after ecological shocks, habitat narrowing), and favored harmful algal bloom-forming organisms. Climate-induced drivers also affected the human component of the social-ecological system, preventing fishers from securing a fulltime livelihood and limiting the fishery economic potential. Adaptive responses at multiple levels provided some capacity to address climate change effects, and transformative pathways are being taken to adapt to climate-induced changes over the long-term. Transformative changes were fostered by the local perception of environmental change, shared narratives, sustained scientific monitoring programs, and the interaction between knowledge systems, facilitated by a bridging organization within a broader process of governance transformation. The combination of autonomous adaptations (based on linking social capital and fishery leaders agency) and government-led adaptations were essential to face the challenges imposed by climate change. Our results serve as a learning platform to anticipate threats and envision solutions to a wide range of small-scale fisheries in fast-warming regions worldwide.     

Identifying stakeholder-relevant climate change impacts: A case study in the Yakima River Basin,Washington, USA

Designing climate-related research so that study results will be useful to natural resource managers is a unique challenge. While decision makers increasingly recognize the need to consider climate change in their resource management plans, and climate scientists recognize the importance of providing locally-relevant climate data and projections, there often remains a gap between management needs and the information that is available or is being collected. We used decision analysis concepts to bring decision-maker and stakeholder perspectives into the applied research planning process. In 2009 we initiated a series of studies on the impacts of climate change in the Yakima River Basin (YRB) with a four-day stakeholder workshop, bringing together managers, stakeholders, and scientists to develop an integrated conceptual model of climate change and climate change impacts in the YRB. The conceptual model development highlighted areas of uncertainty that limit the understanding of the potential impacts of climate change and decision alternatives by those who will be most directly affected by those changes, and pointed to areas where additional study and engagement of stakeholders would be beneficial. The workshop and resulting conceptual model highlighted the importance of numerous different outcomes to stakeholders in the basin, including social and economic outcomes that go beyond the physical and biological outcomes typically reported in climate impacts studies. Subsequent studies addressed several of those areas of uncertainty, including changes in water temperatures, habitat quality, and bioenergetics of salmonid populations.     

Public microblogging on climate change: One year of Twitter worldwide

Public perceptions of climate change are traditionally measured through surveys. The exploding popularity of social networks, however, presents a new opportunity to research the spatiotemporal pattern of public discourse in relation to natural and/or socio-economic events. Among the social networks, Twitter is one of the largest microblogging services. The architecture of Twitter makes the question “what's happening?” the cornerstone of information exchange. This inspired the notion of using Twitter users as distributed sensors, which has been successfully employed in both the natural and social sciences. In 2012 and 2013, we collected 1.8 million tweets on “climate change” and “global warming” in five major languages (English, German, Russian, Portuguese, and Spanish). We discuss the geography of tweeting, weekly and daily patterns, major news events that affected tweeting on climate change, changes in the central topics of discussion over time, the most authoritative traditional media, blogging, and the most authoritative organizational sources of information on climate change referenced by Twitter users in different countries. We anticipate that social network mining will become a major source of data in the public discourse on climate change.     

Climate change and mental health: an exploratory case study from Rigolet, Nunatsiavut, Canada

As the impacts from anthropogenic climate change are increasing globally, people are experiencing dramatic shifts in weather, temperature, wildlife and vegetation patterns, and water and food quality and availability. These changes impact human health and well-being, and resultantly, climate change has been identified as the biggest global health threat of the 21st Century. Recently, research is beginning to indicate that changes in climate, and the subsequent disruption to the social, economic, and environmental determinants of health, may cause increased incidences and prevalence of mental health issues, emotional responses, and large-scale sociopsychological changes. Through a multi-year, community-led, exploratory case study conducted in Rigolet, Nunatsiavut, Labrador, Canada, this research qualitatively explores the impacts of climate change on mental health and well-being in an Inuit context. Drawing from 67 in-depth interviews conducted between January 2010 and October 2010 with community members and local and regional health professionals, participants reported that changes in weather, snow and ice stability and extent, and wildlife and vegetation patterns attributed to climate change were negatively impacting mental health and well-being due to disruptions in land-based activities and a loss of place-based solace and cultural identity. Participants reported that changes in climate and environment increased family stress, enhanced the possibility of increased drug and alcohol usage, amplified previous traumas and mental health stressors, and were implicated in increased potential for suicide ideation. While a preliminary case study, these exploratory findings indicate that climate change is becoming an additional mental health stressor for resource-dependent communities and provide a baseline for further research.     

