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George Washington University’s PISA Helps Share Rural Vietnamese Climate Adaptation Strategies
›“Climate change is not a topic of debate in Vietnam, it’s a real challenge to future prosperity and security,” says George Washington University’s Partnerships for International Strategies in Asia (PISA) program in this video about their climate adaptation and mitigation work in Nam Dinh province. “[Vietnam’s] population density (265 people/square kilometer), its long coastline (3,444 km), its two major rivers (the Red and Mekong) – all help make it one of the 10 countries considered most vulnerable to climate change,” the narrator says.
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Lessons From Peru to Nepal
Glacial Lake Outburst Floods: “The Threat From Above”
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“We have never experienced so many potentially dangerous lakes in such a short period of time,” said Alton Byers of The Mountain Institute (TMI) during a roundtable discussion on glacial melt, glacial lakes, and downstream consequences at the Wilson Center on October 26. “There have always been glacial lake outburst floods,” said Byers. What has changed is how quickly these lakes now grow. “Suddenly, you wake up in the morning, and now there are hundreds and hundreds of these lakes above you – the threat from above,” he said.
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Book Review: ‘Plundered Nations? Successes and Failures in Natural Resource Extraction’
›The principal argument of Plundered Nations? Successes and Failures in Natural Resource Extraction is highlighted by the question mark in the title. In many resource rich countries, natural assets have not led to development. The book advances the hypothesis that “for the depletion of natural assets to be converted into sustained development, a series of decisions has got to be got sufficiently right” (p. 1). That series of decisions is examined in detail through case studies on Cameroon, Chile, Iran, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Nigeria, Russia, and Zambia, produced by a diverse group of academic and practicing economists under the auspices of the Center for the Study of African Economies and the Oxford Center for the Economics of Resource Rich Countries (OxCarre).
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Watch: Geoff Dabelko on Climate Adaptation and Peacebuilding at SXSW
›November 16, 2011 // By Wilson Center StaffThe problems of climate adaptation, poverty alleviation, and peacebuilding are common to many parts of the world. Yet the efforts to address them are often pursued separately or with little coordination. Capturing the co-benefits of building institutional capacity critical to all three areas is an idea that will likely receive little attention at next year’s Rio+20 Earth Summit in Brazil, says ECSP Director Geoff Dabelko.
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Robert Olson for the Science and Technology Innovation Program
Geoengineering for Decision Makers
›Download Geoengineering for Decision Makers, by Robert Olson, from the Wilson Center. Excerpted below is the executive summary.
Geoengineering involves intentional, large-scale interventions in the Earth’s atmosphere, oceans, soils or living systems to influence the planet’s climate. Geoengineering is not a new idea. Speculation about it dates at least to 1908, when Swedish scientist Svente Arrhenius suggested that the carbon dioxide released from burning fossil fuels might help prevent the next ice age. Until recently, proposals for using geoengineering to counteract global warming have been viewed with extreme skepticism, but as projections concerning the impact of climate change have become more dire, a growing number of scientists have begun to argue that geoengineering deserves a second look.
Below are 10 of the major concerns about geoengineering that policymakers need to be aware of and give due consideration. These concerns apply mainly to solar radiation management (SRM), the form of geoengineering that attempts to cool the climate by reflecting a small amount of solar radiation back into space. SRM involves significantly higher risks than the other form of geoengineering, carbon dioxide removal (CDR) which involves removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in the ocean, plants, soil, or geological formations.- Unintended Negative Consequences: We may know too little about the Earth’s geophysical and ecological systems to be confident we can engineer the climate on a planetary scale without making an already bad situation even worse;
- Potential Ineffectiveness: Some proposed CDR methods are so weak that they would produce useful results only if sustained on a millennial timescale;
- Risk of Undermining Emissions-Mitigation Efforts: If politicians come to believe that geoengineering can provide a low-cost “tech fix” for climate change, it could provide a perfect excuse for backing off from efforts to shift away from fossil fuels;
- Risk of Sudden Catastrophic Warming: If geoengineering is used as a substitute for emissions reduction, allowing high concentrations of CO2 to build up in the atmosphere, it would create a situation where if the geoengineering ever faltered because of wars, economic depressions, terrorism or any other reasons during the millennium ahead, a catastrophic warming would occur too quickly for human society and vast numbers of plant and animal species to adapt;
- Equity Issues: Geoengineering efforts might succeed in countering the warming trend on a global scale, but at the same time cause droughts and famines in some regions;
- Difficulty of Reaching Agreement: It could be harder to reach global agreements on doing geoengineering than it is to reach agreements on reducing carbon emissions;
- Potential for Weaponization: Geoengineering research could lead to major advances in knowledge relevant for developing weather control as a military tool;
- Reduced Efficiency of Solar Energy: For every one percent reduction in solar radiation caused by the use of SRM geoengineering, the average output of concentrator solar systems that rely on direct sunlight will drop by four to five percent;
- Danger of Corporate Interests Overriding the Public Interest: Dangers include a lack of transparency in SRM technology development and the possibility that the drive for corporate profits could lead to inappropriate geoengineering deployments;
- Danger of Research Driving Inappropriate Deployment: Research programs have often created a community of researchers that functions as an interest group promoting the development of the technology that they are investigating.
