Regionalisation of global insights into dryland vulnerability: Better reflecting smallholders’ vulnerability in Northeast Brazil

Global analyses of vulnerability reveal generic insights into the relation between socio-ecological systems and the stress impacting upon them including climate and market variability. They thus provide a valuable basis for better understanding and comparing the evolution of socio-ecological systems from a broad perspective. However, even when reflecting sub-national differences, global assessments necessarily aggregate regional variations in the underlying conditions of vulnerability. Refinements are therefore necessary to better accommodate context-specific processes and hence facilitate vulnerability reduction. This study presents a novel methodology to refining global insights into vulnerability at a regional scale. It is based on a spatially explicit link between broad patterns of vulnerability and modelled regional smallholder development. Its application in order to better represent the drylands of Northeast Brazil reveals specific facets of smallholders’ vulnerability at the municipio level, reflecting non-linear dynamics. The results show that smallholders’ vulnerability was widely exacerbated in the most vulnerable areas. One key mechanism causing such a vulnerability increase involved intensifying resource degradation and the related potential for impoverishment as modelled at the regional scale. In addition, by subsequently re-orienting their livelihoods towards off-farm activities, smallholders became more sensitive to fluctuations and competition in the labour market. In contrast to these critical trends, living and environmental conditions improved in only some areas, thus indicating a decrease in vulnerability. Altogether, in differentiating the heterogeneity of resource management and smallholders’ livelihoods, the regional refinement presented in this study indicates necessary adjustments to generic strategies for vulnerability reduction gained at the global scale.     

Integrating farmers’ adaptive knowledge into flood management and adaptation policies in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta: A social learning perspective

Flood management and adaptation are important elements in sustaining farming production in the Vietnamese Mekong Delta (VMD). While over the past decades hydraulic development introduced by the central government has substantially benefited the rural economy, it has simultaneously caused multiple barriers to rural adaptation. We investigate the relational practices (i.e., learning interactions) taking place within and across the flood management and adaptation boundaries from the perspective of social learning. We explore whether and how adaptive knowledge (i.e., experimental and experiential knowledge) derived from farmers’ everyday adaptation practices contributes to local flood management and adaptation policies in the selected areas. We collected data through nine focus groups with farmers and thirty-three interviews with government officials, environmental scientists, and farmers. Qualitative analysis suggests that such processes are largely shaped by the institutional context where the boundary is embedded. This study found that while the highly bureaucratic operation of flood management creates constraints for feedback, the more informal arrangements set in place at the local level provide flexible platforms conducive to open communication, collaborative learning, and exchange of knowledge among the different actors. This study highlights the pivotal role of shadow systems that provide space for establishing and maintaining informal interactions and relationships between social actors (e.g., interactions between farmers and extension officials) in stimulating and influencing, from the bottom-up, the emergence of adaptive knowledge about flood management and adaptation in a local context.     

Integrated assessment of smallholder farming’s vulnerability to drought in the Brazilian Semi-arid: a case study in Ceará

Smallholder farming is among the most vulnerable sectors due to its great social and economic sensitivity. Despite future climate change, current climate variability is already an issue of concern that justifies adaptation efforts. In Brazil, the Semi-Arid Region is a climate hotspot, well known for both historic socioeconomic setbacks, and agriculture failures caused by dry spells and severe droughts. In 2010, the Brazilian government enacted the National Policy on Climate Change, which states as one of its key goals the identification of vulnerabilities and the adoption of adequate measures of adaptation to climate change. The improvement of vulnerability assessment tools is a response to the growing demand of decision makers for regular information and indicators with high spatial and temporal resolution. This article aims at undertaking a comparative assessment of smallholder farming’s vulnerability to droughts. An integrated assessment system has been developed and applied to seven municipalities located in the Brazilian Semi-Arid Region (within the State of Ceará). Results show regional vulnerability contrasts driven by institutional and socioeconomic factors, beyond climatic stressors.     

