Hao Li-PRoACC-Proposal-Ver.1-28 May

PRoACC

Research proposal

on

Institutional Adaptation Strategies to Climate risk in the Lancang River Basin

By

Hao Li

Engineer

ChangjiangRiver Scientific Research Institute

Wuhan, Hubei, China

UNESCO-IHE Mentors:

Prof Meine Pieter van Dijk

Prof Joyeeta Gupta

22June 2010

1. Introduction

a. Project title:

Institutional Adaptation Strategies to Climate risk in the LancangRiver Basin

b. Acronym

ADAPT-Lancang

c. Location of the research

The proposed study will be conducted in Sipsong Panna and Pu’er in Yunnan province along the gradient of the LancangRiver Basin.

d. Participating partners

Roles / Output[1]
Partner 1: / ChangjiangRiver Scientific Research Institute / Overall implementation of the research activities / LRB 1
LRB 2
LRB 3
LRB 4
LRB 5
Acronym: / CRSR
Address: / No. 23 Huangpu Avenue, wuhan, Hubei ,China
Type of organization: / Academic institution
Partner 2: / Changjiang Water Resources Commission / Consult on institutional and policy framework; / LRB 2
LRB 4
LRB 5
Acronym: / CWRC
Address: / No. 1863 Jiefang Avenue, Wuhan, Hubei ,China
Type of organization: / Government
Partner 3: / Yunnan Water Science Institute / Assist in conducting household and community survey;
Participate in project as stakeholder; / LRB 1
Acronym: / YWSI
Address: / Guangfu tower, kunming, Yunnan, China
Type of organization: / Academic institution

e. Project Idea and Concept:

The LancangRiver Basinis experiencing a significant change in temperature and precipitation. In order to address the water scarcity and drought, not only government but also other organizations have design policies or apply measures to facilitate adaptations. But some times, the structure of local institutions hamper the adaptation practices,and the result of adaptation will increase inequity in communities. So,it’s important for policy makers to systematically and comprehensively understand the technical and social capacities of institutions to formulate and implement strategies of adaptation to water scarcity and drought caused by climate change risks in rural area of the LRB.

Our Primary research questionsare: What roles do local institutions play in the multi-level institutions to adapt to water resources scarcity or drought caused by climate change/variation in the rural area of the LRB? To what extent does multi-level institutions have capacity to adapt to climate risk?

Our main two hypotheses are (1) the incentives, such as subsidies, have a positive influence on adaptation practices; Characteristics of local institutions determine adaptation practices at the local level.

Accordingly, our conceptual frame work is organized around several core concepts: institution, adaptation, adaptation capacity, and the institutional adaptation capacity.Institutions are humanly created formal and informal mechanisms that shape social and individual expectations, interactions, and behavior (Ostrom 1990). Institutions structure and shape outcomes through the actions of individuals and decision makers associated with them. Institutions influence the livelihoods and adaptation of rural households in three important ways. ( Agrawal and Perrin, 2008)

Adaptation is understood as adjustment in natural or human systems in response to actual or expected climatic stimuli or their effects, which moderates harm or exploits beneficial opportunities. (IPCC, 2001) And adaptive capacity follows the definition of IPCC (2001, 2007) as: “The ability of a system to adjust to climate change (including climate variability and extremes) to moderate potential damages, to take advantage of opportunities, or to cope with the consequences”

The institutions are not directlyexposed to climate risk, thus the adaptive capacity of an institutionshould be understood as theability to perform functions that facilitate the adaptive capacity of their constituencies. So we defined the institutional adaptive capacity as “ability (of a certain country) to mobilize and/or adapt itsinstitutions to address a policy issue, as climate change” (Willems,2004).In this research, institutions are rules and practices. Rules are formal institutions and practices are informal institutions.

