GPP 509 – Communicating Policy

Week 3 – Policy brief analysis

Policy Brief #1: UN-DESA – Building climate change resilience for sustainable development

Author Hiroshi Kawamura, Economic Affairs Officer, UN-DESA (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs)
Policy areas Climate change, climate change resilience, sustainable development, international development, risk management
What is it telling us?
  • Climate change disproportionally affects low-income countries and peoples
    • more dependent on natural resources, lower resilience to natural disaster
  • Exposure to adverse effects of climate change largely determined by socioeconomic factors
    • e.g lower cost land is often more prone or vulnerable natural disasters
  • Low climate change resilience linked to “structural inequalities that reproduce poverty, marginalization, and social exclusion”
    • e.g. lack of access to adequate healthcare, housing, employment, education, etc.
  • Adverse effects of climate change threaten to inhibit economic growth or undo previous development work if no effective steps are also taken to bolster climate change resilience
  • building resilience requires working to better support and include marginalised groups who are more susceptible to climate hazards as well as policy interventions to :
    • bolster emergency assistance and reduce disaster risk
    • adapt to a changing climate
    • manage ecosystems
    • diversity incomes
Functional elements
  • Issue definition and needs analysis
  • Figure depicting factor relationships
  • Recommendations for policy to build climate change resilience
What did I make of it? A condensed and high-level policy brief that provided a well rounded summary of issues in climate change resilience in sustainable international development. Best suited for an audience with limited prior exposure to the subject area. Makes a good starting point for further conversation and research.

Policy Brief #2: UN-DESA – International finance to support climate change resilience

Author Alex Julca, Contributor, UN-DESA (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs)
Policy areas Climate change, climate change resilience, sustainable development, international development, Financing development
What is it telling us?
  • Lower income countries and people are disproportionately affected by climate change
  • Climate change adaptation (as opposed to mitigation) costs in developing countries projected to reach between $70 billion and $100 billion per year by 2050
  • International resources are insufficient
    • International community has pledged $100 billion per year for climate change adaptation and mitigation
    • estimated that mitigation accounts for about 77% of climate change funding
      • Gap between adaptation and mitigation spending is called the “adaptation gap”
  • Climate change adaptation interventions benefit public goods, often have high initial costs, prolonged investment timelines, and low private ROI
    • adaptation investment better suited to public funds
  • 3 types of policy interventions may help to increase private investment in adaptation:
    • direct regulatory action, using public investments to trigger private investments, and implementing policies to improve access to adaptation technologies
  • There is a need for a well defined and monitored “climate finance” structure to increase funding stability for climate adaptation and mitigation
Functional elements
  • Issue definition and needs analysis
  • Recommendations for policy
  • Recommendations for financial structuring of climate finance
What did I make of it? An informative overview of the current gap between the growing necessity for climate change adaptation investment and available funding. The brief might have benefitted from the use of some visual aids.

Policy Brief #3: UN-DESA – Data and statistics for climate change resilience

Author Alex Julca, Contributor, UN-DESA (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs)
Policy areas Climate change, climate change resilience, sustainable development, international development
What is it telling us?
  • Basic data on populations in zones most vulnerable to climate hazards is essential for developing impact assessments and corresponding policy
  • basic data on most vulnerable people is difficult to collect – rural, informal settlements, marginalised groups, etc.
    • much of the existing data on these groups are rough estimates
  • specialised research that does measure parameters in these populations often rely on inconsistent methods, concepts, and classifications, making external comparison difficult
  • There is a strong need for a standardisation and integration of the data on these marginalised groups
  • Relatively few organizations/governments have adequate resources to act as central data hubs of this scale
Functional elements
  • Issue definition and needs analysis
  • Recommendations for data collection and standardisation
What did I make of it? A clear description of the need for harmonised methods and categories in the data on marginalised people to better inform policy.