WOULD YOU LIKE TO JOIN THIS PATH ? CLICK HERE
The world is facing unprecedented climate challenges.Many of those challenges can be directly
directly connected to human activity.unchecked industrialization, unplanned urbanization,
unregulated drilling, overfishing and bottom trawling,deforestation, strip mining, fracking, the list goes on.So humanity is faced with a choice:continue on an unsustainable trajectory
or stop and think.Stop and listen, stop and learn from nature.Nature offers multiple solutions to the many problems facing humanity today,
and there is perhaps still time to apply them.But time is running outand the need for action is immediate.This course offers an overview of nature-based solutions toone of the greatest challenges humanity faces: climate change and the increasing frequency and violence of the events that
that change is driving.It is an opportunity to learn, but it is also an opportunity
for you to interact with experts in the field,get involved in nature based initiatives and propose nature
and propose nature-based solutions of your own.My name is Nathalie Doswald and together with my colleagues Xinyue Gu and Mikhail Fernandes, we will be guiding you through
this exciting new course, nature-based solutions for
disaster and climate resilience.Whether you are a civil society organization or youth leader,
a faith based leader, policymaker, researcher, engineer or just a business owner,
this short online course will provide you with jargon-free,clearly articulated ideas and concrete examples that will
enable you to better understand what is at stake, what the solutions are, and how you can learn more and engage
Our first question is, how does nature provide solutions to
reducing the impacts of the climate crisis?
As the climate crisis intensifies,
disaster events are increasing around the world.
These are partly due to climate change,
partly due to the way in which we manage or mismanage our land
and natural resources.
This course will provide you with a better understanding of
what causes disasters such as floods and landslides,
what can be done to reduce them, and how to help communities adapt to
climate change and better withstand its harmful effects.
Nature-based solutions for climate and disaster resilience
are already being implemented worldwide,
and many can be scaled to have a global impact.
As this course will show, nature-based solutions
are sustainable, cost effective and beneficial
in multiple ways.
They can be applied to a range of challenges
from reducing carbon emissions
to solving societal problems such as
income inequality, food security
and other inequities.
For example, they may present many opportunities
for achieving better health.
It is known, for example, that bringing greenery into
urban areas strengthens the immune system
and promotes better mental health.
Or better management of ecosystems can prevent
the emergence of pathogens like COVID-19.
We need to work with nature rather than against it,
and now is the time to start.
Civil society and young people are calling
for fundamental change in the way we interact with
the natural world,
demanding that governments,
UN agencies and the international community as a whole
join efforts to address the climate and biodiversity
emergency our planet is facing.
Applying nature-based solutions is as crucial to meeting
those demands as it is vital to achieving
the Sustainable Development Goals.
Nature is much, much older than we are and will be around
long after we are gone.
By working with rather than against Nature
we improve our chances of following it,
at least some of the way, into what will undoubtedly be
a brilliant future.
So let's get started.
Why is this topic important?
The climate and environmental crises are unprecedented. Citizens and grassroot organisations around the world are requesting that governments, private sector and all consumers take action. • Extreme weather: Climate change has resulted in a change in frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. In 2019, extreme weather events (storms, heat/cold waves, droughts, floods, wildfires) affected more than 100 million people (EM-DAT).
• Disasters: Disasters have increased in the last 20 years (2000-2019). In the period 2000 to 2019, there were 7,348 major recorded disaster events compared to 4,212 between 1980-1999. Climate-related disasters have increased the most, accounting for 6,681 events (UNDRR, 2020). • Biodiversity loss: Natural ecosystems have declined by 47 per cent on average, relative to their earliest estimated states and approximately 25 per cent of species are already threatened with extinction (IPBES, 2019). Nature provides many solutions to keeping us healthy and reducing the climate crisis. • Nature reduces the climate crisis by sequestering and storing carbon in biomass, which reduces the greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere. • Nature protects us from hazards by providing barriers against storm surges and stabilizing soils on slopes, preventing landslides. • Nature keeps us healthy through fresh air, food, water, and boosts our mood. This course will provide you with new ideas, knowledge, sources of information and a community of practice for learning more and getting involved. • Connect with the Partnership for Environment and Disaster Risk Reduction (PEDRR) • Connect with the Global Adaptation Network (GAN) • Connect with the Friends of Ecosystem-based Adaptation (FEBA)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Water Pollution in Padang, Indonesia--The stream in this video is right at sea level, so during biannual high tides the communities along its banks are flooded with a toxic mix of urban chemical runoff and human waste.