Adaptation,adaptive capacity and vulnerability

This paper reviews the concept of adaptation of human communities to global changes, especially climate change, in the context of adaptive capacity and vulnerability. It focuses on scholarship that contributes to practical implementation of adaptations at the community scale. In numerous social science fields, adaptations are considered as responses to risks associated with the interaction of environmental hazards and human vulnerability or adaptive capacity. In the climate change field, adaptation analyses have been undertaken for several distinct purposes. Impact assessments assume adaptations to estimate damages to longer term climate scenarios with and without adjustments. Evaluations of specified adaptation options aim to identify preferred measures. Vulnerability indices seek to provide relative vulnerability scores for countries, regions or communities. The main purpose of participatory vulnerability assessments is to identify adaptation strategies that are feasible and practical in communities. The distinctive features of adaptation analyses with this purpose are outlined, and common elements of this approach are described. Practical adaptation initiatives tend to focus on risks that are already problematic, climate is considered together with other environmental and social stresses, and adaptations are mostly integrated or mainstreamed into other resource management, disaster preparedness and sustainable development programs.     

Historical analogies as tools in understanding transformation

Historical analogies of environmental change and stress are a well-established method of examining vulnerability to the impacts of climate change. In our view historical analogies of social transformations can similarly illuminate what factors are conducive to transformation. In this paper we draw on the historical example of the environmental transformation of Aotearoa New Zealand from predominately woodlands into farmlands; a transformation which was inextricably linked with the social transformation of indigenous Māori society following European colonisation. The Aotearoa New Zealand case study illustrates how both incidental and purposeful transformations can be instigated by small groups of committed individuals working in formal or informal networks, but can also be imposed by outside experts who instituted widespread changes under notions of progress and improvement without local support or consent. Such transformations involved widespread changes to Indigenous governance regimes, agricultural systems, production and consumption patterns, lifestyles, values and worldviews, and inevitably involved both beneficial and negative outcomes for local peoples. We argue that thinking historically about transformational change provides an opportunity to assess the processes that shape both vulnerability and resilience, and the circumstances under which transformational change occurs, as well as the potential dangers of irreversible changes.     

Scales of perception: public awareness of regional and neighborhood climates

Understanding public perceptions of climate is critical for developing an effective strategy to mitigate the effects of human activity on the natural environment and reduce human vulnerability to the impacts of climate change. While recent climate assessments document change among various physical systems (e.g., increased temperature, sea level rise, shrinking glaciers), environmental perceptions are relatively under-researched despite the fact that there is growing skepticism and disconnect between climate science and public opinion. This study utilizes a socio-ecological research framework to investigate how public perceptions compared with environmental conditions in one urban center. Specifically, air temperature during an extreme heat event was examined as one characteristic of environmental conditions by relating simulations from the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) atmospheric model with self-reported perceptions of regional and neighborhood temperatures from a social survey of Phoenix, AZ (USA) metropolitan area residents. Results indicate that: 1) human exposure to high temperatures varies substantially throughout metropolitan Phoenix; 2) public perceptions of temperature are more strongly correlated with proximate environmental conditions than with distal conditions; and 3) perceptions of temperature are related to social characteristics and situational variables. The social constructionist paradigm explains public perceptions at the regional scale, while experience governs attitude formation at the neighborhood scale.     

基于自然的气候变化解决方案

基于自然的解决方案(NbS)是近10年提出的人类社会应对一系列环境和社会挑战的成本有效的方式,但直到近期才在国际社会引起重视。针对气候变化,NbS指通过对生态系统的保护、恢复和可持续管理减缓气候变化,同时利用生态系统及其服务功能帮助人类和野生生物适应气候变化带来的影响和挑战。这些生态系统包括森林、农田、草地、湿地（海岸带）生态系统,人工的或天然的。NbS能够为实现《巴黎协定》目标贡献30%左右的减排潜力,同时带来巨大的环境和社会经济的协同效益。但是,在过去的气候变化政策和行动中,包括国家自主贡献（INDC）,NbS尚未得到充分的重视,流入NbS相关的气候资金明显不足。为充分发挥NbS的潜力,建议开展中国NbS减排潜力及其协同效应研究,识别成本有效的中国NbS优先领域,梳理国际国内NbS成功案例,制定推动NbS主流化相关激励政策,推动多领域NbS协同治理。     

