From governance

scenarios to climate action Insights from scenario-guided policy

development across six global

regions

Joost Vervoort – Environmental Change Institute,

University of Oxford

CGIAR program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food

Security

Future Earth “Seeds of a Good Anthropocene”

FP7 TRANSMANGO

H2020 SUSFANS

Linking scenarios and policy

• Scenarios can be a powerful

approach for exploring futures in

complex systems

• However, scenarios are not

strategies – adaptation to

what?

• Need to integrate scenarios

with policy and governance

processes

The CCAFS scenarios project

Eastern Africa Western Africa

Southeast Asia Central

America

Andes Region

South Asia

CGIAR Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security: CC

and ag policies, practices and measures – facilitating

climate smart agriculture and food systems

CCAFS scenarios project

• Regional socio-economic and climate scenarios

• Stakeholder-driven; quantified IMPACT (IFPRI) &

GLOBIOM(IIASA); linked to SSPs/RCPs

• With 240 partner organisations FAO, UNEP

WCMC, Oxfam, regional and national stakeholders

• Goal: guide policy development at national and

regional levels + guide global development

organisations

(Vermeulen et al. 2013, Chaudhury et al. 2013, Vervoort et al. 2014)

Developing vs. using scenarios

Vervoort et al. Global Environmental Change 2014

Two approaches: • 1. start with plan,

develop scenarios; test across scenarios (Honduras)

• 2. Develop scenarios, develop plans in individual scenarios, test across scenarios (Bangladesh)

Draft plan Test plan in scenarios

Develop scenarios

Robust plan

Develop scenarios

Scenarios Inspire plan elements

Test elements across scenarios

Robust plan

Case studies

• Honduras: SAG Agricultural CC

adaptation plan. Started with

incomplete draft, scenario review

and deep changes, now regional

implementation + interest

throughout government

• Cambodia: CCPAP. Southeast

Asia scenarios long

collaborative process + internal

training public consultations

implementation

Case studies

• Bangladesh: 7th FYP.

Generating ideas for

strengthening broad

country strategy.

• Tanzania: multiple rounds

of reviews

• Burkina Faso: integration

of science and policy

agendas

• Ghana: multi-level

integration

• Colombia: last-minute

changes

Case studies

Key factors:

• Focusing on specific policies

• Trust, timing, openness

• Full policy formulation process, and beyond

• Flexibility and credibility of the scenarios

• Rapid development of new relationships

• Informing process outsiders

• Vermeulen, S. J., A. J. Challinor, P. K. Thornton, B. M. Campbell, N. Eriyagama, J. M. Vervoort, J. Kinyangi, A. Jarvis, P. Läderach, J. Ramirez-Villegas, K. J. Nicklin, E. Hawkins, and D. R. Smith. 2013. Addressing uncertainty in adaptation planning for agriculture. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 110:8357-8362.

• Vervoort, J. M., ., P. Thornton, P. Kristjanson, W. Förch, P. J. Ericksen, K. Kok, J. S. I. Ingram, M. Herrero, A. Palazzo, A. E. S. Helfgott, A. Wilkinson, P. Havlík, ., D. Mason-D'Croz, and C. Jost. 2014. Challenges to scenario-guided adaptive action on food security under climate change. Global Environmental Change.

• Chaudhury, M., J. Vervoort, P. Kristjanson, P. Ericksen, and A. Ainslie. 2013. Participatory scenarios as a tool to link science and policy on food security under climate change in East Africa. Regional Environmental Change 13:389-398.

• http://ccafs.cgiar.org/scenarios - look for blogs and video - Joost.vervoort@eci.ox.ac.uk

A B C D

A1 B1 C1 D1

A2 B2 C2 D2

A3 B3 C3 D3

FACTORS, STATES

COMPATIBILITY

B1 B2 B3

A1 2 0 1

A2 1 1 1

A3 2 0 2

SCENARIOS

(A2,B2,C2,D1) (A1,B3,C1,D3)

(A3,B3,C2,D3)

FINAL SCENARIOS

(A2,B2,C2,D1) (A1,B3,C1,D3)

(A3,B3,C2,D3) 10000s of ways

(A2,B1,C2,D1)

Choose 4,6,8..

MATLAB program (OLDFAR)

Multiple factors, multiple states: Andes

Sugarcane yields under four climate models and “no climate change” for five socio-economic scenarios for South Asia, indexed to 2010

Games & scenarios

• Integrating decision-making and

governance dynamically into

scenarios

• Using participatory game design

• Games - participatory system models

+ the benefits of identification and

immersion

• Scenarios can be explored

dynamically; multiple perspectives

• Bridge power gaps

Nils Ferrand’s work