Adapting to climate change in MENA: assessment, vulnerability and action

Water managers, farmers and those living in rural areas will relate how they are experiencing today the impacts of a drier, hotter and more extreme climate in the MENA region. Yet there is little published research and analysis of these changes and their impacts. In two recently completed projects, climate change modeling research has been undertaken for the region and with the accompanying vulnerability assessment, has highlighted those people/sectors most vulnerable. Many water and farming systems have been identified as being at risk to drought and recent events in the Levant and Maghreb have highlighted this all too painfully. 

This side event will present the results from these ongoing studies and use these as the starting point for discussions on the possibilities and challenges of implementing practical and institutional measures for climate change adaptation to manage water and food security in this most complex of regions. The discussions will also examine how policy messages and country positions on climate change negotiation can be formulated and informed by scientific regional climate modeling outputs and vulnerability assessments.

The contributors will examine the vexed and complex questions of managing climate change in the MENA region. The presentations and discussions for this event are based around a series of questions:

1. What will the future climate be like in the MENA region?
2. How will future extreme events such as drought differ from today’s?
3. Which areas, sectors and communities will be most vulnerable?
4. Will 1.5 ^oC make a difference to farming system yields?
5. What tested adaptation measures can be effectively introduced to help mitigate the impacts on water and food security?
6. What role can national negotiators, international donors and UN organizations play in supporting the MENA region in addressing climate change?