This session, moderated by Koko Warner, UNU Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS), considered loss and damage related to climate change, with a focus on bringing together applications and solutions from different disciplines.

Billy Hare, Climate Analytics GmbH, provided insights to the loss and damage discussion by tracing some of the narratives from the impact analysis of specific case studies and snapshots of related consequences. Discussing Sub-Saharan Africa, he underlined increasing average temperatures and extremes as the main problem affecting the viability of current crops and livestock, and warned that this would lead to substantial productivity losses and “profound transitions” in the near future. He also provided a picture on South Asia, and said water management poses pressing challenges. He pointed out that extreme rainfall results in flooding, long dry periods and sea level rising, and underscored the absence of an effective water management system, which makes the exact risk difficult to predict.

David Wrathall, UNU-EHS, addressed adverse effects of climate change that may render certain areas unproductive and uninhabitable, and the policy regime around loss and damage. He stressed that adaptation may not be sufficient in cases where local systems are overwhelmed by the adverse effects of climate change, and called for reconfiguration of the root drivers for vulnerability. He pointed out that diversifying economies and undoing power relationships that make people vulnerable may prove helpful.

Warner addressed nine case studies, forming part of the UNU study, noting that they provide peoples’ perspectives to complement science. She underscored that adaptation efforts may not be enough in certain cases, as they provide short-term solutions. She also addressed non-economic loss and damage, noting the existence of important elements, including identity, culture, family, language, ecosystems, that are impossible to quantify economically. She finally underlined that the most important feature of policy making in the future will be to facilitate dialogue, as the problems we face do not have many historical analogies.

During discussions, participants exchanged ideas on a variety of issues, inter alia: raising funds for adaptation and loss and damage, as well as ways to link them; coordination at the regional and international level; and finding balance between quantification and other considerations.

This side event, moderated by Yunus Arikan, ICLEI, presented a progress update on the implementation of local governments global initiatives, as well as positions on the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiations.

Maryke van Staden, ICLEI, discussed ICLEI’s Global Climate Initiatives. Introducing the Mexico City Pact on global commitments, she said it aims, inter alia, to: reduce local greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions voluntarily; adopt and implement local climate mitigation measures; develop local adaptation strategies; and register emission inventories, commitments, climate mitigation and adaptation measures and actions in a measurable, reportable and verifiable (MRV) manner. On ICLEI’s Low Carbon City Agenda, she presented ICLEI’s new global programme, the GreenClimateCities (GCC), and its tools and protocols.

Providing a country perspective, Bruna Cerqueira, ICLEI, described elements of local climate action in Brazil, including the Cities for Climate Protection Campaign, São Paolo’s climate change policy, the Rio+20 process, which deepened the engagement of local governments, and the Urban Low Emission Development Strategies (Urban-LEDS) programme.

Farhan Helmy, National Council on Climate Change (DNPI), Indonesia, presented the Indonesian context on ways to advance local climate change action at the national level. Discussing Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs) and Registry as a potential area for sub-national engagement, he listed challenges for national governments in establishing NAMAs Registry systems, including: institutional arrangements; approval mechanisms; and technical capacities for information validation and verification.

Introducing the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) programme on vertically integrated NAMAs (V-NAMAs), Konrad von Ritter, Consultant, GIZ, explained it aims to involve sub-national actors into national mitigation strategies. He discussed, inter alia, the challenge to motivate and create incentives to engage sub-nationals, and stressed the need for a balanced package of financial incentives and mandates.

Discussing challenges measuring GHG emissions at the local level, including non-comparable and inconsistent tools and methodologies available, Fong Wee Kean, World Resources Institute (WRI), stressed the need for an international standard for accounting and reporting GHG emissions from cities and communities. He then provided an update on the implementation of the Global Protocol for Community-Scale GHG Emissions (GPC) and introduced the GPC Pilot Version 1.0 launched in 2012.

The ensuing discussions focused on MRV and assessment of action, cooling appliances and methods to measure direct emissions, MRV and crediting, and emission reductions from cities through new, more efficient constructions.

This session, moderated by James Kinyangi, CCAFS East Africa, considered progress on agricultural mitigation focusing, inter alia, on: NAMAs; priorities for reducing emissions that enable agricultural development; and tools and approaches for quantifying GHGs and identifying mitigation options on small-scale farms and landscapes.

Timm Tennigkeit, Unique Forestry and Land Use, presented examples of quantified mitigation activities in Brazil, Ethiopia, Kenya and Mongolia recommending, inter alia: aligning mitigation plans with national priorities; understanding of social dimensions of NAMAs; researching barriers to adoption; and building national research capacities.

Jon Hillier, University of Aberdeen, underscored that, concerning mitigation activities, one size does not fit all, calling for region-specific approaches. He concluded that the most effective mitigation options vary depending upon location, providing world maps to support his argument.

Marja-Liisa Tapio Biström, UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), addressed elements and tools for mitigation planning in agriculture. She used the case study of the emission intensity of milk production in East Africa to demonstrate that there is plenty of opportunity to improve the current systems. She concluded underscoring the urgent need to transform food production modalities, creating efficient and resilient systems with mitigation co-benefits.

Eugenio Diaz-Pines, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, and the Standard Assessment of Mitigation Potential and Livelihoods in Small-Holder Systems (SAMPLES) team, presented SAMPLES, which provides a multi-dimensional assessment of mitigation options, combining data on farm and field type, profit, production method, emissions per hectare and per kilogram, as well as social acceptability of different production systems.