- How might people living in this area benefit from coastal ecosystem services? How might this impact their decision to stay in this area with known hazards?
- What Nature-based Solutions (or hybrid solutions, i.e. combined with civil engineering) could be used to improve this area?
****************
In the two preceding units,
we talked about what nature-based solutions are
and how they can help communities increase their
resilience to disaster and climate risks.
In this unit,
we will start by outlining some of the main challenges related
to climate change and disasters.
Whether you live in a city on a coastal plain or on the top of a
or on the top of a mountain, in an inland desert, or anywhere in between,
the chances are you have already seen some of the changes in the climate.
This might take the form of more frequent storms and floods,
more intense heat waves and extended droughts.
Another challenge may simply be a shift in seasonal temperatures
that alters the way plants and animals around you grow and behave.
Your experience of those events will vary depending on whether
you live in a city or in the country, and whether the community
in which you live has developed strategies that help you and
your loved ones to cope.
For the sake of simplicity,
we are going to focus on three distinct settings:
urban, coastal and drylands.
For all their benefits, cities pose a number of challenges to
their human populations, both in terms of climate-related risks
and exposure to hazard events.
This is a problem for a number of reasons,
one of the most obvious being the sheer number of people living in them.
According to the most recent estimates and using
updated definitions, around 5.6 billion people live
in urban areas and the number is expected to increase.
Built for the most part with steel and concrete,
cities are tremendous absorbers and retainers of heat.
They may often be cool places to live, but they're typically
significantly warmer than their surroundings.
This can make them uncomfortable places to be, and during
heat waves, potentially dangerous for certain groups of people,
notably the elderly or infirm.
Home to most of the planet's traffic,
as well as a good deal of the planet's industry,
they typically have poor air quality, a significant health
hazard that accounts for an estimated seven million deaths
every year, according to the World Health Organization.
Because cities concentrate populations, often forcing people to
live close together and in unsanitary conditions, especially in
the unplanned urban developments that surround cities in
many developing countries,
they can also act as amplifiers of infectious
disease outbreaks, accelerating disease transmission.
This phenomenon has been widely observed in the COVID-19 pandemic.
Generally located on or near coasts
or on the banks of the rivers,
cities are also more likely to be impacted by floods, storms,
hurricanes and tsunamis.
In the past two years, Venice, Delhi and Sydney all been
affected by disasters ranging from heat waves to floods.
Rising sea level is exacerbating some of these problems
and is already impacting some cities.
For example, Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, which has a
population of nearly 10 million people, is being relocated at a
cost of 33 billion US dollars because of
land subsidence, which has made it even more vulnerable to sea
level rise and flooding.
More often than not, urban development involves significant
degradation or destruction of the ecosystems that could play an
important role in reducing exposure to different hazards.
While there are nature-based solutions to the challenges faced
by cities, putting them into effect is not always easy.
This is because of the population density, the pollution and the
limitations in space, expanding and restoring natural areas that
categorise urban environments.
But there are a growing number of examples of how they have been
put into practice.
Around 40% of the world's population
lives within 100 km of the coast.
People are drawn to coastal areas because of the economic
benefits that accrue from access to transoceanic trade,
coastal fisheries, tourism and recreation.
Unfortunately, coastal areas are particularly exposed to climate
and disaster risks, including hurricanes and cyclones, tsunamis,
coastal flooding and sea surges.
In many cases, these risks are exacerbated by the degradation of
coastal wetlands, mangroves and coral reefs that can result from
poorly planned or unplanned development.
It is therefore vital to be mindful of the particular ecosystem
requirements of coastal areas, recognizing, for example,
that while mangrove and reef based fisheries provide food and
livelihood on which many coastal communities rely.
To be sustainable, those communities must work with rather than
against the ecosystem that surrounds them.