A spatio-temporal modelling framework for assessing the fluctuations of avalanche occurrence resulting from climate change: application to 60 years of data in the northern French Alps

Based on a previous township-scale model, a spatio-temporal framework is proposed to study the fluctuations of avalanche occurrence possibly resulting from climate change. The regional annual component is isolated from the total variability using a two-factor nonlinear analysis of variance. Moreover, relying on a Conditional AutoRegressive sub-model for the spatial effects, the structured time trend is distinguished from the random noise with different time series sub-models including autocorrelative, periodic and change-point models. The hierarchical structure obtained takes into account the uncertainty related to the estimation of the annual component for the quantification of the time trend. Bayesian inference is performed using Monte Carlo simulations. This allows a comparison of the different time series models and the prediction of future activity in an explicit unsteady context. Application to the northern French Alps illustrates the information provided by the model’s different components, mainly the spatial and temporal terms as well as the spatio-temporal fluctuation of the relative risk. For instance, it shows no strong modifications in mean avalanche activity or in the number of winters of low or high activity over the last 60 years. This suggests that climate change has recently had little impact on the avalanching rhythm in this region. However, significant temporal patterns are highlighted: a complex combination of abrupt changes and pseudo-periodic cycles of approximately 15 years. For anticipating the future response of snow avalanches to climate change, correlating them with fluctuations of the constraining climatic factors is now necessary.     

Situated adaptation: Tackling the production of vulnerability through transformative action in Sri Lanka’s Dry Zone

Drawing attention to the production of vulnerability across scales in Sri Lanka, we contribute to knowledge of why certain people and social groups are vulnerable. We build our contribution on the theoretical application of ‘situated adaptation’. A situated analytical approach identifies, assesses, and responds to the everyday realities and politics of those living in climate changed environments. It highlights uneven geographies of vulnerability and opportunity, while identifying new imaginations and possibilities for transformative action that counter the production of vulnerability. We illustrate the utility of ‘situated adaptation’ by filling an empirical gap relating to experiences of political-economic and environmental change in Sri Lanka’s Dry Zone. We detail situated experiences by drawing on field research in the Anuradhapura District, revealing how the lives and livelihoods of farmer participants are structured by a productivity-vulnerability paradox. We demonstrate how a prevalent adaptation-development paradigm (whereby development and adaptation programs co-exist in theory and practice) is unable to address the structural drivers of vulnerability in Sri Lanka’s Dry Zone. A situated adaptation approach both explains why this is the case and highlights opportunities for alternative transformative actions, potentially identifying a more democratic and egalitarian politics of co-determining socionatural change.     

‘This was different’: transferring climate mitigation knowledge practices south to south with the MAPS programme

This article is a case study of the Mitigation Action Plans and Scenarios programme (MAPS) which worked in climate change mitigation and development policy-making spaces in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru and South Africa from 2010–2015. The MAPS programme was focused on achieving change in the commitment of southern decision makers to mitigate against climate change through government-mandated, stakeholder processes which generated evidence making a case for a low carbon transition. The article draws on reflective materials generated in the last year of the project. The value of MAPS was found in the well-tested data and evidence-driven scenario building; locally specific and country-driven processes; a culture of knowledge sharing through facilitated communities of practice; the role of professional facilitation in process design and in conducting stakeholder processes; shared experiences of working in the south, and particularly with cultural differences and conflict; and new ways of working south–south with each other, and with donors. These MAPS programme experiences stood in contrast to previous north–south knowledge sharing involvements. Theoretically, the article asks whether MAPS represents southern theory-making (after Connell, 2007). It concludes that through the action-oriented, facilitated co-production way of working on climate change in the south, MAPS represents an understanding of southern theory that challenges the orthodoxy of global knowledge production. MAPS emphasizes the need for theorizing in, and of, the south, and connecting policy and practices.

Key policy insights

• Climate change mitigation work in the south faces poorly resourced, fragmented, under-capacitated governance structures, often in conflicted settings.

