Programme Cooperation Agreement 2010 – 2011

gramme (HICAP) partners CICERO and ICIMOD to pre- pare a report on the impact of climate change, specifically how the livelihoods of women in mountain communities of the Hindu-Kush are affected. Two GRID-Arendal staff spent three weeks on a field mission in the northern re- gion of Mustand Province in Nepal to conduct data gath- ering and interviews in selected communities. The resulting Rapid Response Assessment (RRA), Wom- en at the Frontline of Climate Change: Gender Risks and Hopes , 48 was launched in December 2011 at a side event of the UNFCCC COP 17. The report shows that women play a stronger role than men in the management of eco- systems services and food security in the region, and that they are often in the ‘frontline’ in respect to the impacts of a changing climate. The report inter alia calls for the de- sign of climate change adaptation programmes that are sensitive and responsive to the differentiated and multi- ple roles of men and women; improving women’s liveli- hoods through greater access, control and ownership of resources, and; ensuring an enabling environment for the increased participation and substantive inputs of women in decision and policy-making related to climate change issues. Prior to the launch of the report, HICAP partners and the Mountain Partnership Secretariat of FAO organised a Mountain Day event at COP 17, “Highlighting the Criti- cal Role of Mountain Ecosystems for Climate Adaptation and Sustainable Development”. A high-level panel, includ-

Maybe (What will happen when the Greenlandic Ice melts away?)

Greenland’s inland ice is melting. Maybe Greenland is going to be like a green land. Maybe there will be strange animals and new vegetables. Maybe the life of Greenlanders will change in the future. Maybe the fish will disappear and new fish will come instead. Maybe Greenlanders cannot fish anymore. They have to look for new jobs. Maybe there will be no ice.

– Aqqa Lange

MSV status and visibility among the climate change com- munity was elevated in 2011. In May MSV was granted Ob- server status to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) at the 33 rd Plenary Session of the IPCC, a sta- tus that entitles GRID-Arendal to nominate authors for IPCC reports, provide review comments, and attend sessions of the IPCC and its Working Groups. Subsequent to this, MSV was invited to join the CICERO booth at UNFCCC COP 17 in Durban, South Africa. The Portraits of Resilience exhibit of children’s photos and stories on climate change opened simultaneously at the Durban Natural History Museum. 47

47. The Portraits of Resilience collection was further expanded in 2011 through a photo project at schools in Fiji, Kiribati, and Tuvalu. 48. http://www.grida.no/publications/rr/women-and-climate-change http://himalaya.dw.grida.no/publications.aspx?id=4998

Throughout 2011, the Polar and Cryosphere Programme worked with Himalayan Climate Change Adaptation Pro-

Figure 2: Humpback annual migrations between feeding grounds in polar waters to mating and calving grounds in tropical waters are amongst the longest of any mammal

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