4th World Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation (WSCCA- 2021)

Climate change is among the major challenges of modern times. As the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the COP 25 recommendations call for action not only from government, but also from various stakeholders.

Apart from the knowledge offered by modelling and forecasts which allows us to understand the problem and how it develops in the future, we need to know more about approaches, methods and tools, which may help us to cope with the social, economic and political problems posed by climate change now. In order words, we need to speed up developments in the field of climate change adaptation.

It is against this background that the “4th World Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation” is being organised. The event is organised by the International Climate Change Information and Research Programme (ICCIRP) with support from various international organisations. The Symposium will be a truly interdisciplinary event, covering some of the key areas in the field of climate change adaptation.

The “4th World Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation” will be held on-line, as a side event of the 26th Session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 26) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which will be held in Glasgow on 9th-20th December 2020. The Paris Agreement will be 5 years old then, and it is a good time to take stock, review progress and pave the way for future developments. Consistent with this need, the theme of the Symposium is "Innovation in Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation in Support of Policies Implementation". As the title suggests, the event will offer a platform to introduce and discuss the latest ideas, trends and innovative approaches and methods to move forward the climate agenda, especially in respect of climate transformation, and the implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
 

Consistent with the need for more cross-sectoral interactions among the various stakeholders working in the field of climate change adaptation, the aims of the “4th World Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation” are as follows:

• i.    to provide research institutions, universities, NGOs and enterprises all round the world with an opportunity to display and present their works in the field of climate change adaptation and technologies which may mitigate climate change;
• ii.    to foster the exchange of information, ideas and experiences acquired in the execution of climate change adaptation projects, especially successful initiatives and good practice;
• iii.    to discuss methodological approaches and experiences deriving from case studies and projects, which aim to show how the principles of climate change adaptation may be implemented in practice;
• iv.    to network the participants and provide a platform so they can explore possibilities for cooperation.

Last but not the least, a further aim of the event will be to document and disseminate the wealth of experiences on climate change adaptation available today across the world. To this purpose, papers submitted and accepted will be published in the book “Climate Change Strategies: handling the challenges of adapting to a changing climate”. This will be a further volume of the award-winning book series “Climate Change Management” published by Springer, which since its creation in 2008 has become the world´s leading book series on climate change management. 

In addition, authors who may wish to do so, may have their papers considered for the International Journal of Climate Change Strategies and Management (a fully indexed journal, also at ISI /Thomson Reuters). However, Article Processing Charges (APCs) do apply. 

Delegates attending the “4th World Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation” will come from a cross-sectoral range of areas, from both industrialised and developing countries. They include:

i. officials at city, regional and national level concerned with climate change
ii. members of NGOs working with climate change;
iii. researchers at universities and research centres;
iv. teaching staff at universities;
v. representatives from companies 
vi. representatives from development agencies working with climate change adaptation and executing projects on the ground;
vii. project officers and consultants;
viii. other people interested in the field.

The participation of doctoral students is warmly encouraged and supervisors/advisers are kindly requested to facilitate their participation. The sort of international exposure and the rich content of this Symposium will be beneficial to their work, and their careers.

It is believed that this wide range of participants will help to outline the need for and the usefulness of integrated approaches towards climate change adaptation and, hence contribute to the further consolidation of this thematic area.

The “4th World Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation” is organised by means of a set of presentations, divided into 5 main themes, distributed over parallel sessions dealing with some of the issues of strategic value in the field of climate change adaptation. These are:

●    Session 1:  Technological approaches to Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation
●    Session 2:  Food Security and Climate Change: Adapting Agriculture to Climate Change
●    Session 3:  Climate Change Adaptation, Resilience, Extreme Events and Disaster Risk Management
●    Session 4: Climate Change Policy, Governance and Climate Services
●    Session 5: Climate Literacy, Information, Communication and Outreach
●    Session 6: Climate Change and Health
●    Session 7: Stakeholders Engagement in adaptation and mitigation

The submitted papers will be clustered under one of the planned sessions.

The schedule of the “4th World Symposium on Climate Change Adaptation”  is as follows. All times are in Central European Time (UTC+2), you can see the time conversion tool here.

The mixture of plenary and parallel sessions will provide participants with an outstanding opportunity to interact, network and learn about the latest ideas, projects and practices aimed at mainstreaming climate change adaptation, worldwide.
 

• Deadline for submission of abstracts: 10th September 2021
• Deadline for submission of presentations: 20th October 2021 
• Deadline for the submission of papers: 20th December 2021
• Deadline for registrations: 10th October 2021

Since the book is expected to be launched shortly after the event, the deadlines need to be followed. Delegates may also attend the event, without submitting a paper.  

A discounted fee of € 100 will be charged to delegates who register until 30th September 2021 (early bird registration). Early bird fee applies to Registration and Payment received before the 30th September and 30th December respectively. After that, delegates will need to pay the full fee of € 200. The reduced fee for MSc/PhD students is €50. The fee includes access to the event and the presentations. Authors contributing to the book will have a PDF of their chapters and an electronic token with which they may download the book “Climate Change Strategies: handling the challenges of adapting to a changing climate” for their personal use.