Land use and land cover tools for climate adaptation

Land use and land cover interact with atmospheric conditions to determine current climate conditions, as well, as the impact of climate change and environmental variability on ecological systems. Such interactions are ubiquitous, yet changes in LULC are generally made without regard to their biophysical implications. This review considers the potential for LULC to compound, confound, or even contradict changes expected from climate change alone. These properties give LULC the potential to be used as powerful tools capable of modifying local climate and contributing significantly to the net impact of climate change. Management practices based modifications of LULC patterns and processes could be applied strategically to increase the resilience of vulnerable ecological systems and facilitate climate adaptation. These interventions build on the traditional competencies of land management and land protection organizations and suggest that these institutions have a central role in determining the ecological impact of climate change and the development of strategies for adaptation. The practical limits to the use of LULC-based tools also suggest important inflection points between manageable and dangerous levels of climate change.     

Assessment of thermal bioclimate and tourism climate potential for central Europe—the example of Luxembourg

Tourism destinations often require information about climate to assess their climate potential. This can be performed in terms of mean conditions of relevant climatological parameters. For a user-friendly analysis and visualization of climate data relevant for tourism application in Luxembourg, information is prepared based on the facets of climate in tourism. Information on thermal comfort/stress conditions as well as aesthetical and physical parameters is considered. In the present study, relevant and sensible factors were identified and presented. Therefore, physiologically equivalent temperature, precipitation patterns and the Climate-Tourism/Transfer-Information-Scheme are applied. In addition, extreme events relevant for heat stress are analysed based on existing data sets (i.e. heat waves of 2010). Expected climatic conditions for the future are investigated using the projections of two different regional climate models. The results concerning climate change conditions reveal increasing heat stress and sultriness but decreasing cold stress. This information is the basis for an adequate assessment to provide relevant information for different environmental planning issues as well as for the growing tourism sector of Luxembourg.     

Global Climate Change and Tropical Forest Genetic Resources

Global climate change may have a serious impact on genetic resources in tropical forest trees. Genetic diversity plays a critical role in the survival of populations in rapidly changing environments. Furthermore, most tropical plant species are known to have unique ecological niches, and therefore changes in climate may directly affect the distribution of biomes, ecosystems, and constituent species. Climate change may also indirectly affect plant genetic resources through effects on phenology, breeding systems, and plant-pollinator and plant seed disperser interactions, and may reduce genetic diversity and reproductive output. As a consequence, population densities may be reduced leading to reduction in genetic diversity through genetic drift and inbreeding. Tropical forest plants may respond to climate change through phenotypic plasticity, adaptive evolution, migration to suitable site, or extinction. However, the potential to respond is limited by a rapid pace of change and the non-availability of alternate habitats due to past and present trends of deforestation. Thus climate change may result in extinction of many populations and species. Our ability to estimate the precise response of tropical forest ecosystems to climate change is limited by lack of long-term data on parameters that might be affected by climate change. Collection of correlative data from long-term monitoring of climate as well as population and community responses at selected sites offer the most cost-effective way to understand the effects of climate change on tropical tree populations. However, mitigation strategies need to be implemented immediately. Because many effects of climate change may be similar to the effects of habitat alteration and fragmentation, protected areas and buffer zones should be enlarged, with an emphasis on connectivity among conserved landscapes. Taxa that are likely to become extinct should be identified and protected through ex situ conservation programs.     

USE OF A STOCHASTIC WEATHER GENERATOR IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF CLIMATE CHANGE SCENARIOS

Climate change scenarios with a high spatial and temporal resolution are required in the evaluation of the effects of climate change on agricultural potential and agricultural risk. Such scenarios should reproduce changes in mean weather characteristics as well as incorporate the changes in climate variability indicated by the global climate model (GCM) used. Recent work on the sensitivity of crop models and climatic extremes has clearly demonstrated that changes in variability can have more profound effects on crop yield and on the probability of extreme weather events than simple changes in the mean values. The construction of climate change scenarios based on spatial regression downscaling and on the use of a local stochastic weather generator is described. Regression downscaling translated the coarse resolution GCM grid-box predictions of climate change to site-specific values. These values were then used to perturb the parameters of the stochastic weather generator in order to simulate site-specific daily weather data. This approach permits the incorporation of changes in the mean and variability of climate in a consistent and computationally inexpensive way. The stochastic weather generator used in this study, LARS-WG, has been validated across Europe and has been shown to perform well in the simulation of different weather statistics, including those climatic extremes relevant to agriculture. The importance of downscaling and the incorporation of climate variability are demonstrated at two European sites where climate change scenarios were constructed using the UK Met. Office high resolution GCM equilibrium and transient experiments.     

