What drives national adaptation? A global assessment

That the climate is changing and societies will have to adapt is now unequivocal, with adaptation becoming a core focus of climate policy. Our understanding of the challenges, needs, and opportunities for climate change adaptation has advanced significantly in recent years yet remains limited. Research has identified and theorized key determinants of adaptive capacity and barriers to adaptation, and more recently begun to track adaptation in practice. Despite this, there is negligible research investigating whether and indeed if adaptive capacity is translating into actual adaptation action. Here we test whether theorized determinants of adaptive capacity are associated with adaptation policy outcomes at the national level for 117 nations. We show that institutional capacity, in particular measures of good governance, are the strongest predictors of national adaptation policy. Adaptation at the national level is limited in countries with poor governance, and in the absence of good governance other presumed determinants of adaptive capacity show limited effect on adaptation. Our results highlight the critical importance of institutional good governance as a prerequisite for national adaptation. Other elements of theorized adaptive capacity are unlikely to be sufficient, effective, or present at the national level where national institutions and governance are poor.     

Investing in low-carbon transitions: energy finance as an adaptive market

The amount of capital required to transition energy systems to low-carbon futures is very large, yet analysis of energy systems change has been curiously quiet on the role of capital markets in financing energy transitions. This is surprising given the huge role finance and investment must play in facilitating transformative change. We argue this has been due to a lack of suitable theory to supplant neoclassical notions of capital markets and innovation finance. This research draws on the notion from Planetary economics: Energy, climate change and the three domains of sustainable development, by Grubb and colleagues, that planetary economics is defined by three ‘domains’, which describe behavioural, neoclassical, and evolutionary aspects of energy and climate policy analysis. We identify first- and second-domain theories of finance that are well established, but argue that third-domain approaches, relating to evolutionary systems change, have lacked a compatible theory of capital markets. Based on an analysis of electricity market reform and renewable energy finance in the UK, the ‘adaptive market hypothesis' is presented as a suitable framework with which to analyse energy systems finance. Armed with an understanding of financial markets as adaptive, scholars and policy makers can ask new questions about the role of capital markets in energy systems transitions.

Policy relevance

This article explores the role of financial markets in capitalising low-carbon energy systems and long-term change. The authors demonstrate that much energy and climate policy assumes financial markets are efficient, meaning they will reliably capitalise low-carbon transitions if a rational return is created by subsidy regimes or other market mechanisms. The authors show that the market for renewable energy finance does not conform to the efficient markets hypothesis, and is more in line with an ‘adaptive’ markets understanding. Climate and energy policy makers that design policy, strategy, and regulation on the assumption of efficient financial markets will not pay attention to structural and behavioural constraints on investment; they risk falling short of the investment levels needed for long-term systems change. In short, by thinking of financial markets as adaptive, the range of policy responses to enable low-carbon investment can be much broader.     

将灾害风险管理和适应气候变化纳入可持续发展

IPCC发布的《管理极端事件和灾害风险,推进气候变化适应》特别报告(SREX)指出,极端事件和灾害的影响很大程度上取决于社会经济系统的风险暴露程度及其脆弱性特征。这意味着,不合理的发展过程将加剧灾害风险及其损失,另一方面,采取积极的减灾和适应行动,能够减小灾害风险并促进社会、经济、环境的可持续发展。SREX报告有助于启发决策者与社会公众,为充满不确定风险的未来进行合理规划,包括关注未来因人口和社会财富增长导致的暴露度和脆弱性增加,在国家和部门层面整合适应、减灾与发展政策,利用多种政策工具加强决策的科学性和灵活性,发挥不同主体在适应治理与灾害风险管理中的作用等等。     

Policy integration: Do laws or actors integrate issues relevant to flood risk management in Switzerland?

Existing research emphasizes interdependencies between social and ecological systems in climate change adaptation. Ecological systems are often complex and span several issues that are not integrated in the social governance system. In order to increase the fit between social and ecological systems, understanding factors that promote the integration of interdependent issues is crucial. In this paper, we consider 11 issues related to flood risk management, e.g., technical flood protection and habitat loss, which are typically addressed in different policy sectors but exhibit ecological, functional, or geographical interdependencies. We analyze two bases for issue integration: a) political actors connecting issues and, b) the legal framework cross-referencing issues. We propose a network method for systematic comparisons between issue integration based on actors and integration based on laws. For the case of Swiss flood risk management, we find that actor- and law-based issue integration co-vary and might be self-reinforcing. We further find that issue integration mostly rests on laws, although cases exist where actors are the main basis of integration. Results promote our understanding of potential bases for the integration of policy issues, thereby contributing knowledge about adaptive governance capacities in social-ecological systems that buffer the effects of climate change.     

