Supporting Science, Technology and Innovation to Respond to Climate Change in the Least Developed Country Context

1. Supporting Science, Technology and Innovation to Respond to Climate Change in the Least Developed Country Context Sara E. Farley International Science and Technology StrategistPortorose, Slovenia * EFC/Republic of SloveniaJune 2008 * Global Philanthropists: Partners for a Knowledge Based Response to Climate Change

2. What I Observed: HUGE Challenges, HUGE Opportunities

3. The Big Disconnect Development Poverty increases vulnerability to global change. Global Change Global change can increase vulnerability to poverty.

4. The Big Disconnect Yet development and global changehave been addressed, researched,and funded as unrelated issues. Business As Usual

5. Big Picture Context Insufficient science, technology, and innovation (STI) capacity: Most developing countries lack the capacity and the voice required to direct, perform, disseminate, and use much research. A growing STI gap: Differences in growth due to the distribution, use, adoption, adaptation, and generation of knowledge are widening. STI a low priority for donors: Donors provide relatively little support to STI for development than they do to other sectors.

6. Different Donor Approaches

7. Cluster 1: Global or Regional Public Goods InitiativesCGIAR/Future Harvest • Since 1972, WB has put $1 billion into the CGIAR, leveraging $7.5 billion from donors • The CGIAR/Future Harvest supports 15 international agricultural research centers, each focused on a particular crop/challenge addressing food security for poor people • CGIAR research outputs are global public goods

8. Cluster 2: STI Capacity DeepeningMillennium Science Initiative Uganda • Millennium Science Initiative (MSI) challenge: • Support university education and research to achieve national development goals • US$ 30 million grant • Beneficiaries: tertiary education institutions, researchers, research institutions, firms through public-private research component • 2 components

9. Cluster 3: Linkage initiatives TOKTEN Rwanda • Transfer of Knowledge through Expatriate Nationals (TOKTEN) challenge: • Facilitate short-term (2-8 weeks) peer-to-peer visits and collaboration between expatriates in the diaspora with individuals/institutions in the home country • Goals: “transfer modern know-how” to solve specific challenges and encourage “brain circulation” • Beneficiaries: key sectors with human resources/knowledge constraints • UNDP started in 1977, several countries • http://www.toktenrwanda.org

10. Cluster 4: Integrated initiativesPEARL Rwanda • Partnership for Enhancement of Agribusiness in Rwanda (PEARL) challenge: • Upgrade quality coffee productionto enhance rural farmer incomes and grow exports • USAID US$ 7 million • Integrated objectives: • Graduate training for agriculturalists (MSc Agr) • Quality improvements through technology upgrading and process improvements • Market diversification through entry into foreign markets • Farmer empowerment through linkages • Focus on human development—ICT, media, health • Result: smallholder farmer income per kilo US$ 0.22 US$ 2.0 in 6 years!

11. Most common donor support to STI for development • Cluster 2 initiatives (STI capacity building) most common across the donor community • Orientation of most Cluster 2 initiatives: • Modern versus traditional • National versus global, local, or regional • Institutional versus functional • Strategic versus integrative • Production versus absorption • Inputs versus outcomes • The most ideal STI initiative for LDCs is the least common: Cluster 4

12. Like the planet, development aid is vulnerable too. • Implementing Adaptation Strategies

13. To address the Big Disconnect and better integrate the approaches of the Development Research and Global Change Research communities we must: • Understand our differences • Overcome our differences • Create a new paradigm for integration, cooperation, and resource maximization

14. Has the donor/policy community made progress toward rethinkingglobal change and development aid to promote environmentally and socially sustainableeconomic growth?