Several of the best climate studies suggest that stabilizing the amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases below the level that risks dangerous climate change will require a social mobilization and technological transformation at a speed and scale that has few if any peacetime precedents. If correct, and the needed mobilization does not occur in the years immediately ahead, then decision makers later in the century could find themselves in a situation where geoengineering is the only recourse to truly dangerous climate change. The most fundamental argument for R&D; on geoengineering is that those decision makers should not be put in a position of either letting dangerous climate change occur or deploying poorly evaluated, untested technologies at scale. At the very least, we need to learn what approaches to avoid even if desperate.
Continue reading by downloading the full report from the Wilson Center.
Robert Olson is a Senior Fellow at the Institute for Alternative Futures. -
Reducing Urban Poverty: A New Generation of Ideas
›Download Reducing Urban Poverty: A New Generation of Ideas from the Wilson Center.
In 2008 the global population reached a remarkable turning point; for the first time in history, more than half of the world’s people were living in cities. Moving forward into the 21st century, the world faces an unprecedented urban expansion with projections for the global urban population to reach nearly five billion by the year 2030. Virtually all of this growth will occur in the developing world where cities gain an average of five million residents every month, overwhelming ecosystems and placing tremendous pressure on the capacity of local governments to provide necessary infrastructure and services. Failure to incorporate urban priorities into the global development agenda carries serious implications for human security, global security, and environmental sustainability.
Recognizing a need to develop and strengthen urban-focused practitioner and policymaking ties with academia, and disseminate evidence-based development programming, the Wilson Center’s Comparative Urban Studies Project, USAID’s Urban Programs Team, the International Housing Coalition, the World Bank, and Cities Alliance teamed up to co-sponsor an academic paper competition for graduate students studying urban issues. The first competition took place in the months leading up to the 5th World Urban Forum, held in Rio de Janeiro in March 2010.
This publication, Reducing Urban Poverty: A New Generation of Ideas, marks the second annual academic paper competition. “Reducing urban poverty” was chosen as the theme with each author focusing on one of three topics: land markets and security of tenure; health; and, livelihoods. A panel of urban experts representing the sponsoring institutions reviewed 70 submitted abstracts, from which 16 were invited to write full length papers. Of these, six were selected for this publication. We congratulate the graduate students who participated in this competition for their contribution to our understanding of the complex relationship between urbanization and poverty.
These papers highlight the new research and innovative thinking of the next generation of urban planners, practitioners, and policymakers. It is our hope that by infusing the dialogue on these issues between the academic and policy worlds with fresh perspectives, we will foster new and innovative strategies to reduce global urban poverty.
Sources: UNFPA, UN-HABITAT. -
In Colombia, Rural Communities Face Uphill Battle for Land Rights
›November 14, 2011 // By Kayly Ober“The only risk is wanting to stay,” beams a Colombian tourism ad, eager to forget decades of brutal internal conflict; however, the risk of violence remains for many rural communities, particularly as the traditional fight over drugs turns to other high-value goods: natural resource rights.
La Toma: Small Town, Big Threats
In the vacuum left by Colombia’s war on drugs, re-armed paramilitary groups remain a threat to many rural civilians. Organized groups hold footholds, particularly in the northeast and west, where they’ve traditionally hidden and exploited weak governance. Over the past five years, their presence has increased while their aims have changed.
