Welcome to SEARCA Knowledge Center on Climate Change Adaptation in Agriculture and Natural Resource Management in Southeast Asia (KC3)

Harvested Publications

Changes in climate, economic development, urbanization, and population growth will impact water availability around the world. To prepare for these changes, decision-makers need to consider future scenarios of global water supply and demand. Investors, policymakers, companies, and development organizations can use such projected estimates to quantify future impact, hedge risks, and adapt to changes at relevant scales. For certain decisions and analysis, the national scale may be important, and to the best of our knowledge, no up-to-date, country-level projections currently…
Productivity in the agricultural sector is inherently dependent on weather, such as variations in rainfall and temperature. As a result, weather risk events can cause losses in yield and production that translate into economic losses for producers, as well as other sector stakeholders that depend on income from agricultural trade, transport, processing, or export. Extreme temperatures, floods, droughts, hailstorm, and windstorms are just a few examples of weather risk events that cause major economic losses. In developing countries, weather risk is especially significant due to the…
The financing needs of climate change mitigation and adaptation are uncertain and large. In response, an extensive architecture of financing for climate change mitigation and adaptation has started to develop around the world. Is there a role for a regional approach in this developing financing architecture? This paper examines the issue in the context of the Asia and Pacific region. The paper argues that, while climate change is a global public good, it has strong regional features, and, consequently, regional institutions and financing arrangements play an…
To safeguard the region’s natural wealth and development gains in the face of climate change challenges, the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) countries need to strengthen the resilience of their natural and human systems. The GMS must also harness opportunities to reduce its contribution to climate change. Ecosystem-based approaches can help GMS countries address these challenges by making use of ecosystems and biodiversity to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to assist people to adapt to a changing climate. The brief summarizes the current state of GMS knowledge and experience on ecosystem-based approaches.…
El Niño is local warming of surface waters that takes place in the entire equatorial zone of the central and eastern Pacific Ocean of the Peruvian coast and which affects the atmospheric circulation worldwide (Kiladis and Diaz, 1989). It usually peaks around Christmas, hence the name of the phenomenon: El Niño is Spanish for Christ Child. La Niña refers to the cold equivalent of El Niño. It is a recurrent weather phenomenon that takes place approximately every two to seven years and usually lasts between…
Countries report their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and removals from all sectors via national GHG Inventories, submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in accordance with international climate policy agreements and technical guidelines developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The agriculture sector represents a unique challenge for national inventory compilers, especially in developing countries, due to significant difficulties in compiling and regularly updating national statistics for agriculture, forestry, and land use —the first necessary step in preparing…
Enabling Farmers to Face Climate Change: Second Cycle of the Benefits Sharing Fund Projects This booklet provides an overview of the characteristics and main activities of the projects that are being implemented as part of the second project portfolio of the Benefit-sharing Fund (BSF) of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. This second portfolio consists of 22 projects that are currently implemented in 33 countries across Africa, Asia, Near East, Latin America, and the Caribbean.…
Genetic resources for food and agriculture play a crucial role in food security, nutrition, and livelihoods and in the provision of environmental services. They are key components of sustainability, resilience, and adaptability in production systems. They underpin the ability of crops, livestock, aquatic organisms, and forest trees to withstand a range of harsh conditions. Thanks to their genetic diversity plants, animals and micro-organisms adapt and survive when their environments change. Climate change poses new challenges to the management of the world’s genetic resources for food and agriculture,…
Growing conditions for agriculture are diverse in the Lower Mekong Basin (LMB), from the mountainous areas of Lao PDR and the Central Highlands in Vietnam to the lowland plains in the Mekong Delta. Farming systems range from traditional shifting agriculture systems dominated by upland rice through industrial plantations, including smallholder intensive rice farmers. Rainfed agriculture is the dominant type of agriculture in the LMB. Rainfed rice is the dominant crop, representing 75% of the agricultural area within the LMB. Other…
This review outlines existing knowledge (context-specific and localized) of climate change impacts, vulnerability, and adaptation, assesses the limitations of different frameworks and approaches used by various initiatives in Cambodia, and identifies knowledge gaps for future research. It explores the impacts of climate change on livelihoods through three dimensions: (1) agricultural practices, technology, policy, irrigation, credit and markets; (2) community-based natural resources management and the roles of forest, fishery and water-user communities in protecting and managing resources; and (3) gender considerations.…
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