Integrating agriculture and climate change mitigation at landscape scale: Implications from an Australian case study

Rural and regional hinterlands provide the ecosystem service needs for increasingly urbanised communities across the globe. These inter-related ecosystem services provide key opportunities in securing climate change mitigation and adaptation. Their integrated management in the face of climate change, however, can be confounded by fragmentation within the complex institutional arrangements concerned with natural resource management. This suggests the need for a more systemic approach to continuous improvement in the integrated and adaptive governance of natural resources.This paper explores the theoretical foundations for integrated natural resource management and reviews positive systemic improvements that have been emerging in the Australian context. In setting clear theoretical foundations, the paper explores both functional and structural aspects of natural resource governance systems. Functional considerations include issues of connectivity, knowledge use and capacity within the natural resource decision making environment. Structural considerations refer to the institutions and processes that undertake planning through to implementation, monitoring and evaluation.From this foundation, we review the last decade of emerging initiatives in governance regarding the integration of agriculture and forests across the entire Australian landscape. This includes the shift towards more devolved regional approaches to integrated natural resource management and recent progress towards the use of terrestrial carbon at landscape scale to assist in climate change mitigation and adaptation. These developments, however, have also been tempered by a significant raft of new landscape-scale regulations that have tended to be based on a more centralist philosophy that landowners should be providing ecosystem services for the wider public good without substantive reward.Given this background, we explore a case study of efforts taken to integrate the management of landscape-scale agro-ecological services in the Wet Tropics of tropical Queensland. This is being achieved primarily through the integration of regional natural resource management planning and the development of aggregated terrestrial carbon offset products at a whole of landscape scale via the Degree Celsius initiative. Finally, the paper teases out the barriers and opportunities being experienced, leading to discussion about the global implications for managing climate change, income generation and poverty reduction.     

Climate change and extreme weather events: can developing countries adapt?

Developing countries are vulnerable to extremes of normal climatic variability, and climate change is likely to increase the frequency and magnitude of some extreme weather events and disasters. Adaptation to climate change is dependent on current adaptive capacity and the development models that are being pursued by developing countries. Various frameworks are available for vulnerability and adaptation (V&A) assessments, and they have both advantages and limitations. Investments in developing countries are more focused on recovery from a disaster than on the creation of adaptive capacity. Extreme climatic events create a spiral of debt burden on developing countries. Increased capacity to manage extreme weather events can reduce the magnitude of economic, social and human damage and eventually, investments, in terms of borrowing money from the lending agencies. Vulnerability to extreme weather events, disaster management and adaptation must be part of long-term sustainable development planning in developing countries. Lending agencies and donors need to reform their investment policies in developing countries to focus more on capacity building instead of just investing in recovery operations and infrastructure development.     

适应气候变化的国际行动和农业措施研究进展

针对气候变暖采取稳健的适应措施已成为国际社会共识。该文综合了当前适应气候变化的国际谈判进展及已有的农业适应气候变化措施,指出适应资金严重不足,技术研发、应用与转让难以实施,以及适应气候变化行动实施能力的不足严重制约着适应气候变化行动的有效实施;关于农业适应气候变化的技术措施仍缺乏系统的理论研究与应用示范。在此基础上,提出了未来中国农业适应气候变化需要重点开展的研究任务,即农业气象灾变过程的新特点及其风险管理, 农业适应气候变化的大数据决策管理系统研发及适应气候变化的农业气候区划与减灾保产技术研究,以切实推进农业适应气候变化,为确保国家粮食安全与农业可持续发展提供支撑。     

Climate change and extreme weather events: can developing countries adapt?

