Nepal’s adaptation to climate change goes local

Gulf Times: In the next few months Nepal will start implementing local adaptation plans for climate vulnerable communities in its impoverished far-and mid-western region under the National Adaptation Programme of Action (NAPA).

NAPA, submitted to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, provides a process for least developed countries to identify priority activities that respond to their urgent and immediate needs to adapt to climate change, and are seen by many as a defining step towards delivering climate finance to those most vulnerable.

There is a lot of global discussion around climate change, but “what there is a real shortage of, is practical implementation experience,” Simon Lucas, climate change and inclusive growth adviser at the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) in Nepal, told IRIN. “The world is watching these sorts of approaches.”

Nepal was the first country in the world to officially endorse a Local Adaptation Plan of Action (LAPA) as part of its 2010 NAPA framework. The bottom-up approach will be Nepal’s first attempt at translating central-level climate adaptation plans into tangible projects on the ground, including input from vulnerable communities.

“Government actions on climate change so far are focused at the international and national level. There are no specific actions at the local level,” noted a study conducted in 2010 to inform the LAPA piloting phase.

The government adopted a national LAPA framework in 2010, based on pilots conducted with DFID support in 10 of the country’s 75 districts. Nepal is now finalising designs for 70 village-level LAPAs to address the needs of 400,000 people in 14 mid- and far-western districts, as part of a $21mn commitment by DFID and the European Union....

Imja Lake and glacier, shot by Daniel Alton Byers, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license