• Given conflicted settings, skilled facilitation is an integral part of knowledge-making processes.

• Strong local communities of practice, who undertake learning-by-doing and are connected to ‘stubborn’ development realities, are also key to knowledge-making.

• Intentional co-production of data and evidence enable peer-to-peer learning and the trust-building which is vital to strong communities of practice.

     

Use of the Köppen–Trewartha climate classification to evaluate climatic refugia in statistically derived ecoregions for the People’s Republic of China

Changes in climate as projected by state-of-the-art climate models are likely to result in novel combinations of climate and topo-edaphic factors that will have substantial impacts on the distribution and persistence of natural vegetation and animal species. We have used multivariate techniques to quantify some of these changes; the method employed was the Multivariate Spatio-Temporal Clustering (MSTC) algorithm. We used the MSTC to quantitatively define ecoregions for the People’s Republic of China for historical and projected future climates. Using the Köppen–Trewartha classification system we were able to quantify some of the temperature and precipitation relationships of the ecoregions. We then tested the hypothesis that impacts to environments will be lower for ecoregions that retain their approximate geographic locations. Our results showed that climate in 2050, as projected from anthropogenic forcings using the Hadley Centre HadCM3 general circulation model, were sufficient to create novel environmental conditions even where ecoregions remained spatially stable; cluster number was found to be of paramount importance in detecting novelty. Continental-scale analyses are generally able to locate potentially static ecoregions but they may be insufficient to define the position of those reserves at a grid cell-by-grid cell basis.     

Will coastal wetlands continue to sequester carbon in response to an increase in global sea level?: a case study of the rapidly subsiding Mississippi river deltaic plain

The highly visible coastal phenomenon of wetland loss in coastal Louisiana (LA) was examined through the prism of carbon accumulation and loss. Carbon storage or sequestration in rapidly subsiding LA coastal marsh soils was based on vertical marsh accretion and aerial change data. Marshes sequester significant amount of carbon through vertical accretion however, large amounts of carbon previously sequestration in the soil profile is lost through annual deterioration of these coastal marshes. Hurricanes, such as Katrina and Rita, have triggered instantaneous large carbon losses of sequestered soil carbon through the destruction of large areas of marsh. This analysis shows proposed coastal restoration efforts will not be sufficient to restore carbon losses by storms and marsh deterioration. Further, we have estimated the economic benefit of carbon sequestration for coastal wetland restoration efforts. Results show that LA coastal marshes may not serve as a net sink of carbon. These results may serve as a predictor of the impact of future predictions of increasing global sea level rise on carbon sequestration for other coastal regions.     

Transformational adaptation on the farm: Processes of change and persistence in transitions to ‘climate-smart’ regenerative agriculture

Regenerative agriculture, an alternative form of food and fiber production, concerns itself with enhancing and restoring resilient systems supported by functional ecosystem processes and healthy, organic soils capable of producing a full suite of ecosystem services, among them soil carbon sequestration and improved soil water retention. As such, climate change mitigation and adaptation are incidental to a larger enterprise that employs a systems approach to managing landscapes and communities. The transformative potential of regenerative agriculture has seen growing attention in the popular press, but few empirical studies have explored the processes by which farmers enter into, navigate, and, importantly, sustain the required paradigm shift in their approach to managing their properties, farm businesses, and personal lives. We draw on theories and insights associated with relational thinking to analyze the experiences of farmers in Australia who have undertaken and sustained transitions from conventional to regenerative agriculture. We present a conceptual framework of “zones of friction and traction” occurring in personal, practical, and political spheres of transformation that both challenge and facilitate the transition process. Our findings illustrate the ways in which deeply held values and emotions influence and interact with mental models, worldviews, and cultural norms as a result of regular monitoring; and how behavioral change is sustained through the establishment of self-amplifying positive feedbacks involving biophilic emotions, a sense of well-being, and an ever-expanding worldview. We conclude that transitioning to regenerative agriculture involves more than a suite of ‘climate-smart’ mitigation and adaptation practices supported by technical innovation, policy, education, and outreach. Rather, it involves subjective, nonmaterial factors associated with culture, values, ethics, identity, and emotion that operate at individual, household, and community scales and interact with regional, national and global processes. Findings have implications for strategies aimed at facilitating a large-scale transition to climate-smart regenerative agriculture.     