A recent PBS documentary, The War We Are Living (watch below), profiles the struggles of two Afro-Colombian women, Francia Marquez and Clemencia Carabali, in the tiny town of La Toma confronting the paramilitary group Las Aguilas Negras, La Nueva Generacion. The Afro-Colombian communities the women represent – long persecuted for their mixed heritage – are traditional artisanal miners, but the Aguilas Negras claim that these communities impede economic growth by refusing to deal with multinationals interested in mining gold on a more industrial scale in their town.
For over seven years, the Aguilas Negras have sent frequent death threats and have indiscriminately killed residents, throwing their bodies over the main bridge in town. At the height of tensions in 2010, they murdered eight gold miners to incite fear. Community leaders know that violence and intimidation by the paramilitary group is part of their plan to scare and displace residents, but they refuse to give in: “The community of La Toma will have to be dragged out dead. Otherwise we’re not going to leave,” admits community leader Francia Marquez to PBS.
La Toma’s predicament is further complicated by corruption and general disinterest from Bogota. Laws that explicitly require the consent of Afro-Colombian communities to mine their land have not always been followed. In 2010, the Department of the Interior and the Institute of Geology and Minerals awarded a contract, without consultation, to Hector Sarria to extract gold around La Toma and ordered 1,300 families to leave their ancestral lands. Tension exploded between the local government and residents.
The community – spurred in part by Marquez and Carabali – geared into action; residents called community meetings, marched on the town, and set up road blocks. As a result, the eviction order was suspended multiple times, and in December 2010, La Toma officially won their case with Colombia’s Constitutional Court. Hector Sarria’s mining license as well as up to 30 other illegal mining permits were suspended permanently. But, as disillusioned residents are quick to point out, the decision could change at any time.
“Wayuu Gold”
Much like the people of La Toma, the indigenous Wayuu people who make their home in northeast Colombia have also found themselves the target of paramilitary wrath. Wayuu ancestral land is rich in coal and salt, and their main port, Bahia Portete, is ideally situated for drug trafficking, making them an enticing target. In 2004, armed men ravaged the village for nearly 12 hours, killing 12, accounting for 30 disappearances, and displacing thousands. Even now, seven years later, those brave enough to lobby for peace face threats.
Now, other natural resource pressures have emerged. In 2011, growing towns nearby started siphoning water from Wayuu lands, and climate change is expected to exacerbate the situation. A 2007 IPCC report wrote that “under severe dry conditions, inappropriate agricultural practices (deforestation, soil erosion, and excessive use of agrochemicals) will deteriorate surface and groundwater quantity and quality,” particularly in the Magdalena river basin where the Wayuu live. Glacial melt will also stress water supplies in other parts of Colombia. The threat is very real for indigenous peoples like the Wayuu, who call water “Wayuu gold.”
“Without water, we have no future,” says Griselda Polanco, a Wayuu woman, in a video produced by UN Women.
The basic right to water has always been a contentious issue for indigenous peoples in Latin America – perhaps most famously in Cochabomba, Bolivia – and Colombia is no different: most recently 10,000 protestors took to the streets in Bogota to lobby for the right to water.
Post-Conflict Land Tenure Tensions
Perhaps the Wayuu and people of La Toma’s best hope is in a new Victims’ Law, ratified in June 2011, but in the short term, tensions look set to increase as Colombia works to implement it. The law will offer financial compensation to victims or surviving close relatives. It also aims to restore the rights of millions of people forced off their land, including many Afro-Colombian and indigenous peoples.
But “some armed groups – which still occupy much of the stolen land – have already tried to undermine the process,” reports the BBC. “There are fears that they will respond violently to attempts by the rightful owners or the state to repossess the land.”