Climate change is a multi-level problem, so the institution to deal with climate risk is also multi-level. The linkage of mutil-level institutions by the method of subsidies is very important in adaptation practices. Except for climate stimuli, the household and communityreceive the incentives from the policy designed by government and the driving forces from biophysical and socio-economic contexts. The local institutions will shape these outside forces and organize the adaptation which will effect on the level and distribution of livelihood and human behaviour. These also will be the incentives to redesign policy and institutions (Fig. 1).

Figure 1. Conceptual framework showing the role of institution to the adaptive capacities

2. Description of the research project

a. Rationale and background

The Lancang River Basin (LRB) is prone to drought and water scarcity caused by seasonal alterative monsoon. In recent 50 years, the LRB have experienced a significanttemperatureand precipitation changingin terms of time and space distribution(Yiping and Yunling, 2005). And this trend will intensify in future under the climate change(Snidvongs, et. al., 2003). Along with karst landform, undeveloped economy make the household and community in rural more vulnerable when ecological and social systems expose to changes or variation of climate. Because the characteristic of undeveloped economy, such as limited financial, institutional and human resource, and high ecosystem-dependent economic and livelihood activities, abate the capacity of household and community to adopt adaptations (IPCC, 2007).

Throughout human history, institutions (social patterns) are important for addressing and mitigating factors of insecurity and instability, dealing in particular with various aspects of vulnerability (Uphoff et. al.,2006).Therefore, understanding the institutional capacity to adaptationin the LRB will contribute to the adaptation research and policy making, especially from the viewer of local institution.In order to understand the institutional capacity, the researches have been conducted as follows:

(1) Research on the framework of multi-level governances and their interconnections. The climate change is a multi-scare problem both in terms of administrative levels and time-scales (Willink, 1991).On the one hand, up-scaling and centralization appear to be attractive policy strategies for dealing withclimate change (Kwadijk, Klijn & Van Drunen 2006), but on the other hand, downscaling the issue and understanding what sort of measures need to be taken in specific contexts is critical to find the appropriate set of consistent and complementary measures that work at different administrative levels.

(2) The linkage of local institution with external interventions. In this multi-level institution system, local Institutionsplay a very important role in mediating external interventions into local contexts (Diazet al.,2005) and articulate between local and extra-local social and political process through which adaptation efforts unfold(Diaz,2008). The research based on UNFCCC database has proved that different types of institution determine its role in adaptation practices and multi-level institution system (Agrawal and Perrin, 2008;Pittmanet al.,2009).Obviously, the key points when we try to understand the institutional capacity are linkage relationship between local institution and external institutions, and the role of different kind of local institution playing in adaptations.

(3) How to assess the institutional capacity. Although many institutional dimensions, such as variety(Nooteboom 2006; Pahl-Wostl 2009; Duit & Galaz 2008; Armitage 2008;), learning capacity(Pelling & High 2005;Olson et al. 2004;Carpenter et al. 2001; Marshal & Marshal 2007), room for autonomous change(Milman & Short 2008; Polsky et al. 2007;Smit et al. 2000;Armitage 2005), leadership(Pielke 1998; Goldfinsh & ‘t Hart 2003; Marlin et al. 2007;Termeer 2009), resources(Biermann 2007;Nelson et al. 2010; Yohe et al. 1996; Yohe & Tol 2002), fair governance(Haddad 2005; Botchway 2001;Biermann 2007), have been considered in assessment of adaptive capacity, there’s little research give a whole picture of institutions on their ability to enhance the adaptive capacity of society (WRR 2006). Recently, a method, namely “Adaptive Capacity Wheel” (Gupta, forthcoming), has been appliedto assess the institutional capacity adaptation in the Netherlands.

So, the knowledge gaps are (1) Until now, there is seldom knowledge about the role of local institutions, the framework of multi-level institutions and capacity in adaptation to CC in the LRBuntil now, and (2) there is no general knowledge about institutional capacity of adaptation to address climate risk for the assessments were all based on case study using different criterions and method, and the results weren’t comparable.

b. Problem statement & research questions:

Our overall research questions are: What roles do local institutions play in the multi-level institution system to adapt to water resources scarcity or drought caused by climate change/variation in the rural area of the LRB?To what extentdoesmulti-level institutions have capacity to adapt to climate risk?