Nicholas Berry, University of Edinburgh, proposed balancing the risk of inaction against the need for accuracy by using process-based models, allowing users control over precision and cost. He then presented the Small-Holder Agriculture Monitoring and Baseline Assessment methodology and prototype tool (SHAMBA 2012) and its applications in Malawi.

Moses Tenywa, Uganda, summarized the discussion underscoring, inter alia: the lack of access concerning funds related to agriculture; the need to create synergies between the private sector and national governments; the lack of understanding between Annex I and other countries; and the urgent need for capacity building.

During discussions, participants posed questions on, inter alia: the future of similar methodologies; potential users of SHAMBA 2012 and other similar tools; the quality of gathered data; and monitoring of mitigation trade-offs between accuracy and cost.

Yuka Greiler, Switzerland, introduced the session, highlighting the need to coordinate water policy and management with climate change action. She called for mutual learning, including through the Nairobi Work Programme on impacts, vulnerability and adaptation to climate change (NWP), to improve understanding of climate change adaptation.

Karin Lexén, Director, SIWI, also for the AGWA and WCC, moderated the session. She said the session would provide an opportunity to discuss how to strengthen the NWP into a facilitative platform.

Richard Muyungi, Subsidiary Body on Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) Chair, noted the value of side events that provide forums to inform and enrich discussions in negotiations.

Xianfu Lu, UNFCCC Secretariat, provided an overview of the activities of the NWP and the country submissions. On country submissions, she noted that they highlight the importance of learning from past experience and underscore the need to link the NWP work programme with the Cancun Adaptation Framework, while emphasizing the need to make outputs relevant to actions on the ground.

Bubu Jallow, the Gambia, said all delegates agree the NWP has done a lot in its nine work areas. He said any relaunch of the NWP should go beyond information generation to dissemination. One possibility, he said would be focusing on thematic areas such as integrated water resources management (IWRM), and agriculture and food security, among others.

Shyla Raghav, CI, recommended examining reasons why information from the NWP is not being used, calling for examining how to better engage stakeholders. She called for the NWP to have a more evaluative role.

A panel then discussed issues including the next phase of the NWP. Ainun Nishat, Bangladesh, highlighted that the distinction between adaptation actions and development is often unclear. He noted the need for capacity building for modeling and risk assessment.

Marianne Karlsen, Norway, noted the diversity of country circumstances, calling for defining thematic areas that unite all countries, both developed and developing. She called for the NWP to become a strategic knowledge base for the UNFCCC’s institutional arrangements on adaptation.

Jana Kontrosova, EU, noted the main problem is that the information collected by the NWP does not reach practitioners on the ground. She emphasized the value of the focal point forum as a space to address issues of Parties and partner organizations.

Jos Timmerman, the Netherlands, noted the UNECE Taskforce on Water and Climate Change under the UNECE Water Convention, saying the outcomes of the taskforce have resulted in pilot projects catalyzing adaptation to climate change in transboundary river basins.

Shereen D’Souza, US, noted the critique that the NWP is not focused enough on implementation, saying that practitioners approach adaptation from a sectoral perspective and that organizing the information within the NWP into thematic areas could facilitate access.

Juan Hoffmaister, Bolivia, noted the need to define whether and how the NWP is linked to other elements of adaptation infrastructure under the UNFCCC. He said there was some common ground on thematic areas, noting the possible need to find unifying themes.

Summarizing, Sonja Koeppel, UNECE, encouraged discussions between partner organizations, Parties and stakeholders on ways to improve the NWP.

This side event, moderated by Xiangjun Yao, FAO, discussed ways to increase productivity, adapt to climate change, build resilience and reduce GHG emissions from agricultural sectors, including forestry and fisheries.

The first session of the event presented an overview of new FAO knowledge on adaptation and mitigation options. Alexandre Meybeck, FAO, stressed the importance of the policy recommendations resulting from the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) decision on climate change.

Addressing options for strengthening food security under climate change, Lucia Palombi, FAO, focused on the FAO Sourcebook On Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA), Forestry And Fisheries (www.fao.org/climatechange/climatesmart/en/). She said CSA addresses the multiple challenges faced by agriculture and food systems simultaneously and holistically.

The second session of the side event looked at synergies between adaptation and mitigation at country level. Austin Tibu, Malawi, provided evidence of synergistic mitigation and adaptation focus areas in Malawi, including fertilizer use efficiency, conservation agriculture, agroforestry practices and legume rotation.

Bui My Binh, Viet Nam, presented a CSA project in the northern mountainous regions of Viet Nam, focused on sustainable land management (SLM) on sloping land.

Robert Jordan, International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM), stressed the importance of training farmers in basic low-cost organic agricultural practices, and building partnerships with stakeholders that have access to vulnerable rural farming communities.

Elwyn Grainger-Jones, International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), called for recognition of smallholder farmers in global dialogues on climate change and the role they can play in the solution. He said IFAD’s new Adaptation for Smallholder Agriculture Programme (ASAP) is now the largest global fund dedicated to supporting the adaptation of poor smallholder farmers to climate change across the world.

Addressing, inter alia, the issue of financing, Wendy Mann, FAO, stressed the importance of integrated approaches, noted the fragmentation of financing streams currently available, and called for ways to combine them in order to reward policies and practices that are integrated and look across different sectors.

Saliha Dobardzic, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), stated that the GEF has moved towards addressing the need for an integrated approach overcoming artificial divisions between adaptation and mitigation, by financing projects that leverage multifocal benefits.

The ensuing discussions touched upon, among others: a holistic approach to livestock taking into account aspects such as indigenous peoples; carbon markets linked to CSA; agribusiness; and industrial-scale agriculture.