Climate change impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2016

Executive summary
thereby delivering the services needed by the intended
users. Furthermore, enhanced knowledge and
experiences facilitate the development, prioritisation
and implementation of adaptation options, and the
integration of them flexibly into other policies.
An increasing number of countries, and also city
networks, are developing systems for the monitoring,
reporting and evaluation of adaptation policies. An
approach that combines quantitative indicators and
qualitative information, including process‐based
indicators, can be a strong basis for assessments. Only
a few countries have so far established such approaches.
The European Commission has developed a
process‐based 'adaptation preparedness scoreboard'
to assess the progress of Member States, which will
be included in its evaluation of the EU Adaptation
Strategy, which is due to be published in 2018. There
is an increasing need to complement this scoreboard
with quantitative information at the EU level.
As part of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk
Reduction, the finalisation of a set of indicators to
measure progress in its implementation is planned
by the end of 2016. Countries, including EU Member
States, need to establish national databases of
disaster impacts on ecosystems, human health and
the economy. The Sendai Framework indicators for
weather‐ and climate‐related hazards are expected
to be very relevant and useful for climate change
adaptation.
Overall, the main knowledge gaps are regarding
national and sectoral impact, vulnerability and
adaptation assessments; economic damages and
losses; costs and benefits of adaptation; options for
effectively mainstreaming adaptation into public
and private investments; adaptation services;
interdependencies, synergies and trade‐offs between
policy objectives; and monitoring systems and
tools. EU‐funded research, in particular through
Horizon 2020, and national research should address
these adaptation knowledge gaps. However,
transformative adaptation will require innovations and
structural change, as well as reflexive learning from
experience. The Horizon 2020 programme aims to
facilitate such changes.
30 Climate change, impacts and vulnerability in Europe 2016 | An indicator-based report