It has been estimated that by 2050, sea level rise will push
average annual coastal floods higher than land that is currently
home to 300 million people, while high tides could permanently
rise above land currently occupied by over 150 million people.
Locations likely to bear the brunt of sea level rise include the
Pearl River Delta in China, Jakarta in Indonesia and
Bangkok in Thailand.
Meeting this challenge will obviously require action on many
fronts and will increase pressure to mitigate climate change.
Drylands make up 41 percent of the earth's land surface and are
home to a third of the world's population,
mostly in developing countries.
Dryland ecosystems include deserts, grasslands,
shrublands and woodlands, which provide important
ecosystem benefits, including water regulation, carbon storage
and provision of fiber, timber, bioenergy and food.
While high in cultural and ecological diversity, drylands are
characterized by low agricultural productivity and low
soil moisture content.
For these reasons, they are prone to degradation and
desertification and are extremely vulnerable to human activity
and climate change.
Desertification is a major threat to people living in drylands,
the phenomenon impacting both settlements and livelihoods.
Climate scientists predict that global drylands will expand by
up to 10% under a high greenhouse gas emission scenario
by the end of the 21st century, with as much as 80% of
this expansion occurring in developing countries.
Because drylands store 46 percent of the world's carbon,
the sustainable management is also vital
to mitigating climate change.
Applying nature based solutions and drylands is challenging
because of the often harsh conditions encountered there.
However, it is in drylands that nature-based solutions can
perhaps have the greatest impact.
So what solutions does nature provide to tackle such complex challenges?
We will be seeking to answer that question in the next lecture video.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
If you live in a city, you have probably experienced this yourself,
you walk into a park and it's cooler than the surrounding streets.
This is because the materials of which cities are made
absorb, store and radiate heat.
What is true of parks is true of rural areas, which tend to be
significantly cooler than cities.
Research tells us that parks can reduce ambient daytime temperature
by an average of 0.94°C;
while average night-time reduction is around 1.15°C.
Establishing parks with plenty of trees is thus a widely accepted
measure to combat urban heat.
Parks with their plants, trees and shrubs can also act as bio filters
for polluted air while serving as water retention areas in the case
of stormwater or riverine flooding
(thus reducing the need for grey, or engineered, infrastructure investments).
Parks can also be combined with community gardens to provide
locally-grown food and areas for community interaction.
Green buildings with green roofs are another recognized measure
reducing urban rainwater runoff and cooling buildings.
Investment in green infrastructure can also yield
important environmental benefits.
Such initiatives will be increasingly necessary as climate change
continues to drive up global temperatures.
Many cities are using nature-based solutions
to deal with climate and disaster risk.
While compelling, the implementation of nature-based solutions
to increasing disaster and climate resilience is not without its challenges.
For example, nature-based solutions in cities may be difficult to
implement because of competition for space.
Hybrid approaches, which combine blue-green infrastructure with
grey engineering structures
may be the most effective in this context, such as permeable pavements
and bioswale drainage.
Implementing such measures requires ecologists,
engineers and urban planners to work together.
In China, for example, 30 cities have adopted
the Sponge City concept, which, as the name suggests,
involves rendering urban environments more permeable.
By 2030, the participating cities must ensure that 80 percent of
their urban lands absorb and reuses at least 70 percent
of their rain that falls on them.
In many cases, city development requires a consideration of
surrounding areas, since challenges like dealing with floods and
ensuring clean water need to be tackled upstream,
while the waste that
cities discharge will often have an impact downstream.
In Seattle, the Street Edge Alternatives project uses bioswales,
channels designed to concentrate and convey stormwater runoff
while removing debris and pollution.
The Mexican city of Xalapa is banking on ecosystem-based adaptation to
reduce landslides and floods with the help of UNEP.
This is part of the five-year, CityAdapt initiative,
which has been rolled out across Latin America and the Caribbean
to support cities in their efforts to adapt to climate change.
One of the main activities is reforesting areas surrounding the city
to improve the watershed and promote rainwater harvesting systems in
public buildings and schools.