Abstract

Developing countries are vulnerable to extremes of normal climatic variability, and climate change is likely to increase the frequency and magnitude of some extreme weather events and disasters. Adaptation to climate change is dependent on current adaptive capacity and the development models that are being pursued by developing countries. Various frameworks are available for vulnerability and adaptation (V&A) assessments, and they have both advantages and limitations. Investments in developing countries are more focused on recovery from a disaster than on the creation of adaptive capacity. Extreme climatic events create a spiral of debt burden on developing countries. Increased capacity to manage extreme weather events can reduce the magnitude of economic, social and human damage and eventually, investments, in terms of borrowing money from the lending agencies. Vulnerability to extreme weather events, disaster management and adaptation must be part of long-term sustainable development planning in developing countries. Lending agencies and donors need to reform their investment policies in developing countries to focus more on capacity building instead of just investing in recovery operations and infrastructure development.     

从气候变化的新视角理解灾害风险、暴露度、脆弱性和恢复力

不断变化的气候可导致前所未有的极端天气和气候事件。这些事件能否构成灾害,在很大程度上取决于脆弱性和暴露度水平。虽然无法完全消除各种灾害风险,但灾害风险管理和气候变化适应的重点是减少脆弱性和暴露度,并提高对各种潜在极端事件不利影响的恢复力,从而促进社会和经济的可持续发展。全面的灾害风险管理要求更加合理地分配对减灾、灾害管理等方面所付出的努力。过去的主流是强调灾害管理,但目前减灾成为关注焦点和挑战。这种主动积极的灾害风险管理与适应有助于避免未来的风险和灾害,而不仅仅是减少已有的风险和灾害,同时这也是灾害风险管理和气候变化适应更加紧密联系的一个背景。灾害风险管理促进气候变化适应从应对当前的影响中汲取经验,而气候变化适应帮助灾害风险管理更加有效地应对未来变化的条件。     

‘Strange changes’: Indigenous perspectives of climate change and adaptation in NE Arnhem Land (Australia)

Despite growing global attention to the development of strategies and policy for climate change adaptation, there has been little allowance for input from Indigenous people. In this study we aimed to improve understanding of factors important in integration of Yolngu perspectives in planning adaptation policy in North East Arnhem Land (Australia). We conducted workshops and in-depth interviews in two ‘communities’ to develop insight into Yolngu peoples’ observations and perspectives on climate change, and their ideas and preferences for adaptation. All participants reported observing changes in their ecological landscape, which they attributed to mining, tourism ‘development’, and climate change. ‘Strange changes’ noticed particularly in the last five years, had caused concern and anxiety among many participants. Despite their concern about ecological changes, participants were primarily worried about other issues affecting their community's general welfare. The results suggest that strategies and policies are needed to strengthen adaptive capacity of communities to mitigate over-arching poverty and well-being issues, as well as respond to changes in climate. Participants believed that major constraints to strengthening adaptive capacity had external origins, at regional, state and federal levels. Examples are poor communication and engagement, top-down institutional processes that allow little Indigenous voice, and lack of recognition of Indigenous culture and practices. Participants’ preferences for strategies to strengthen community adaptive capacity tended to be those that lead towards greater self-sufficiency, independence, empowerment, resilience and close contact with the natural environment. Based on the results, we developed a simple model to highlight main determinants of community vulnerability. A second model highlights components important in facilitating discourse on enhancing community capacity to adapt to climatic and other stressors.     

Learning across levels of governance: Expert advice and the adoption of carbon dioxide emissions reduction targets in the UK

This paper is concerned with environmental governance and policy formation in the area of climate change. Specifically, it examines a decision by the UK Government in 2003 to adopt a demanding, long-term CO₂ emissions reduction target, following the advice of one of its longest standing environmental advisory bodies, the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution. It explores the origins of the Commission's recommendation and the reasons for its relatively rapid uptake in public policy. It argues that in both cases, a complex mix of structural and contingent, cognitive and non-cognitive factors can be identified, operating at different levels of governance. Finally, the paper reflects on what we might learn from this particular case about policy processes and the role of knowledge and expert advice within them.     

