Outlook on climate change adaptation in the Tropical Andes mountains

Conclusions

Methodological limitations National and sectoral policies initially reviewed were those accessible by Internet. Later, government officials provided inputs in a workshop held in Lima. They also responded to a survey, and sent additional documents. This Outlook has benefited from these and other officials’ comments on sectoral and adaptation policies in the Andean region. Gathering the relevant information for a proper, comprehensive and exhaustive assessment has had some shortcomings in relation to data, information and institutions: • Lack of data (or access to it) and information about benchmarks, performance indicators, implementation stage, outcomes and bottlenecks of existing policies. • Limited institutional capacity to provide updated information about policies’ status. • Inadequate monitoring and evaluation system. • Lack of adequate intersectoral collaboration. • National and sectoral policies implemented on the same territory are sometimes difficult to differentiate. Thus, overlapping policies have different priorities, time schedules, resources employed, and discourses used. This reveals the challenge presented by a joint national climate change adaptation goal. • The little recognition given to mountains and adaptation within the countries’ agenda.

The policies of the Andean countries analysed in this report fall short in terms of their inclusion of both mountains and adaptation to climate change. Though mountains hold strategic resources (e.g. water, food, minerals), the development models promoted in these countries have favoured urban areas, flat regions, and lowlands. It has also been noted that the few mining regulations may hinder policies towards conservation or sustainable mountain development. Moreover, mountains are home to indigenous populations that have historically been marginalized and excluded from access to and control of their resources. Ongoing policies are overlooking the synergic effects and feedback between climatic and non-climatic processes on mountains. For instance, some risks emerging from these effects but not yet addressed are food insecurity, biodiversity loss, population displacement, diminishing provision of ecosystem services, and changing water availability. In addition, the impact of these risks and their effects on the adaptive capacity and resilience of local communities are not considered, which in turn may increase their vulnerability. The risk of glacier lakes outburst floods (GLOF) has not been addressed in this Outlook because these are present mainly in Peru and Bolivia (to a lesser degree). However, the recently created National Institute of Research on Glaciers and Mountain Ecosystems in Peru illustrates an institutional arrangement that can address risk of GLOFs but also tackle the understanding of mountains impacts and adaptation to climate change.

Bottlenecks affecting adaptation-related policies are often caused by limited institutional capacity. This translates as rare coordination between sectors whose activity areas overlap, and little integration between national and local activities. This little integration may be worse if the authorities belong to rival political parties. The small budget for adaptation and mountains leads to bottlenecks and is indicative of the little priority given to these areas in the political agenda. At the local level, there is salient insufficient technical capacity to understand climate-crop relations and climate change impacts on agriculture. Furthermore, the network of meteorological stations has little coverage and low density, particularly in the mountains. This hinders the generation of knowledge on local weather to inform policies. However, the Initiative for Hydrologic Monitoring in the Andean Ecosystems aims to improve data coverage and sharing to inform policymaking. This initiative still needs to be linked to national meteorological services to achieve major impact. Finally, the policy analysis also shows the uneven development of policies among sectors. While sectors such as water seem to have some policy instruments, the health and energy sectors in mountains are less prepared for adapting to climate change. Though this chapter does not aim to explain such unequal attention, it is worth mentioning in order to promote the sectoral exchange of information and lesson sharing, as well as to stimulate research to analyse such differences.

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