The five formulated sub-research questions are:

(1)What are impacts of climate change on water sector in rural area of the LRB?

(2)What is the institutional and policy framework in multi-level to address climate risk in water sector of the LRB?

(3)What are the adaptation strategies that can be access or have been applied by households and communities to address the increased risk of water resources scarcity and drought in the rural area of LRB? How do multi-level policy and institution impact on them?

(4)How do biophysical, socio-economic context and other driving forces affect on applying of adaptation strategies? How do different adaptations affect on the level and distributions of livelihood?

(5)What’s the capacity of institutions to react to climate change? What are defects of these institutions that need to improve? Hence what strategies should be developed by farmers and government to realize it?

c. Overall & specific objectives

The goal of our project is to develop a systematic and comprehensive understanding of the technical and social capacities of institutions to formulate and implement strategies of adaptation to water scarcity and drought caused by climate change risks in rural area of the LRB.

The research objectives are:

(1)To identify the physical and social exposures to water scarcity and drought in rural area of the LRB;

(2)To identify the policy andinstitutional framework of water sectorfor adaptive policyin the LRB.

(3)To investigate the adaptation strategies adopted by households and communities to address the water scarcity and drought, and analyze the effects of adaptations on level and distribution of livelihood in rural area of the LRB;

(4)To identify the biophysical, socio-economical factors that influence the adoption of adaptation strategies in the rural area of the LRB,andidentify the incentives caused by policy and institutional framework that hamper or promote the adaptation strategies adopted by household and communities in the rural of the LRB

(5)To assess adaptive capacity of institutions to resolve water scarcity and drought in the LRB, then compare it with the MekongRiver Basin.

d. Research methodology and implementation:

  1. Research approach & activities

The following figure provides a clear idea of the structure of the research.

Figure2. The structure of the research

The literature survey

The literature survey will study water governance, institutional analysis, assessment of adaptive capacity, impact of drought, policy on water scarcity and drought.We will look at research reports, scholarly publications, public speeches, government documents, and materials prepared by public and private organizations.

The literature review will concentrate on following aspects:

  1. Expected macro and micro impacts of climate change in the Mekong region
  2. Development strategies/scenarioand whether climate change impacts are taken into account
  3. What do the research results say about the adaptation strategies that are relevant for these specific impacts of climate change? An inventory of these strategies.
  4. Theoretical understanding on adaptive capacity and institutional analysis

Content analysis

Content analysis aims to analyze the directly relevant and implicitly relevant policy documents that provide incentives and disincentives to deal with climate change adaptation and the process involved in devising such incentives at different levels of governance. It also aims to assess how multi-level politics shape the decisions behind those incentives.

Content analysis includes documents review and will be supplemented by interviewswith stakeholders. Documents review focuses on reviewing existing regional, national, and local level policies on climate change adaptation in the Mekong region. Stakeholders’ interview will be done with up to 10 stakeholders at each regional, national and provincial level.

The content analysis will focus on following aspects:

  1. Are there specific climate change adaptation policies at different levels: Mekong, national and provincial?
  2. What laws/policies are relevant for expected climate change impacts?
  3. What incentives/disincentives are included in the laws/policies?
  4. How do these incentives/disincentives compare with adaptation strategies in literature?
  5. How do different laws/policies linked with each other?

Case study

The case study sites will be selected based on four criteria:

iDifferent biophysical context,

iiDifferent livelihood options,

iiiDifference in likely climate change impacts, and

ivLink with the existing case study areas of regional/national initiatives such as Mekong River Commission, which allows us to link with multi-level adaptation policies.

In selected case studies we concentrate on analyzing:

  1. Expected impacts of climate change at local level: What are impacts of clime change at household or community level?
  2. Are there specific climate change adaptation policies at local level?
  3. What local level laws/policies are relevant for expected climate change impacts?
  4. What incentives/disincentives are available at local level? Who can access theseincentives given the contextual challenges and other driving factors?
  5. How do these incentives/disincentives compare with adaptation strategies in literature?
  6. How do different incentives/disincentives linked with each other?
  7. To what extent do these incentives/ disincentives promote the adaptive capacity of humans to deal with climate change?