A conceptual framework for analysing adaptive capacity and multi-level learning processes in resource governance regimes

Governance failures are at the origin of many resource management problems. In particular climate change and the concomitant increase of extreme weather events has exposed the inability of current governance regimes to deal with present and future challenges. Still our knowledge about resource governance regimes and how they change is quite limited. This paper develops a conceptual framework addressing the dynamics and adaptive capacity of resource governance regimes as multi-level learning processes. The influence of formal and informal institutions, the role of state and non-state actors, the nature of multi-level interactions and the relative importance of bureaucratic hierarchies, markets and networks are identified as major structural characteristics of governance regimes. Change is conceptualized as social and societal learning that proceeds in a stepwise fashion moving from single to double to triple loop learning. Informal networks are considered to play a crucial role in such learning processes. The framework supports flexible and context sensitive analysis without being case study specific.First empirical evidence from water governance supports the assumptions made on the dynamics of governance regimes and the usefulness of the chosen approach. More complex and diverse governance regimes have a higher adaptive capacity. However, it is still an open question how to overcome the state of single-loop learning that seem to characterize many attempts to adapt to climate change. Only further development and application of shared conceptual frameworks taking into account the real complexity of governance regimes can generate the knowledge base needed to advance current understanding to a state that allows giving meaningful policy advice.     

Assessing future vulnerability and risk of humanitarian crises using climate change and population projections within the INFORM framework

INFORM Risk Index is a global indicator-based disaster risk assessment tool that combines hazards, exposure, vulnerability and lack of coping capacity indicators with the purpose to support humanitarian crisis management decisions considering the current climate and population. In this exploratory study, we extend the Index to include future climate change and population projections using RCP 8.5 climate projections of coastal flood, river flood and drought, and SSP3 and SSP5 population projections for the period 2036 to 2065. For the three hazards considered, annually 1.3 billion people (150% increase), 1.8 billion people (249% increase) and 1.5 billion people (197% increase) in the mid-21st century are projected to be exposed under the 2015, SSP3 and SSP5 population estimates, respectively. Drought shows the highest exposure levels followed by river flood and then coastal flood, with some regional differences. The largest exposed population is projected in Asia, while the largest percent changes are projected in Africa and Oceania. Countries with largest current and projected risk including non-climatic factors are generally located in Africa, West and South Asia and Central America. An uncertainty analysis of the extended index shows that it is generally robust and not influenced by the methodological choices. The projected changes in risk and coping capacity (vulnerability) due to climate change are generally greater than those associated with population changes. Countries in Europe, Western and Northern Asia and Africa tend to show higher reduction levels in vulnerability (lack of coping capacity) required to nullify the adverse impacts of the projected amplified hazards and exposure. The required increase in coping capacity (decreased vulnerability) can inform decision-making processes on disaster risk reduction and adaptation options to maintain manageable risk levels at global and national scale. Overall, the extended INFORM Risk Index is a means to integrate Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation policy agendas to create conditions for greater policy impact, more efficient use of resources and more effective action in protecting life, livelihoods and valuable assets.     

Navigating climate crises in the Great Barrier Reef

A dramatic escalation of extreme climate events is challenging the capacity of environmental governance regimes to sustain and improve ecosystem outcomes. It has been argued that actors within adaptive governance regimes can help to steer environmental systems toward sustainability in times of crisis. Yet there is little empirical evidence of how acute climate crises are navigated by actors operating within adaptive governance regimes, and the factors that influence their responses. Here, we qualitatively assessed the actions key governance actors took in response to back-to-back mass coral bleaching – an extreme climate event – of the Great Barrier Reef in 2016 and 2017, and explored their perceptions of barriers and catalysts to these responses. This research was, in part, a product of collaboration and knowledge co-production with Great Barrier Reef governance actors aimed at improving responses to climate crises in the region. We found five major categories of activity that actors engaged with in the wake of recurrent mass coral bleaching: assessing the scale and extent of bleaching, sharing information, communicating bleaching to the public, building local resilience, and addressing global threats. These actions were both catalyzed and hindered by a range of factors that fall within different domains of adaptive capacity; such as assets, social organization, and agency. We discuss the implications of our findings as they relate to existing research on adaptive capacity and adaptive governance. We conclude by coalescing insights from our interviews and a participant engagement process to highlight four key ways in which the ability of governance actors, and the Great Barrier Reef governance regime more broadly, can be better prepared for, and more effectively respond to extreme climate events. Our research provides empirical insight into how crises are experienced by governance actors in a large-scale environmental system, potentially providing lessons for similar systems across the globe.     

