IPCC_Managing Risks of Extreme Events.pdf - Climate Access

Managing the Risks: International Level and Integration across ScalesChapter 77.1. The International Levelof Risk Management7.1.1. Context and BackgroundA need to cope with the risks associated with atmospheric processes(floods, droughts, cyclones, and so forth) has always been a fact of humanlife (Lamb, 1995). In more recent decades, extreme weather events haveincreasingly come to be associated with large-scale disasters and anincreasing level of economic losses (Chapters 2 and 4). Considerableexperience has accumulated at the international (as well as local andnational) level on ways of coping with or managing the risks.The same cannot be said for the risks associated with anthropogenicclimate change. These are new risks identified as possibilities orprobabilities (IPCC 1990, 1996, 2007).Acceptance of climate change and its growing impacts has led to astronger emphasis on the need for adaptation, as exemplified, forexample, in the Bali Action Plan (adopted at the 13th Session of theConference of the Parties to the UNFCCC (UNFCCC, 2007a) and theCancun Agreements of December 2010.The international community is thus faced with a contrast between along record of managing disasters and the risks of ‘normal’ climateextremes, and the new problem of adaptation to anthropogenic climatechange and its associated changes in variability and extremes. It hasbeen asked how the comparatively new field of anthropogenic climatechange adaptation (CCA) can benefit from the longer experience indisaster risk management (DRM). That question is a major focus of thisSpecial Report.Climate extremes can have both negative and positive effects. Theoccurrence of extreme events has raised consciousness of climate changewithin the public and in policymakers. This can then help to enhance asense of priority to governmental action in terms of supporting DRM,enhancing adaptation, and promoting mitigation (Adger et al., 2005).An international framework for integration of climate-related DRM andCCA in the development process could provide the potential for reducingexposure and vulnerability (Thomalla et al., 2006; Venton and La Trobe,2008). Collective efforts at the international level to reduce greenhousegases are a way to reduce long-term exposure to frequent and moreintense climate extremes. International frameworks designed to facilitateadaptation with a deliberate effort to address issues of equity, technologytransfer, globalization, and the need to meet the Millennium DevelopmentGoals (MDGs) can, when combined with mitigation, lead to reducedvulnerability (Adger et al., 2005; Haines et al., 2006). The 2007/2008 HumanDevelopment Report noted that if climate change is not adequatelyaddressed now, 40% of the world’s poorest (i.e., 2.6 billion people) willbe confined to a future of diminished opportunity (Stern, 2007; Watkins,2007). The long-term potential to reducing exposure to climate risks liesin sustainable development (O’Brien et al., 2008). Both seek to buildresilience through sustainable development (O’Brien et al., 2008).Some claim that DRM and CCA could be realized through increasedawareness and use of synergies and differences, and by the provision ofa framework for integration in areas of overlap between the two(Venton and La Trobe, 2008). The World Conference on DisasterReduction held in Kobe (UNISDR, 2005c), Hyogo Prefecture, Japan in2005 and the Bali Action Plan both point to the need for incorporationof measures that can reduce climate change impacts within the practiceof disaster risk reduction (DRR). Integration of the relevant aspects ofDRR and CCA can be facilitated by using the Hyogo Framework forAction (2005-2015) as agreed by 168 governments in Kobe (UNISDR,2005a).7.1.2. Related Questions and Chapter StructureWithin the context of the overarching question – how can experiencewith disaster risk management inform and help with climate changeadaptation? – there are a series of other related issues to be addressedin this chapter in order to provide a basis for their closer integration. Afirst question concerns the rationale for disaster risk management andclimate change adaptation at the international level. The issues ofsystemic risks and international security, economic efficiency, solidarity,and subsidiarity are addressed in Section 7.2.A second topic concerns the nature and development of institutions andcapacity at the international level. This topic is explored in Section 7.3concentrating on the Hyogo Framework for Action and the UnitedNations Framework Convention on Climate Change.A third issue concerns the opportunities for and constraints on disasterrisk management and climate change adaptation at the internationallevel. These include the matters of legal, financial, technology, risktransfer, and cooperation, and the creation of knowledge and itsmanagement and dissemination. All are addressed in Section 7.4.Considerations of future policy and research are addressed in Section7.5.The challenge of bringing lessons from disaster risk reduction to climatechange adaptation takes on a different complexion at different temporaland spatial scales. The question of integration across scales is taken upin Section 7.6.7.2. Rationale for International ActionThis section provides a brief overview of selected concepts and principlesthat have been invoked to justify (or restrain) financing, assistance,regulation, and other types of international policy interventions fordisaster risk management and climate change adaptation. There is noattempt to be comprehensive, and additional principles are discussed inSection 7.2.5. Starting from the reality that risks of extreme weather andrisk management interventions cross national borders and transcend398