Event Description
Climate change has wide-ranging and complex impacts on water resources. These impacts have potentially huge implications on the agricultural, drinking water and energy sectors, public health, and ecosystem functionality. While this is particularly true in the regions of the world least able to cope with the impacts of climate change, the water management challenges posed by climate change will be universal.

The nature and extent of a given community's vulnerability is a function of socio-economic characteristics, such as wealth inequality and marginalisation, population growth, social instability, inequality and conflict, environmental degradation, and housing conditions and growth. The vulnerability of a particular ecosystem is variable in time and space and is related both to climate pressures and community responses to their particular vulnerabilities. Water and how it is managed, presents one of the more significant opportunities to enhance resilience and adapt to present and future climate variability. Prudent water management can moderate the effect of hydrological extremes, provide the basic platform for livelihoods and economic development, reduce the fluctuations in production, and sustain ecosystems.  Prudent water management is not likely to occur under current planning paradigms that rest heavily on the assumption of climatic and hydrologic stationarity.
 
Drawing on current water resources management and climate change expertise and experience from selected regions, both in the developed and developing worlds, this seminar will examine vulnerability, discuss appropriate analytical tools, consider the relevance to the practice of water resources management and explore practical interventions and policy actions.


Programme

Chairs: Dr. Peter G. McCornick, Duke University, USA, Dr. David Purkey, SEI, USA, and Mr. Pieter van Eijk, WI, Netherlands

This event is part of the two day focus on Water and Climate. See all related events below:

Day 1
2009-08-19 09:00 - 10:30 Opening Session
Opening Session:Reassessing our Knowledge: Are We Ready to do the Right Thing?

2009-08-19 11:00- 12:30 Morning Seminar
Climate Change Vulnerability in Water Management: Setting the Stage for Action

2009-08-19 12:45 - 13:45 Lunch Side Event
Separate Streams? Integrating Climate Change Adaptation with Water Management

2009-08-19 14:00 - 17:30 Afternoon Seminar
IWRM as a Practical Approach to Climate Change Adaptation

2009-08-19 17:45 - 18:45 Evening Side Event
Bridging the Water and Climate Change Agendas: Raising the Profile of Water in the UNFCCC Negotiations

Day 2
2009-08-20 09:00 - 10:30 Morning Seminar
Financing Mechanisms to Make Funding Available for Adaptation Measures

2009-08-20 11:00 - 12:30 Morning Seminar
From Theory to Reality: Sustainable Water Management in an Uncertain Climate

2009-08-20 12:45 - 13:45 Lunch Side Event
Why Tackling Water, Energy and Climate Change Together Makes Business Sense

2009-08-20 12:45 - 13:45 Lunch Side Event
Presenting the African-European Parliamentary Dialogue on Climate Change

2009-08-20 14:00 - 15:30 Afternoon Seminar
Getting the Politics Right - Towards Stronger Collective Action on Water and Climate Change Impacts at COP-15 and Beyond


Event Summary and Conclusions
This seminar drew on expertise and experience from selected regions, both in the developed and developing worlds, to examine appropriate analytical tools, practical interventions, and policy actions that optimize water resource management in responding to climate change uncertainty and vulnerability.  Peter McCornick, Director of Water Policy at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute, provided context for the seminar through an example of water policy strategies for reducing vulnerability and enhancing adaptation to climate change and other changing circumstances, specifically population and economic growth, in the Ganges basin.  He presented some of the general barriers to implementing such strategies, including data and information constraints, the critical technical and human capacity at various scales, and the challenges posed by the socio-political setting.  David Purkey, Senior Scientist at Stockholm Environment Institute, further set the stage for action through an analysis of a decision support tool, the XRLM framework, that improves water management capacity under uncertain climate and water conditions.  This framework was applied in California’s El Dorado Irrigation District to analyze and communicate complex climate change information for improved decision making.

The other case studies applied a variety of analytical tools to improve decision making under uncertain conditions in the developing world.  Sushil Bajpai, Director of the Watershed Organization Trust (WOTR), described a large scale community-based capacity building program that encompasses hundreds of India’s watersheds, where an adaptive management approach to reduce vulnerability to changing circumstances has been applied.  The WOTR Project Adjustment Tool integrates livelihoods and project-specific data with new climate change information to appropriately adjust program activities and ensure sustainable coping strategies in the face of changing circumstances.  Chris Baker, head of Wetlands International Wetlands and Water Program, discussed the response of water infrastructure planning to climate change vulnerability in the Inner Niger Delta, Mali and introduced a model that is working to align community and scientific knowledge to help communities adapt to flooding events in the delta.  Lastly, Radhika Dave of Conservation International applied a stakeholder analysis in the development of an adaptation action plan that can facilitate both ecosystem and human adaptation in Madagascar’s climate sensitive regions and sectors.

There were a number of key messages as an end result of this seminar.  The presentations all indicated that effective water management is not likely to occur under current planning and management paradigms that, among other things, rest heavily on the assumption of climatic and hydrologic stationarity.  As such, there is a need to develop new planning frameworks and methods that produce outcome that can work well across a number of scenarios and uncertainties.  The presenters provided case studies of projects working to move scientific uncertainty into the practical process, with a finding that water resource managers need to learn from emerging tools and case studies, and continue to improve upon these processes through adaptive management and flexibility.