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About: Nepalese people are highly dependent on forests and forest products to fulfill energy demands and for timber for construction and maintenance of houses and buildings. The main reasons for the conversion of forest areas are encroachment for resettlement/agriculture, and acquisition of forest area for infrastructure development including road expansion.
ICEM's Mainstreaming Climate Risk Management in Development project has been featured in a recent article by the Thomson Reuters Foundation. Published as part of the Foundation's Human Impact series, the article outlines actions of the ADB-funded project and Nepal's government to coordinate efforts across ministries to build climate resilience into infrastructure planning.
About: The Government of Nepals (GoN’s) National Adaptation Programme of Action for Climate Change (NAPA) outlines 43 adaptation measures grouped into nine priority areas or ‘profiles’. Stemming from the NAPA, a Strategic Program for Climate Resilience (SPCR) has been developed focusing on long-term interventions aimed at enhancing climate resilience in Nepal. Mainstreaming climate change risk management in development is a technical assessment component of the SPCR. The expected outcome is that the GoN’s infrastructure development programs, policies and projects incorporate safeguards to address the effects of climate change.
On 7-13 February 2013, a week long working session was held in Chitwan District, Nepal to develop and refine the climate change vulnerability assessment methodology and tools to be applied to sector infrastructure. Following testing these tools will be adopted across government as a vulnerability assessment and adaptation planning method for integrating climate change in infrastructure development.
ICEM has been awarded the Asian Development Bank (ADB) project Mainstreaming Climate Change Risk Management in Development in Nepal, which began in July 2012 and will run to 2017. ICEM is working with seven national government agencies responsible for infrastructure development throughout the country, such as irrigation, roads and bridges, flood and river management and water supply and sanitation.
Client: Asian Development Bank | Partner: GEOCE Consultants (P) Ltd. | DurationDuration: May 2021- May 2023 | Location: Nepal
The Government of Nepal is taking strides forward to increase resilience to flooding through investments in flood protection infrastructure, community awareness, and early warning systems. In support of this goal, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has engaged ICEM in this Transaction Technical Assistance (TRTA) project to build the capacity of Nepal’s Department of Water Resources and Irrigation (DWRI) and develop a GIS-based flood infrastructure Asset Management Systems (AMS) to improve monitoring, evaluation and maintenance of flood protection infrastructure.
The project runs through four phases, consisting of the following key activities which will be carried out in close coordination with DWRI:
Phase 1: A comprehensive assessment of the physical, environmental, institutional, and socio-economic conditions of the target sub-basins.
Phase 2: An assessment of integrated flood risk management (IFRM) capacity needs and readiness for stakeholders, including DWRI, provincial and local government and a user needs assessment for the AMS to inform further development of the system appropriate for the local context.
Phase 3: A review of detailed engineering designs, construction methodologies and design changes for selected subprojects in West Rapti, Bakhara, Lakhandei, Mohana Khutiya and Mawa Ratuwa.
Phase 4: Participatory training workshops and field activities for IFRM capacity building for a diverse cross-section of trainees.
Photo: Wikimedia.org
Technical Assessments on Value Driven Agricultural Resilience to Climate Change About: Market driven approaches can provide an important route for strengthening resilience to climate change in agriculture. The project seeks to identify and assess climate-resilient high-value agricultural products that can be linked to local markets and/or global standards such as Geographical Indication (GI), Global Good Agricultural Practices (Global GAP), organic Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS) and others. This approach goes beyond narrow, farm-specific interventions, involving a range of value chain actors, including consumers, based on shared interest in producing, processing, marketing and consuming high quality and safe products that be certified as more resilient and sustainable.
Towards this goal, ICEM is undertaking an integrated climate risk and market opportunity assessment for selected high-value agricultural products in the Koshi River Basin in Nepal and the Northern Tonle Sap region of Cambodia. Specific emphasis is placed on value chains with potential to access higher-value markets through certification and the adoption of international best practice. Other project activities includes gap analysis in terms of the value chain’s systemic, institutional and individual capacity, technology and information needs as well as barrier analysis in terms of information access, particularly in relation to consumer demands for safe and high-quality food.
Outputs will include: Assessment of high value or high-quality product value chains in target regions that can be linked to local markets and/or global standards Feasibility report for developing and scaling up value-driven resilience to climate change via climate finance Feasibility report on consumer-based mechanisms for food safety as part of the market-based approach, including methods to overcome barriers to information access Conceptual framework for value-driven agricultural resilience to climate change drawing on lessons learned and […]
Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), defined as the use of natural processes and/or elements to increase ecosystem health of human-altered systems, have strong potential to achieve the triple goal of reducing damage to ecosystems, meeting increasing demands and enhancing resilience to climate change in Asia’s agricultural sector. Primary purposes of NBS can be production, structural engineering (green infrastructure (GI)), bioremediation, or conservation. Although certain practices that fall within this definition have long been utilised by farmers, there is an advantage to bringing them under the umbrella of NBS, together with innovative measures which are emerging from other sectors like urban planning and design, where the concept of GI is more commonly applied.
Natural ecosystems are multifunctional, and their processes and elements are therefore excellent at providing multiple benefits. Riparian buffer zones, a conserved strip of vegetation between a stream or river and adjacent agricultural fields, for example, can filter pollution from agricultural runoff and subsurface flow, protect river banks from erosion. Additionally, they can increase resilience against climate change by decreasing the impact of floods or even droughts and high temperatures (mostly through the provision of shelter and shading by trees), and providing tree-based produce which can diversify the food and income of rural communities.
From the 24-25th July 2019, ICEM with the Government of Vietnam and FAO, convened a regional workshop “Potential for applying Nature-Based Solutions and Green Infrastructure in Asia’s agriculture”, with the aim to exchange knowledge and experience on challenges and opportunities with current and potential NBS in the agricultural sector. The workshop is part of the FAO funded project “Identifying Green Infrastructure and Nature-Based Solutions for More Resilient Rural Communities”. As part of the project, ICEM is […]
These posters are based on five case studies presented by country representatives at the regional workshop “Potential for applying Nature-Based Solutions and Green Infrastructure in Asia’s Infrastructure”, hosted by ICEM in Hanoi on the 24-25th July 2019.
Read news item about the workshop