‘Green’ on the ground but not in the air: Pro-environmental attitudes are related to household behaviours but not discretionary air travel

The rise in greenhouse gas emissions from air travel could be reduced by individuals voluntarily abstaining from, or reducing, flights for leisure and recreational purposes. In theory, we might expect that people with pro-environmental value orientations and concerns about the risks of climate change, and those who engage in more pro-environmental household behaviours, would also be more likely to abstain from such voluntary air travel, or at least to fly less far. Analysis of two large datasets from the United Kingdom, weighted to be representative of the whole population, tested these associations. Using zero-inflated Poisson regression models, we found that, after accounting for potential confounders, there was no association between individuals’ environmental attitudes, concern over climate change, or their routine pro-environmental household behaviours, and either their propensity to take non-work related flights, or the distances flown by those who do so. These findings contrasted with those for pro-environmental household behaviours, where associations with environmental attitudes and concern were observed. Our results offer little encouragement for policies aiming to reduce discretionary air travel through pro-environmental advocacy, or through ‘spill-over’ from interventions to improve environmental impacts of household routines.     

Counter-conducts and the green grab: Forest peoples’ resistance to industrial resource extraction in the Saracá-Taquera National Forest,Brazilian Amazonia

This paper contributes to the theory of environmentality – the ‘conduct of conduct’ with regard to the environment – by incorporating Foucault’s notion of counter-conducts to elucidate the political subjectivities emergent from the performance of dissent in relation to different forms of power – sovereign, disciplinary and biopower – through which a spatialized rational-technical governmentality of ‘green’ mining and logging is enacted in Saracá-Taquera National Forest (FLONA), Brazilian Amazonia. We analyse the counter-conductive subjectivities emergent from forest peoples’ political articulation through identity categories riberinhos and quilombolas (enshrined in the 1988 Constitution and subsequent laws), claiming of rights to delimit areas of traditional use and ancestral territories, along with direct action, critical discourse and reassertion of agroecological knowledge against industrial resource extraction. To capture the dynamic relation of the conduct of conduct to counter-conducts we draw on a late Foucauldian model of a self, wherein his earlier focus on how the Panopticon shapes self-discipline is complemented by a turn to care for and ethics of the self - practices of freedom through which subjects have the potential to transcend self-discipline. We use this lens to illuminate two case-studies, one focusing on mining, the other on timber, exploring how in this protected area - which permits the ‘sustainable’ industrial extraction of natural resources - the state, companies and an NGO try to shape forest peoples as ‘green’ subjects. Counter-conducts provide the theory of environmentality with a broader perspective on resistance foregrounding the production of political subjectivities in dissent whilst breaking with the resistance-domination binary.     

A statistical�Cdynamical scheme for reconstructing ocean forcing in the Atlantic. Part II: methodology, validation and application to high-resolution ocean models

