Across the world, local communities are at the frontlines of climate impacts, struggling in the face of floods, heat stress and loss of livelihoods. They are also uniquely positioned to understand the impact of the climate challenges they face and find ways to cope with them. Yet adaptation measures tend to largely follow a top-down approach that is often unable to introduce solutions that work for or empower communities on the ground. 

Dr. Nambi Appadurai, Executive Director of the Climate Resilience Practice Program at World Resources Institute India, has worked extensively with community-based adaptation projects across Asia and Africa, and is a member of the Tamil Nadu Governing Council on Climate Change. In conversation with Aditi Sundan, he helps decode what the locally led adaptation (LLA) model is and why it is an effective approach for India. The following is an edited transcript of the conversation.

Aditi: What is locally led adaptation, and how is it different from other adaptation approaches?

Dr. Nambi: Locally led adaptation is an evolving concept. It is a bottom-up, inclusive, responsive and flexible process that takes into consideration the needs and resources of climate-vulnerable people, including the knowledge, skills and practices of local communities and stakeholders, in adaptation planning. Adaptation is a very local phenomenon. India is such a huge country with very different agro-ecological zones; we can't have one blanket plan to implement adaptation plans and actions. So, it is very important to understand and factor in the needs of local people to come up with a planning process that is more effective at the ground level. The entire idea is to establish a locally driven process where the community’s needs are reflected effectively, so they have ownership, making interventions long-lasting, rather than a top-down approach.


Aditi: Since it focuses so much on the local context, considering the climate risks that India faces and its diverse geography, can you talk a little more about why it is important or relevant for India?


Dr. Nambi: India is a very diverse country. With 127 agro-ecological zones, the problems are plenty. It is very difficult to come up with a very uniform, one-size-fits-all solution. The people who live in proximity to the impacts have a better knowledge of the kind of impacts they face and what locally driven solutions they have. We can't alienate these people, come out with a different, externally driven solution and expect it to fit the local circumstances. In the local, bottom-up approach, people become the central part of the whole planning process. So, their needs are well reflected. Their repository of knowledge becomes sort of the entry point for designing anything valuable and long lasting in a local context.

But since climate change is happening at a very rapid pace, they cannot really cope with it through the traditional set of mechanisms alone. This is where external aid, in terms of climate risk information, makes the job easier. It is like marrying science with local knowledge, so it has value in the local context. 

But they should also be comfortable using those solutions and should be provided with some of the knowledge and skill sets to carry this LLA agenda forward. It is not only inclusiveness and decision-making integration that matters. It is also leadership that counts. Panchayat leaders at the bottom level, their commitment is very important in driving this process. So, the community becomes the focus of this whole thing, and they drive the whole process.


Aditi: What is the role of principles of climate justice and equity in the process? How can these be integrated and what are the challenges to integrating them in the field, in your experience?


Dr. Nambi: At the local level, certain power structures operate. Normally, it is very difficult to break those structures, because sometimes there are political affiliations, sometimes there is a, sort of charismatic leader, and people’s loyalty to those leaders comes in. This constantly drives a divide among the communities. Locally led adaptation is more conscious about breaking this power structure so local communities can be empowered.

In other words, it is decentralization, be it in the planning process or fiscal mobilization. Unless that is being done, certain sections of society are left out. You know in India, whether it be caste or creed, people with power normally have the resources. With adaptation as well, generally, people who have all these capacities and access to technologies are those who are better off. As an example, when an agriculture extension officer goes to the field, there are certain preferred people who, because of power and influence, might have the first level of access to these resources, whether it be subsidy or whatever else. So, the people at the lower rung of the ladder are always left out.

How do we make their voices heard? How do we get them to participate in this process? How they are given space matters so much in terms of establishing social justice. So, a very conscious effort is put within the climate risk framework to understand their risks.

Even among vulnerable people, we have to address intervariability. For example, women, children, elderly and disabled people are often most affected. They don't have access to many of the resources which are generated through the local government structures, be it panchayat or local government. So, LLA makes a very conscious effort to sort of create that space to establish social justice in the process.


Aditi: Part of enabling decision-making is access to finance. What does the landscape of adaptation finance look like in India today, especially for locally led adaptation programs?