Land restoration in food security programmes: synergies with climate change mitigation

Food-insecure households in many countries depend on international aid to alleviate acute shocks and chronic shortages. Some food security programmes (including Ethiopia’s Productive Safety Net Program–PSNP – which provides a case study for this article) have integrated aid in exchange for labour on public works to reduce long-term dependence by investing in the productive capacity and resilience of communities. Using this approach, Ethiopia has embarked upon an ambitious national programme of land restoration and sustainable land management. Although the intent was to reduce poverty, here we show that an unintended co-benefit is the climate-change mitigation from reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and increased landscape carbon stocks. The article first shows that the total reduction in net GHG emissions from PSNP’s land management at the national scale is estimated at 3.4 million?Mg?CO₂e?y^?1 – approximately 1.5% of the emissions reductions in Ethiopia’s Nationally Determined Contribution for the Paris Agreement. The article then explores some of the opportunities and constraints to scaling up of this impact.

Key policy insights

• Food security programmes (FSPs) can contribute to climate change mitigation by creating a vehicle for investment in land and ecosystem restoration.

• Maximizing mitigation, while enhancing but not compromising food security, requires that climate projections, and mitigation and adaptation responses should be mainstreamed into planning and implementation of FSPs at all levels.

• Cross-cutting oversight is required to integrate land restoration, climate policy, food security and disaster risk management into a coherent policy framework.

• Institutional barriers to optimal implementation should be addressed, such as incentive mechanisms that reward effort rather than results, and lack of centralized monitoring and evaluation of impacts on the physical environment.

• Project implementation can often be improved by adopting best management practices, such as using productive living livestock barriers where possible, and increasing the integration of agroforestry and non-timber forest products into landscape regeneration.

     

Climate change policy responses for Canada's Inuit population: The importance of and opportunities for adaptation

We identify and examine how policy intervention can help Canada's Inuit population adapt to climate change. The policy responses are based on an understanding of the determinants of vulnerability identified in research conducted with 15 Inuit communities. A consistent approach was used in each case study where vulnerability is conceptualized as a function of exposure-sensitivity to climatic risks and adaptive capacity to deal with those risks. This conceptualization focuses on the biophysical and human determinants of vulnerability and how they are influenced by processes and conditions operating at multiple spatial-temporal scales. Case studies involved close collaboration with community members and policy makers to identify conditions to which each community is currently vulnerable, characterize the factors that shape vulnerability and how they have changed over time, identify opportunities for adaptation policy, and examine how adaptation can be mainstreamed. Fieldwork, conducted between 2006 and 2009, included 443 semi-structured interviews, 20 focus groups/community workshops, and 65 interviews with policy makers at local, regional, and national levels. Synthesizing findings consistent across the case studies we document significant vulnerabilities, a function of socio-economic stresses and change, continuing and pervasive inequality, and magnitude of climate change. Nevertheless, adaptations are available, feasible, and Inuit have considerable adaptive capacity. Realizing this adaptive capacity and overcoming adaptation barriers requires policy intervention to: (i) support the teaching and transmission of environmental knowledge and land skills, (ii) enhance and review emergency management capability, (iii) ensure the flexibility of resource management regimes, (iv) provide economic support to facilitate adaptation for groups with limited household income, (v) increase research effort to identify short and long term risk factors and adaptive response options, (vi) protect key infrastructure, and (vii) promote awareness of climate change impacts and adaptation among policy makers.     

An integrated socio-environmental framework for glacier hazard management and climate change adaptation: lessons from Lake 513, Cordillera Blanca, Peru

Glacier hazards threaten societies in mountain regions worldwide. Glacial lake outburst floods (GLOFs) pose risks to exposed and vulnerable populations and can be linked in part to long-term post-Little Ice Age climate change because precariously dammed glacial lakes sometimes formed as glaciers generally retreated after the mid-1800s. This paper provides an interdisciplinary and historical analysis of 40?years of glacier hazard management on Mount Hualcán, at glacial Lake 513, and in the city of Carhuaz in Peru’s Cordillera Blanca mountain range. The case study examines attempted hazard zoning, glacial lake evolution and monitoring, and emergency engineering projects to drain Lake 513. It also analyzes the 11 April 2010 Hualcán rock-ice avalanche that triggered a Lake 513 GLOF; we offer both a scientific assessment of the possible role of temperature on slope stability and a GIS spatial analysis of human impacts. Qualitative historical analysis of glacier hazard management since 1970 allows us to identify and explain why certain actions and policies to reduce risk were implemented or omitted. We extrapolate these case-specific variables to generate a broader socio-environmental framework identifying factors that can facilitate or impede disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation. Facilitating factors are technical capacity, disaster events with visible hazards, institutional support, committed individuals, and international involvement. Impediments include divergent risk perceptions, imposed government policies, institutional instability, knowledge disparities, and invisible hazards. This framework emerges from an empirical analysis of a coupled social-ecological system and offers a holistic approach for integrating disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation.     

