climateadaptation

Climate adaptation is the process of adjusting systems, activities, and structures to reduce vulnerability to climate-related hazards and to take advantage of potential opportunities arising from climate change. It is distinct from mitigation, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Adaptation spans natural and human systems and includes both near-term measures and long-term strategies. It is complementary to mitigation, which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Common adaptation actions include building or upgrading flood defenses, improving water supply reliability, changing agricultural practices, designing heat-resilient cities, and strengthening health systems to cope with heat waves and vector-borne diseases.

Governance and finance: National Adaptation Plans, adaptation funding from governments and multilateral institutions, and private sector investments support these efforts. Measuring progress uses vulnerability assessments, risk analyses, and indicators of resilience.

Challenges: uneven distribution of costs and benefits, capacity gaps, data limitations, politics, and risk of maladaptation if actions worsen other vulnerabilities. Nature-based solutions and ecosystem-based adaptation offer co-benefits but require proper planning.

In policy, climate adaptation is part of climate resilience, sustainable development, and disaster risk reduction. It emphasizes integrating adaptation into planning across sectors and scales.