Rhodri Williams of TerraNullius, a blog that focuses on housing, land, and property rights in conflict, disaster, and displacement contexts, wrote in an email to New Security Beat that there are many hurdles in the way of the law being successful, including ecological changes that have already occurred:Perhaps the biggest obstacle is the fact that many usurped indigenous and Afro-Colombian territories have been fundamentally transformed through mono-culture cultivation. Previously mixed ecosystems are now palm oil deserts and no one seems to have a sense of how restitution could meaningfully proceed under these circumstances. Compensation or alternative land are the most readily feasible options, but this flies in the face of the particular bond that indigenous peoples typically have with their own homeland. Such bonds are not only economic, in the sense that indigenous livelihoods may be adapted to the particular ecosystem they inhabit, but also spiritual, with land forming a significant element of collective identity. Colombia has recognized these links in their constitution, which sets out special protections for indigenous and Afro-Colombian groups, but has failed to apply these rules in practice. For many groups, it may now be too late.
As National Geographic explorer Wade Davis said at the Wilson Center in April, climate change can represent as much a psychological and spiritual problem for indigenous people as a technical problem. Unfortunately, as land-use issues such as those faced by Afro-Columbian communities, the Wayuu, and many other indigenous groups around the world demonstrate, there is a legal dimension to be overcome as well.
Sources: BBC News, Colombia Reports, International Displacement Monitoring Centre, PBS, Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, UN Women. The War We Are Living, part of the PBS series Women, War, and Peace, was instrumental to the framing of this piece.
Image and Video Credit: “Countryside Near Manizales, Colombia,” courtesy of flickr user philipbouchard; The War We Are Living video, courtesy of PBS. -
Jotham Musinguzi on Investing in Family Planning for Development in Uganda
›“What we are seeing is not adequate, but we think we are seeing very good positive movement, and we want to build on that,” said Jotham Musinguzi, director of the African regional office for Partners in Population and Development (PPD) in Kampala, Uganda. Musinguzi is a public health physician by training who previously advised the government of Uganda on population and reproductive health issues. “We think that [the government] is now on a firm foundation to continue investing properly in family planning,” he said.
Family Planning for Development
Uganda’s high population growth rate (the country has a total fertility rate of 6.4 children per woman, according to the UN) presents a number of challenges, said Musinguzi, exerting pressure on education and health systems, as well as on basic infrastructure, particularly for housing and transportation. Additionally, high levels of poverty and unemployment can become a source of instability.
Policymakers in Uganda are beginning to recognize the urgency of the issue, however, particularly in regards to young people, said Musinguzi. “They don’t have access to jobs, they don’t have the skills, and therefore the challenges of poverty eradication become even more important.”
Nonetheless, the country’s contraceptive prevalence rate is low, at 24 percent, with 41 percent of married women expressing an unmet need for family planning services, according to the 2006 Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) for Uganda. Low levels of investment and lack of government involvement remain the primary obstacles, according to Musinguzi, in addition to socio-cultural and religious barriers.
Uganda historically depended primarily on donor finance, rather than government funding, to support family planning and reproductive health services, Musinguzi said. However, over the past two years, the Ugandan government has increased investment due to concerted efforts by PPD, as well as USAID, the UN Population Fund, and civil society groups. “Our point was that if the government does not fund family planning, then they are going to find that achievement of the Millennium Development Goals…is going to be very challenging,” he said.
“I think the low investment in family planning in Uganda is a thing of the past, and we are now looking forward to really better investment in this field,” Musinguzi said. “I am sure we are going to witness quite a big change [in the 2011 DHS] in terms of access as a result of the proper social investment that the government is trying to do now.”
South-South Collaboration
“I have a keen and strong interest in South-South collaboration in the field of reproductive health, family planning, population, and development,” Musinguzi said. Countries in the South have experience linking programming on population and development, and may face similar challenges, he said. For instance, Bangladesh and Vietnam had successful family planning programs that helped blunt rapid population growth rates.
“Countries, like Uganda, and others which haven’t gotten there yet, could learn from these other countries,” said Musinguzi, by sharing best practices and lesson learned, and replicating applicable solutions.
PPD also has a regional project reaching out to policymakers to increase commitment and accountability for family planning and reproductive health services. For instance, parliamentarians may not realize that they can play a significant role, but they have a unique function in providing government and budget oversight, Musinguzi said. Furthermore, they can create legal and administrative frameworks that prioritize family planning programs.
“We continue to make the case for more investment in family planning and reproductive health, but also making sure we hold leaders accountable, to show more commitment, and make sure they improve on the welfare of the people that they represent,” Musinguzi concluded.
The “Pop Audio” series is also available as podcasts on iTunes.
Sources: MEASURE DHS, UN Population Division.
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