Knowledge and Action in Development"> Knowledge and Action in Development">
[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/wirecc/v10y2019i3ne579.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

On the use and misuse of climate change projections in international development

Author

Listed:
  • Hannah Nissan
  • Lisa Goddard
  • Erin Coughlan de Perez
  • John Furlow
  • Walter Baethgen
  • Madeleine C. Thomson
  • Simon J. Mason
Abstract
Climate resilience is increasingly prioritized by international development agencies and national governments. However, current approaches to informing communities of future climate risk are problematic. The predominant focus on end‐of‐century projections neglects more pressing development concerns, which relate to the management of shorter‐term risks and climate variability, and constitutes a substantial opportunity cost for the limited financial and human resources available to tackle development challenges. When a long‐term view genuinely is relevant to decision‐making, much of the information available is not fit for purpose. Climate model projections are able to capture many aspects of the climate system and so can be relied upon to guide mitigation plans and broad adaptation strategies, but the use of these models to guide local, practical adaptation actions is unwarranted. Climate models are unable to represent future conditions at the degree of spatial, temporal, and probabilistic precision with which projections are often provided, which gives a false impression of confidence to users of climate change information. In this article, we outline these issues, review their history, and provide a set of practical steps for both the development and climate scientist communities to consider. Solutions to mobilize the best available science include a focus on decision‐relevant timescales, an increased role for model evaluation and expert judgment and the integration of climate variability into climate change services. This article is categorized under: Climate and Development > Knowledge and Action in Development

Suggested Citation

  • Hannah Nissan & Lisa Goddard & Erin Coughlan de Perez & John Furlow & Walter Baethgen & Madeleine C. Thomson & Simon J. Mason, 2019. "On the use and misuse of climate change projections in international development," Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 10(3), May.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:wirecc:v:10:y:2019:i:3:n:e579
    DOI: 10.1002/wcc.579
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.579
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1002/wcc.579?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Vittorio Serra & Antonio Ledda & Maria Grazia Gavina Ruiu & Giovanna Calia & Valentina Mereu & Valentina Bacciu & Serena Marras & Donatella Spano & Andrea De Montis, 2022. "Adaptation to Climate Change Across Local Policies: An Investigation in Six Italian Cities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-16, July.
    2. Patrycja Klusak & Matthew Agarwala & Matt Burke & Moritz Kraemer & Kamiar Mohaddes, 2023. "Rising Temperatures, Falling Ratings: The Effect of Climate Change on Sovereign Creditworthiness," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(12), pages 7468-7491, December.
    3. Theodore G. Shepherd & Elisabeth A. Lloyd, 2021. "Meaningful climate science," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 169(1), pages 1-16, November.
    4. Barbara Kęsicka & Rafał Stasik & Michał Kozłowski & Adam Choryński, 2023. "Is Controlled Drainage of Agricultural Land a Common Used Practice?—A Bibliographic Analysis," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(9), pages 1-17, September.
    5. Siatwiinda M. Siatwiinda & Iwan Supit & Bert van Hove & Olusegun Yerokun & Gerard H. Ros & Wim de Vries, 2021. "Climate change impacts on rainfed maize yields in Zambia under conventional and optimized crop management," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 167(3), pages 1-23, August.
    6. Robert Wilby & Xianfu Lu, 2022. "Tailoring climate information and services for adaptation actors with diverse capabilities," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 174(3), pages 1-13, October.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:wirecc:v:10:y:2019:i:3:n:e579. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1002/(ISSN)1757-7799 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.