Well-being and environmental change in the arctic: a synthesis of selected research from Canada’s International Polar Year program

The social and cultural dimensions of arctic environmental change were explored through Canada??s International Polar Year (IPY) research program. Drawing on concepts of vulnerability, resilience and human security, we discuss preliminary results of 15 IPY research projects (of 52) which dealt with the effects and responses of northern communities to issues of ecological variability, natural resource development and climate change. This paper attempts to determine whether the preliminary results of these projects have contributed to the IPY program goal of building knowledge about well-being in the arctic. The projects were diverse in focus and approach but together offer a valuable pan-northern perspective on many themes including land and resource use, food security, poverty and best practices of northern engagement. Case study research using self-reported measures suggests individual views of their own well-being differ from regional and territorial standardized statistics on quality of life. A large body of work was developed around changes in land and resource use. A decline in land and resource use in some areas and consequent concerns for food security, are directly linked to the effects of climate change, particularly in coastal areas where melting sea ice, erratic weather events and changes in the stability of landscapes (e.g., erosion, slumping) are leading to increased risks for land users. Natural resource development, while creating some new economic opportunities, may be compounding rather than offsetting such stresses of environmental change for vulnerable populations. While the IPY program has contributed to our understanding of some aspects of well-being in the arctic, many other issues of social, economic, cultural and political significance, including those unrelated to environmental change, remain poorly understood.     

CLIMATIC CHANGE AT HIGH ELEVATION SITES: AN OVERVIEW

This paper provides an overview of climatic changes that have been observed during the past century at certain high-elevation sites, and changes in a more distant past documented by a variety of climate-sensitive environmental indicators, such as tree-rings and alpine glaciers, that serve as a measure of the natural variability of climate in mountains over longer time scales. Detailed studies such as those found in this special issue of Climatic Change , as well as those noted in this review, for the mountain regions of the world, advance our understanding in a variety of ways. They are not only helpful to characterize present and past climatological features in the mountainous zones, but they also provide useful information to the climate modeling community. Because of the expected refinements in the physical parameterizations of climate models in coming years, and the probable increase in the spatial resolution of GCMs, the use of appropriate data from high elevation sites will become of increasing importance for model initialization, verification, and intercomparison purposes. The necessity of accurate projections of climate change is paramount to assessing the likely impacts of climate change on mountain biodiversity, hydrology and cryosphere, and on the numerous economic activities which take place in these regions.     

Assessment of community preference rankings of potential environmental effects of climate change using the method of paired comparisons

The preference rankings of a rural population in central British Columbia, Canada of potential environmental effects of climate change were assessed using the psychometric method of paired comparison. The survey results were used to develop an interval scale for eight hypothetical, but potential, environmental effects including major and minor impacts to water and fish, forest ecosystems, wildlife, and scenic and recreation. Interval scales were developed for the total sample as well as sub-samples made up of females, males, town residents, non-town residents, respondents with high school or less education, and respondents with at least some post-secondary education. Major impacts on water and fish were considered to be the most serious effects followed by major impacts on forest ecosystems and major impacts on wildlife. Major effects on scenic and recreation were ranked below minor effects on water and fish. Responses from the sub-samples were similar with some minor deviations. For example, females ranked major impacts on wildlife higher than males, and males ranked major impact on scenic and recreation higher than females. However, the overall rankings of females and males were highly correlated. This study showed climate change effects on environmental goods and services in terms of human preferences. A human preferences perspective (combined with biophysical assessments) is required for determining local adaptation priorities and for guiding impacts and adaptation research. The methodology and approach has potential for broader application.     