A novel statistical?Cdynamical scheme has been developed to reconstruct the sea surface atmospheric variables necessary to force an ocean model. Multiple linear regressions are first built over a so-called learning period and over the entire Atlantic basin from the observed relationship between the surface wind conditions, or predictands, and the anomalous large scale atmospheric circulations, or predictors. The latter are estimated in the extratropics by 500?hPa geopotential height weather regimes and in the tropics by low-level wind classes. The transfer function further combined to an analog step is then used to reconstruct all the surface variables fields over 1958?C2002. We show that the proposed hybrid scheme is very skillful in reproducing the mean state, the seasonal cycle and the temporal evolution of all the surface ocean variables at interannual timescale. Deficiencies are found in the level of variance especially in the tropics. It is underestimated for 2-m temperature and humidity as well as for surface radiative fluxes in the interannual frequency band while it is slightly overestimated at higher frequency. Decomposition in empirical orthogonal function (EOF) shows that the spatial and temporal coherence of the forcing fields is however very well captured by the reconstruction method. For dynamical downscaling purposes, reconstructed fields are then interpolated and used to carry out a high-resolution oceanic simulation using the NATL4 (1/4°) model integrated over 1979?C2001. This simulation is compared to a reference experiment where the original observed forcing fields are prescribed instead. Mean states between the two experiments are virtually undistinguishable both in terms of surface fluxes and ocean dynamics estimated by the barotropic and the meridional overturning streamfunctions. The 3-dimensional variance of the simulated ocean is well preserved at interannual timescale both for temperature and salinity except in the tropics where it is underestimated. The main modes of interannual variability assessed through EOF are correctly reproduced for sea surface temperature, barotropic streamfunction and mixed layer depth both in terms of spatial structure and temporal evolution. Collectively, our results provide evidence that the statistical?Cdynamical scheme presented in this two-part study is an efficient and promising tool to infer oceanic changes (in particular those related to the wind-driven circulation) due to modifications in the large-scale atmospheric circulation. As a prerequisite, we have here validated the method for present-day climate; we encourage its use for climate change studies with some adaptations though.     

“It won't be any good to have democracy if we don’t have a country”: Climate change and the politics of synecdoche in the Maldives

Critical attention has recently turned to the climate change “synecdoche”: a place uniquely exposed to the environmental consequences of climate crisis, such as sea-level rise, that becomes a stand-in for the global crisis as a whole and a harbinger of more widespread disaster. The Maldives, which scientists, politicians, and activists predict could be completely submerged by 2100, filled that role between the 2008 inauguration of Mohamed Nasheed, the country's first democratically elected president after years of authoritarian rule, and his 2012 ouster. This ethnography of the Maldivian challenge to climate change asks how claiming a geopolitical identity as the world’s “canary in the coalmine” fostered an emerging internal political culture.I argue that arming climate change solutions became a state-making device in the Maldives, whose fragile coral atoll ecosystem itself became the synecdoche of a young democracy. Between 2008 and 2012, how was environmental knowledge creation understood as a democratic activity? To answer this question, I draw on ethnographic interview testimony and participant-observation in Malé, the Maldivian capital, with politicians, activists, and city residents, as well as an analysis of the Nasheed administration’s public rhetoric. The article centers on the case of Bluepeace, the country’s oldest environmental NGO, which has seen significant international publicity. Following Bluepeace’s efforts to help the Maldives achieve carbon neutrality by 2020—part of Nasheed’s plan to end global climate change through exemplary national sacrifice—this article finds that climate problem solving and democracy were put to work for one another through small-scale mitigation and adaptation experiments.     

“We don’t tell people what to do”: An examination of the factors influencing NGO decisions to campaign for reduced meat consumption in light of climate change

To date, efforts by non-governmental organizations to encourage reduced meat consumption in light of climate change have been quite limited, particularly among environmental non-governmental organizations. This study sought to examine the factors influencing non-governmental organization decisions to establish and sustain dedicated public education and/or policy advocacy campaigns on this issue. More specifically, a grounded theory approach was used to examine environmental, food-focused, and animal protection non-governmental organizations in the U.S., Sweden, and Canada. Results indicate that the relatively limited degree of engagement is primarily attributable to the fact that few non-governmental organization staffers felt that addressing meat consumption within a climate change context was a part of their core missions. Reduced meat consumption was also seen as an issue with limited social and political appeal. Further, many environmental non-governmental organizations appeared to be reluctant to mount campaigns explicitly encouraging personal behavior change of any type. Cross- non-governmental organization collaboration or the creation of additional non-governmental organizations with missions focused on this specific issue may be needed to increase the level of campaigning on this issue.