Dr. Nambi: Mitigation and adaptation are two response options to manage climate risks. One of the basic critiques across the world is that a lot of money goes to mitigation. The world is very focused on mainstreaming mitigation efforts, be it renewable energy or solar. Since mitigation efforts are geared toward reducing emissions, the money flow is also there. Whereas adaptation is always seen as being embedded in the development processes, which has mostly to do with public finance.

Adaptation money is seen as something that has to be generated internally within the country, whereas there are other sources for the mitigation-related efforts: Investments from, say, carbon credit mechanisms, there have been umpteen options there. For adaptation measures, it is all part of the development funding.

Already, the money we have to spend for a large country like India is not going to be easy, so there is always an adaptation finance deficit. How do you address this? Of late, there are several mechanisms, starting with understanding the given resources in a local context.

In public finance, every MP (Member of Parliament) has been allocated a local area development fund, which typically goes to development activities like building schools and hospitals. So, how do we use this money for climate-related activities? Similarly, the members of legislative assemblies also have some money for their own constituencies.

Again, (formerly) MNREGA, the Employment Guarantee Scheme, is another way because some of the components of (formerly)MNREGA to generate employment are typically for rural role building. This has a component of adaptation. So how you sort of intelligently use these things becomes important. 

Of late, the corporate social responsibility money is also becoming important for climate risk-related, resilience and risk managing activities. There are innovative mechanisms across the world as well. There is the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF), which has a local program — locally led climate adaptive living. That particular program is very focused on supporting the local governments in doing a performance-based assessment. For example, the World Bank provides money for rural road construction work, which is a typical development effort. They may not be investing in the climate component of it, but how do you climate-proof these roads? That is the additional money that you need to tap. UNCDF provides that sort of money after an assessment of how much it costs.

There are different innovative mechanisms, like blended finance, also coming up now. It is also important to look at the existing microfinance, so that people have access to livelihoods, not just infrastructure. How do you sort of use this to mitigate the risks of climate change at the local level, particularly for farmers? I mean, not even the day after tomorrow, but tomorrow itself counts for them. So, it is important for them to get access to technology, capacities, skill sets and money.


Aditi: While adaptation finance is difficult to access, is it particularly harder to access for locally led adaptation programs? If so, why?


Dr. Nambi: I would say one of the important reasons for the local people not being able to access this money is a lack of awareness. People don't even know what kind of schemes and programs exist. You know, there might be a typical development program, but it could have climate relevance to it. That is where climate tagging budgets is important.


So, it is important to facilitate, create awareness about what exists and how to use whatever is available at the local level for climate risk management. New money has to come, of course, it is important, because whatever we have is not adequate. But still, how do you leverage the money which is already available to sort of manage climate risks at the local level? That becomes one of the priority areas for any local government. That capacity should be there, inculcating skill sets and the knowledge base for people to use these resources.


Aditi: Could you share an example of what locally led adaptation looks like on the ground? Is there an example of locally led adaptation in action in India or elsewhere?


Dr. Nambi: Of late, across India, several cities and states are working toward resilience measures. It has become part of the agenda at the state level. Tamil Nadu government has been very proactive, they have set up a Tamil Nadu Green Climate Company to channelize the available money to the vulnerable geographies and communities. Then they have different climate missions to address vulnerability issues at different levels.

One of the good examples where we are working is the climate smart villages or climate resilient villages. These are the most impacted villages in vulnerable geographic zones. To identify the risks they face, we started at the district level and devised the district climate adaptation prioritization tool (DCAPT). By working with the local governments, the line department officials and the communities, we identify the priorities. Already certain schemes exist, and then by looking at the climate trends in the districts, we try to understand the scenarios in ten years’ time. What is going to be the impact, what is the impact level and how vulnerable are the areas to say, coastal erosion or salinity? So how do we prioritize those issues? We map them with the available resources, the knowledge they have, and bring the scientific aspect to those things so that people have a better understanding of the risk.

The starting point is to understand the risks. You cannot design a solution without it. The next step is planning. Climate smart agriculture and climate resilient villages are typical models where you design and try to implement programs at the local level to address the issues. And in the process, you also sort of empower the people with technical skills and financial access to cocreate, so you get a comprehensive solution.

Dr. Nambi Appadurai is the Executive Director of the Climate Resilience Practice Program at World Resources Institute India.