15. Strides Toward a Better FutureA Challenge and Solution Comparison [ 5 Case Studies ]

16. Example 1 Building Adaptation Capacity in Africa Challenges: Business As Usual Solution: Climate Change Adaptation in Africa: Action-Research Programme (CCAA) • Little capacity for adaptation to global change in Africa. • No incorporation of climate change-related curricula into teaching at the tertiary level. • Weak linkages between • adaptation research communities in Africa and the internationalglobal change research community. • Donors : IDRC, DFID • Funding: CAD $65 million • Goal: Assist poor people, institutions, and researchers vulnerable to climatechange to learn from actual cases of climate adaptation • Emphases: • Develop tertiary curriculum • Equip research facilities • Create international network tomentor African researchers • Establish processes to include NGOs and civil society

17. Example 2 Climate Proofing Development Projects Challenges: Business As Usual Solution: ADAPT—Assessment and Design for Adaptation to Climate Change • 20-40% of Official DevelopmentAssistance subject to climate risk. • Only 2% of projects address this risk explicitly. • Few tools available to help development specialists measureand respond to the climate risksentailed in a given project. • Donors : World Bank • Goal: Create a tool to assist project developers from donor agencies and recipient countries to assess the degree of climate risks • Emphases: • Easy to use web-based tool • Identify risks—both positive andnegative—that might increase ordecrease as a result of projectedclimate change • Resource and partner identification to address identified risks

18. Example 3 Bridging Poverty and the Environment Challenges: Business As Usual Solution: Poverty and the Environment Initiative • Environment and poverty largelydealt with as separate domains forresearch, funding, and projectinitiation. • Too little research exists on the effects that environmental degradation and global change would have on poor people. • Environment and poverty reduction • poorly integrated in governance regimes. • Donors: UNDP, UNEP, EC • Countries: Global (9 African/Asianpilot countries) • Goal: Help developing countries buildcapacity to mainstream poverty-environ-ment linkages into national developmentplanning processes • Emphases: • Integrate environmental issues • into PRSPs and MDG Strategies • Forum of Ministers on Pov-Env • Strengthen coordination betweendonors to scale-up results • Provide technical support

19. Example 4 Devising and Implementing Adaptation Strategies Challenges: Business As Usual Solution: Implementation of Adaptation Measures in Coastal Zones • The potential economic impact of climate change on Caribbean Community countries is estimatedbetween US$1.4 and $9.0billion for the impacts that couldoccur assuming no adaptation to climate change. • Realizing the benefits of an adaptation strategy requires resources for implementation. • Donors: GEF, World Bank • Financing: US$ 2.1 million • Countries: Dominica, St. Lucia,St. Vincent, Grenadines • Goal: Assist countries in implementingadaptation planning and assessmentinto national strategy • Emphases: • Detailed design of pilotadaptation measures to reducenegative impacts of climatechange on marine and terrestrialbiodiversity and land degradation • Implement pilot investments

20. Example 5 Promoting Integrated Innovation Initiatives Challenges: Business As Usual Solution: Promoting Local Innovation (PROLINNOVA) • Few partnerships exist for government, NGOs, and civil society to collaborate in designing, implementing, and disseminating innovations for ecologically-oriented agriculture. • Little donor support for science,technology, and innovation goes to initiatives that blend indigenous knowledge with modernresearch holistic approach missing. • Weak communication channelsbetween researchers and usersminimize uptake of innovation. • Donors: Rockefeller Foundation, DGIS, WB, IFAD, CGIAR, NGOs, etc. • Countries: Ethiopia, Uganda, Nepal, Ghana, Niger, Sudan, Cambodia, etc. • Goal: Create a national learning network for the promotion of localinnovation in ecologically orientedagriculture and natural resource management • Emphases: • Stimulate local innovation • Create partnerships to disseminateinnovations that work • Operationalize cross-sectoral linkages

21. Crossing the Bridge Over Troubled Water Make it useful: Make climate information more relevant and usable Identify vulnerability: Develop and apply climate risk screening tools Improve process: Identify and use appropriate entry points for climate information Just do it: Shift emphasis to implementation, as opposed to developing new plans Partnership is everything: Encourage meaningful co-ordination and the sharing of good practices

22. We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.Albert Einstein

23. Development for Global Change

24. For more information, contact:Sara E. FarleyInternational Science and Technology Strategist sara.e.farley@gmail.com For the 2007 UNCTAD study on Donor Support to Science, Technology and Innovation for Development in Least Developed Countries: http://www.unctad.org/sections/ldc_dir/docs/ldcr2007_Farley_en.pdf