The norms associated with climate change: Understanding social norms through acts of interpersonal activism

A growing body of research points to the role social norms may play in both maintaining carbon intensive lifestyles and soliciting changes towards more sustainable ways of living. However, despite highlighting the importance of pro-environmental social norms, such literature has said far less about the processes by which such norms might develop. We present a new approach to conceptualising social norms that focuses on understanding their dynamics within social interaction, by positioning interpersonal confrontation as a potential mechanism of change. We examine the normative dynamics of environmentalism by comparing the costs of interpersonally confronting climate change disregard with those associated with confronting racism. In two experimental studies, we presented participants with scenarios describing a person confronting (versus not confronting) contentious comments in each domain. We identified social costs to interpersonal confrontation of climate change disregard but not racism, as indicated by reduced ratings of perceived warmth of and closeness to the confronter (Study 1), and this effect was mediated by the perceived morality of the issue in question (Study 2). Our findings highlight how wider social constructions of (im)morality around climate change impact upon social interactions in ways that have important implications for processes of social (and ultimately environmental) change.     

Impact of climate and socioeconomic changes on fire carbon emissions in the future: Sustainable economic development might decrease future emissions

Fires and their associated carbon and air pollutant emissions have a broad range of environmental and societal impacts, including negative effects on human health, damage to terrestrial ecosystems, and indirect effects that promote climate change. Previous studies investigated future carbon emissions from the perspective of response to climate change and population growth, but the compound effects of other factors like economic development and land use change are not yet well known. We explored fire carbon emissions throughout the 21st century by changing five factors (meteorology, biomass, land use, population density, and gross domestic product [GDP] per capita). Compared to the historical period (2006–2015), global future fire carbon emissions decreased, mainly caused by an increase in GDP per capita, which leads to improvement in fire management and capitalized agriculture. We found that the meteorological factor has a strong individual effect under higher warming cases. Fires in boreal forests were particularly expected to increase because of an increase in fuel dryness. Our research should help climate change researchers consider fire-carbon interactions. Incorporating future spatial changes under diverse scenarios will be helpful to develop national mitigation and adaptation plans.     

Use of aviation by climate change researchers: Structural influences,personal attitudes,and information provision

Aviation is a fast-growing sector, releasing more carbon dioxide per passenger kilometre than other transport modes. For climate change researchers, work-related travel – including for conferences and fieldwork – is a major carbon-emitting activity. At the same time, many argue that climate scientists have an important role in curbing their own aviation emissions to align their practices with their assertions in relation to emissions reduction. We examine the tensions between competing professional demands in relation to flying; measure levels of flying by climate and non-climate researchers; assess influences on choices and attitudes; and consider how information provision and structural changes might enable changes in practice. Study 1 entails a large, international survey of flying undertaken by climate change (including sustainability and environmental science) researchers and those from other disciplines (N = 1408). Study 2 tests effects of varying information provision on researchers’ behavioural intentions and policy support to reduce flying (N = 362). Unexpectedly, we find climate change researchers – particularly professors – fly more than other researchers, but are also more likely to have taken steps to reduce or offset their flying. Providing information about the impacts of aviation increases behavioural intentions and support for institutional policies to reduce flying, particularly amongst more pro-environmental respondents. However, while attitudinal factors (e.g., personal norm) predict willingness to reduce flying, structural/social factors (e.g., family commitments, location) are more important in predicting actual flying behaviour. Recent initiatives to develop a low-carbon and more inclusive research culture within climate science and the broader research community thus need to be supported by broader policies and technologies to encourage and enable low-carbon and avoided travel.     

环境变化对流域水文水资源的影响评估及不确定性研究进展

综述了区分气候变化和人类活动对水文要素影响的研究方法,提出当前研究中应将流域水文过程变化的环境因素来源分为气候自然变异、人为气候变化和人类活动三个方面,并给出了方法体系;基于环境变化下流域水文过程的复杂不确定性,详细剖析了环境变化下流域水文过程的不确定性来源,总结了常用的不确定性评估方法,并介绍了针对定性不确定性（奈特不确定性）评估的信息差距理论。指出为提高减缓和适应环境变化能力,未来应加强以气候自然变异、人为气候变化和人类活动三源分解的环境变化影响研究;不确定性分析应成为环境模拟的固有组成部分,在影响评价中应注重不确定性的评估,并应加强不确定性信息在流域管理决策中的应用研究以及流域风险管理研究。