Attendance to the event is by invitation only. Interested people and organisations are encouraged to submit their expressions of interest and abstracts first, after which they may receive an invitation to register. This is a self-funded event and the organisers are unable to subsidise costs of any kind. They are however happy to issue letters of invitation to support delegates to request funding for their participation.  

• Research and Transfer Centre “Sustainable Development and Climate Change Management”, Hamburg University of Applied Sciences (Germany)
• International Climate Change Information and Research Programme (ICCIRP)
   

• UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
• World Health Organisation (WHO)
• World Meteorological Organisation (WMO)
• Manchester Metropolitan University (UK)
   

Chair 

• Prof. Walter Leal, International Climate Change Information and Research Programme (ICCIRP), Research and Transfer Centre “Sustainable Development and Climate Change Management”, Hamburg University of Applied Sciences (Germany) and Manchester Metropolitan University (United Kindgom)

Co-Chairs 

• Prof. Ismaila Rimi Abubakar
  Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University (University of Dammam), Saudi Arabia
  irabubakar (at) iau.edu (dot) sa
• Prof. Fátima Alves
  Universidade Aberta and CFE, University of Coimbra, Portugal
  fatimaa@uab.pt

 
Members

• Professor Nelson Amaro, Galileo University, Guatemala
• Professor Paula Castro, CFE - Centre for Functional Ecology, University of Coimbra
• Professor Marilyn Silvia Aparicio-Effen, Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, Bolivia
• Professor Desalegn Ayal, University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Professor Ulisses Azeiteiro, University of Aveiro, Portugal
• Prof. Boaventura Chango Cuamba, Eduardo Mondlane University, Mozambique
• Professor Maris Klavins, University of Latvia, Latvia
• Professor Murukesan Krishnapillai, College of Micronesia-FSM, Micronesia
• Professor Evangelos Manolas, Democritus University of Thrace, Greece
• Professor Xavier Medina UOC, Barcelona, Spain 
• Professor Amadou Thierno Gaye, Université Cheikh Anta Diop Dakar, Senegal
• Professor Pastor David Chavez Munoz, Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru, Peru
• Professor Nicholas Otienoh Oguge, University of Nairobi, Kenya
• Prof. Michael Shilin, Russian State Hydrometeorological University, Russia
• Professor Belay Simane, University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
• Professor  Menas Wuta, University of Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe
• Professor Diallo Yacouba,Co-Rural Polytechnic Institute for Training & Appl. Research, Mali
• Professor Sidat Yaffa, University of The Gambia, The Gambia

All questions related to scientific inputs and strategic partnerships should be sent to:

Professor Walter Leal (BSc, PhD, DSc, DPhil, DEd, DLitt, FSB, FRGS, FLS)
Hamburg University of Applied Sciences & Manchester Metropolitan University
Contact: info (at) iccip (dot) net
 

All questions related to abstracts and registrations should be sent to:

Marina Kovaleva
HAW Hamburg, Germany
marina.kovaleva (at) haw-hamburg (dot) de
 

An abstract should be up to 200 words, it should describe the rationale and aims of the paper, and some of its results. General descriptions of broad contexts should be avoided.  The full contact details about the author(s) need to be provided. Abstracts should be written in the third person and not in the first or second one (e.g. I, me, or my paper). Please see below a sample abstract. Authors whose abstracts have been accepted, will receive further details about how to submit their full papers, and further logistical information.
 
SAMPLE ABSTRACT
(PLEASE SEND YOUR ABSTRACT EXACTLY WITH THE FORMAT BELOW TO:

Marina Kovaleva
HAW Hamburg, Germany
marina.kovaleva (at) haw-hamburg (dot) de

Ecosystem services in adaptation projects in West Africa 

Kennedy Wahome Muthee 
Department of Environmental Science, School of Environmental Studies, Kenyatta University, Nairobi, Kenya 
Cheikh Mbow START International, Washington, DC, USA 
Geoffrey Mugo Macharia Department of Environmental Science, School of Environmental Studies, Kenyatta University, Nairobi, Kenya, 
(please make sure you provide your contact e-mail, for correspondences)

Abstract 

The purpose of this paper is to assess the extent to which adaptation projects have incorporated ecosystem services, as well as their redesigning options. The projects selected are listed under the National Adaptation Programme of Action in the West African region.  A desktop survey approach was used to review 168 projects from 13 countries across West Africa. The projects were categorized and analyzed according  to their adaptation goals, thematic focus, their implementation duration and level of investment. The adaptation initiatives are dominated by actions in the agricultural sector, accounting for 32 per cent of the total. Further, they were characterized by small grants consideration with 63 per cent falling under US$1m budget, short-term implementation duration with 46 per cent having three years’ execution period. A large portion of projects (55 per cent) mentioned directly one or more ecosystem services, with provisioning services being referred to in 50 per cent of the cases.  

The study identified the fact that adaptation projects with ecosystem services components are more sustainable and beneficial to the community. Hence, more consideration of nature benefits during project design, more financial consideration and localizing of the projects to realize the global adaptation goal should be considered.