The proposed study will be conducted in Sipsongpanna and Pu’er in Yunnan province along the gradient of the LRB.

Sipsongpannalocates at the extreme southern tip of YunnanProvince with Burma and Laos to the south. Theregion has mountain-valley topography with the HengduanMountains running north-south, and about 95% of the region iscovered bymountains and hill.The LancangRiver flows throughthe centre of Sipsongpanna, and the region contributes morethan 20 important tributaries, resulting in many river valleysand small basins

Pu’er, located on the upstream of Sipsongpanna ,once being one of the famous silk roads in the south in ancient times, is a wide area providing the land of thirty two mu (1mu = 666 m2)per person. Due to the 98.3% mountain topography with the altitude from 376meters to 3306 meters and the location of the tropic of cancer, this area features with the vertical climate.

Interviews

In order to get the information of rural local level, the method of household survey will apply to do so. We plan to conduct three times of household survey. The first pretesting survey is to test the questionnaire and let the interviewer be family with it. The finally complement surveyis for some questionsor interesting points we have missed out before. Asemi-structured questionnaire, which means a series of open-ended questions, will be designed to realize the Objective 1, 3. The questions will be design by the log frame approach to identify the key questions and sub-questions and sub-sub questions to answer the main research question.And the questions need to includethree parts that include (1) the impact of water scarcity and drought on household and communities, (2) the physical and social conditions of household and communities, (3) theadaptations adopted by household or communities, and (4) behavior change or effectson level and distribution of livelihood caused by adaptations.

Also we will apply key informant interview, group discussion, and participant observation to check the framework of policy and institution, to select he appraisal criterion, to exam the analysis results.

Data analysis

Thedescriptivestatistic analysis, sometimes correlation analysis, will be applied for find (1) the role of different local institutions playing in organizing and implementing adaptations, and (2) the relationship between the adaptation and its impact,(3)the function of physical and social driving force on adaptations.

General assessment of institutional adaptive capacity

Based on documentation and field survey, this work will aim to realize Object 5. The characteristic of institutions which aims to address climate risk will be category into six dimensions, which are variety, learning capacity, room for autonomous change, leadership, resources, fair governance. Then the method of “Adaptive Capacity Wheel” (Gupta, forthcoming) can be used to assess the adaptive capacity of institutions in the LRB. Then the result can be compared with MekongRiver Basin.

  1. Anticipated results & deliverables

By this project, we anticipate to get following result: (1) the policy and institutional framework of water sector for adaptive policy in the LRB; (2)the role of local institution in the framework of multi-level institutions and capacity in adaptation to CC in the LRB;(3)the institutional capacity to adapt to address the stress of water scarcity and drought in the rural of the LRB;(4)some general knowledge about the institutional capacity to adaptation through comparing the results of different place.

We also expect to produce a range of scientific and academic products from this research (Table 1), the tentative details of the deliverables are provided in Annex B.

Table 1List of the intended output from the propose research

2010 / 2011
1 / Research reports / 1 / 1
2 / Articles for peer reviewed journals / 1 / 2
3 / Contribution to MSc theses, if applicable
4 / Contribution to PhD theses, if applicable
5 / Other Academic Publications, specify type: / 1
6 / Other Professional publications / products:

e. Dissemination & outreach

This research aims to provide important insights on institutional adaptation strategies to deal with climate risks in the Lancang-Mekong region. The findings will be published as scientific and academic outputs (Table 1) that will ultimately reach to broader audience and stakeholders in the region and globally as well. We will present the findings in different regional/international seminars. Possible international seminars are: IUGG 2011conference “Earth on the Edge: Science for a Sustainable Planet”; 2010 AGU Fall Meeting. In addition, findings will be presented in “ChangjiangRiver forum”.