Coastal ecosystems play a critical role in protecting and
maintaining coastlines, for example, mangroves, coral reefs and
seagrasses absorb wave energy, filter sediments
and reduce storm surges.
More than just being a buffer zone,
they are part of dynamic processes that generate,
trap and distribute sediment across shorelines.
Coastal species such as parrot fish also contribute to the generation
of sediment by secreting sand.
Oyster reefs can also reduce shoreline erosion,
while beaches, sandbanks, and dunes serve as
physical buffers to damaging waves.
Actions to reduce pressure on coastal habitats and species such as
fisheries management and pollution control can play a vital role in
increasing the health and resilience of ecosystems.
While a variety of restoration techniques exist
for areas that have been degraded,
in many cases nature-based solutions applied to coastal
ecosystems provide multiple benefits.
Take, for example, the sand dunes in Yala National Park in Sri Lanka,
which protected the shoreline from the 2004 tsunami,
an example we mentioned back in Unit One.
The park is also a haven for endangered species and generates jobs as
a major tourist destination.
Nature-based solutions to reducing disaster and climate risk
start with drawing up a long term plan for the coastline, which might
also include the watershed or estuary that brings fresh water and
harbors the fish and food that people depend upon.
Nature-based initiatives work best where local governments
collaborate with local communities, including fisherwomen and men,
tourism operators and others to manage trade offs
in full consultation.
Such an approach is known as integrated coastal zone management,
something that we talked about back in Unit Two.
Peatlands do not always receive the attention they deserve.
Peatlands are a type of wetlands which only covers 3 percent of the world,
but they store more carbon than any other type of vegetation.
They are thus crucial in climate change mitigation efforts.
Unfortunately, when drained and degraded due to fires,
agricultural conversion or overexploitation, peatlands become carbon
sources instead of sinks, releasing CO2 into the atmosphere.
This is one of the reasons why Indonesia, the country with the
largest coverage of tropical peatlands in the world, has invested in
a national scale program to restore its peatlands.
To support these governmental efforts,
organizations such as Wetlands International are playing a key role
in the design of efficient restoration practices and
development of the approaches, allowing and upscaling of peatland restoration.
Peat restoration efforts are carried out via three approaches
rewetting, revegetation and revitalizing local livelihoods,
offering alternatives in monocultures such as palm oil plantations.
There are a number of nature-based solutions for tackling the
challenges faced by drylands, notably among them sustainable land
management practices that are used to combat desertification
and to restore land, soil, water and vegetation.
The application of sustainable land and rangelands management,
including careful management of water sources combined with
water-conserving, tilling practices and rangeland restoration,
has been shown to increase crop yields by between 30-170 percent.
One of the main initiatives to combat desertification in the Sahel
and Sahara in Africa is the Great Green Wall Initiative.
This initiative brings together African countries and international
partners under the leadership of the African Union Commission
and Pan-African Agency of the Great Green Wall.
Since its launch in 2007,
major progress has been made in restoring the fertility
of Sahelian lands.
In some instances, hybrid approaches, integrating engineered and
green infrastructure approaches are being used to
meet significant challenges.
This is the case in Oman, for example, where the city of Al-Amarat,
in the northeast of the country, which depends on the Al-Amarat watershed
for its water supply, is faced with increasing demand due to
population growth, while climate change driven extreme flash flood events
are increasing in frequency with disastrous consequences for
the urban communities downstream.
To tackle this problem, a system of seven dams has been
built to ensure water supply, as well as protection from flash flood events,
A revegetation scheme along the stream helps reduce
soil erosion, provides habitat for the local fauna, and acts as a
water cleaning and filtering medium, providing clean water for
domestic and agricultural services.
Clean water will also flow to a natural mangrove reserve downstream,
which plays an important role in protecting the coastal communities
from hazards such as storms while supporting various species
of fish, crabs and birds.
This unit has highlighted three broad categories of natural
environments that are particularly affected by climate and disaster risks.
There are obviously many more, and in many cases they are not quite
so clear cut and separate.
We hope that this unit has nevertheless given you some idea of the
approaches being used to leverage the power of the natural world and
that it will inspire you to think about the challenges surrounding
your community and of the new approaches to tackling them.
No comments:
Post a Comment