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Financing climate change adaptation.

Bouwer LM, Aerts JC

Institute for Environmental Studies, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Netherlands. laurens.bouwer@ivm.falw.vu.nl

This paper examines the topic of financing adaptation in future climate change policies. A major question is whether adaptation in developing countries should be financed under the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), or whether funding should come from other sources. We present an overview of financial resources and propose the employment of a two-track approach: one track that attempts to secure climate change adaptation funding under the UNFCCC; and a second track that improves mainstreaming of climate risk management in development efforts. Developed countries would need to demonstrate much greater commitment to the funding of adaptation measures if the UNFCCC were to cover a substantial part of the costs. The mainstreaming of climate change adaptation could follow a risk management path, particularly in relation to disaster risk reduction. 'Climate-proofing' of development projects that currently do not consider climate and weather risks could improve their sustainability.

Published 3 March 2006 in Disasters, 30(1): 49-63.
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