适应性治理与气候变化：内蒙古草原案例分析与对策探讨

适应性治理通过边学边做,针对各地方的社会经济条件、自然生态系统、地方知识文化等基本特征,基于一个动态、自下而上和自组织的过程不断测试和修正制度安排与知识体系,形成一个旨在解决实际问题的循环过程。通过内蒙古3个地区案例的对比分析研究,基于对其气候变化风险和社会脆弱性的评估,发现其在气候变化影响下形成的不同程度的社会脆弱性正是源于不同的草原利用机制和基于此的社会合作机制。正是因为3个案例地的牧民有着不同的社会资本和社会记忆,所以他们面对极端天气导致的自然灾害时,采取了不同的应对方式,有的牧户可以依赖于社会资本移动牲畜来渡过难关,有的牧户则可以在嘎查范围内重启社会记忆,通过合理安排草场利用和移动牲畜提高自身的抗灾能力,而有的牧户则只能通过买草料独立抗灾。这样不同的结果有力证明了适应性治理在提升这些地区气候变化应对能力方面的必要性和可行性。在地区层面引入适应性治理,可以满足各利益相关方的需求,有利于自然、社会及管理的多学科协同,与“未来地球计划”的协同设计、协同实施和协同推广理念不谋而合,是“未来地球”思想在气候变化适应研究中的实践。     

The Use of Seasonal Climate Forecasting in Policymaking: Lessons from Northeast Brazil

This article examines the use of seasonal climate forecasting in public and private efforts to mitigate the impacts of drought in Ceará, Northeast Brazil. Here, forecasts have been directed towards small scale, rainfed agriculturalists as well as state and local level policymakers in the areas of agriculture, water management, and emergency drought relief. In assessing possibilities and constraints of forecast application in Ceará, the present analysis takes into account three types of variables: (a)characteristics of the forecasts; (b) policymaking systems; and (c)institutional environments. We conclude that, on the one hand, several factors in the Ceará case have limited the effectiveness of seasonal climate forecast use. First, the current level of skill of the forecasts is inadequate for the needs of policy development and farmer decisionmaking. Second, forecast information application has been subject to distortion, misinterpretation and political manipulation. Third, focus on the forecast as a product until recently neglected to take into account end users' needs and decisionmaking behavior. On the other hand, climate forecasting has the potential to offer a dramatic opportunity for state and local level bureaucracies to embark on a path of proactive drought planning.     

Community level adaptation to climate change: The potential role of participatory community risk assessment

This paper explores the value of using community risk assessments (CRAs) for climate change adaptation. CRA refers to participatory methods to assess hazards, vulnerabilities and capacities in support of community-based disaster risk reduction, used by many NGOs, community-based organizations, and the Red Cross/Red Crescent. We review the evolution of climate change adaptation and community-based disaster risk reduction, and highlight the challenges of integrating global climate change into a bottom-up and place-based approach. Our analysis of CRAs carried out by various national Red Cross societies shows that CRAs can help address those challenges by fostering community engagement in climate risk reduction, particularly given that many strategies to deal with current climate risks also help to reduce vulnerability to climate change. Climate change can also be explicitly incorporated in CRAs by making better use of CRA tools to assess trends, and by addressing the notion of changing risks. However, a key challenge is to keep CRAs simple enough for wide application. This demands special attention in the modification of CRA tools; in the background materials and trainings for CRA facilitators; and in the guidance for interpretation of CRA outcomes. A second challenge is the application of a limited set of CRA results to guide risk reduction in other communities and to inform national and international adaptation policy. This requires specific attention for sampling and care in scaling up qualitative findings. Finally, stronger linkages are needed between organizations facilitating CRAs and suppliers of climate information, particularly addressing the translation of climate information to the community level.