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China's policies and actions for addressing climate change
China - Government, 2012This white paper released by the National Development and Reform Commission of the People’s Republic of China provides an overview of the extreme weather and climate events of 2011 in China. Section two asserts addresses climate change and reports that during the 11th Five-Year Plan period, China strengthened scientific research in and impact evaluation of climate change, improved relevant laws and policies, and enhanced the capability of key sectors to adapt to climate change, so as to reduce the negative impact of climate change on economic and social development and people's lives. The sect ...
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G20 Study Group on Climate Finance
Group of Twenty, the (G20) - G20, 2012This study group has been tasked by G20 leaders in Los Cabos to consider ways to effectively mobilize resources for climate finance within the broader set of issues discussed by G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors. G20 Leaders have identified the need for stronger engagement and cooperation to fight climate change in several declarations since 2009.
Strengthening disaster risk reduction in climate change adaptation related agendas at COP18, Doha, Qatar
UN/ISDR, 2012This paper provides key messages on climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction with the intent of strengthening disaster risk reduction in key climate change adaptation agendas at the UNFCCC COP18.
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CDM in Africa - Finance and Support
As early as 2006, Parties to the Kyoto Protocol recognized the importance of a balanced regional distribution of CDM projects and welcomed the establishment of the Nairobi Framework, which brings together UN and regional organizations to support equitable access to the mechanism. In light of the benefits that the CDM can bring to lesser developed regions, the Nairobi Framework partners and others began funding technical support and capacity-building programmes for the CDM, particularly in Africa. The following pages provide a short description of the most important financing and support opport ...
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Benefits of the Clean Development Mechanism 2012
This study assesses the claims made by project participants in the project design documents submitted for registration. The relative reliability of these claims, as verified by a follow-up survey, suggests that the CDM is making a contribution to sustainable development in host countries in addition to the mitigation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Almost all CDM projects claim multiple sustainable development benefits, but the mix of benefits claimed varies considerably by project type.
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The future of environmental sustainability in the Taita Hills, Kenya: assessing potential impacts of agricultural expansion and climate change
The indigenous cloud forests in the Taita Hills, Kenya, have suffered substantial degradation due to agricultural expansion. Currently, only one per cent of the original forested area remains preserved. Furthermore, climate change imposes an imminent threat for local economy and environmental sustainability. In such circumstances, elaborating tools to conciliate socio-economic growth and natural resources conservation is an enormous challenge. This article aims to tackle essential aspects for understanding the ongoing agricultural activities in the area and their environmental consequences. An ...
Turn down the heat: why a 4°C warmer world must be avoided
This report spells out what the world would be like if it warmed by 4 degrees Celsius, which is what scientists are nearly unanimously predicting by the end of the century, without serious policy changes. It provides a snapshot of recent scientific literature and new analyses of likely impacts and risks that would be associated with a 4° Celsius warming within this century, ranging from sea-level rise to increases in tropical cyclone intensity, unprecedented heat waves, severe drought, and major floods in many regions, with serious impacts on ecosystems and associated services.
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Disaster risk management and adaptation to climate change: experience from German development cooperation
German Government, 2012This publication aims to pinpoint commonalities between disaster risk management and adaptation to climate change. It describes the experience gathered from German development cooperation’s work in seven countries, which we see as a stimulus to aim for more effective and efficient interaction between the two fields and to work towards a significant reduction of risk in our partner countries by implementing risk management measures adapted to the respective conditions.
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Potential effects of climate change on crop pollination
Crop production must meet the demands of feeding a growing population in an increasingly degraded environment amid uncertainties resulting from climate change. there is a pressing need to adapt farming systems to meet these challenges. one of agriculture’s greatest assets in meeting them is nature itself: many of the ecosystem services provided by nature – such as nutrient cycling, pest regulation and pollination – directly contribute to agricultural production. the healthy functioning of these ecosystem services ensures the sustainability of agriculture as it intensifies to meet growing deman ...
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Adaptation to climate change with a focus on rural areas in India
The publication provides an overview of the main issues in current adaptation discussions and suggests adaptation options in six different fields related to rural areas: (i) agriculture; (ii) forests; (iii) biodiversity; (iv) water resources; (v) coastal zones; and (vi) disaster risk management. It describes concepts and approaches for adaptation and its integration into development planning using examples from India, as well as other parts of the world, to illustrate how existing theory can be put into practice.
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Central Asia mountains: sustainable mountain development from Rio 1992 to 2012 and beyond
Hughes G.; GRID-Arendal ; United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP); et al. - ZOI Environment Network, 2012This report is an illustrated overview of the trends and challenges in sustainable mountain development in Central Asia since 1992. It highlights selected achievements and lessons learned, and identifies opportunities for further progress. It also presents two case studies from Tajikistan addressing the issues of climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction in mountain regions. The first is a study on the Pilot Program for Climate Resilience, and the second is a tree-planting project designed to stabilize hazardous mountain slopes.
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Climate change in Eastern Europe: Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine
This publication explores the impacts of climate change on Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine. The three countries of Eastern Europe will not be affected as strongly as many other parts of Eurasia, yet they will see more of severe floods and forest fires, decreasing water reserves in the south, and gradual changes in biodiversity, agriculture and food security.
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Progress report on the work of the Consultative Group of Experts on National Communications from Parties not included in Annex I to the Convention: report on the hands-on training workshop for the Asia and Pacific region on vulnerability and adaptation assessment : Note by the secretariat
The Consultative Group of Experts on National Communications from Parties not included in Annex I to the Convention (CGE) conducted a hands-on training workshop for the Asia and Pacific region on vulnerability and adaptation assessment in Vientiane, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, from 8 to 12 October 2012. This report outlines the proceedings of the workshop and summarizes the feedback and recommendations from the participants relating to the updated CGE training materials on vulnerability and adaptation assessment, and the financial, technical and institutional issues in the con ...
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Climate Security Report
ASP, 2012One of the most significant challenges to the global security system in the 21st Century will be a changing climate; the effects of these changes are already being felt all over the world. Climate change poses a clear and present danger to the United States through its effects on our global allies as well as its direct effects on our agriculture, infrastructure, economy and public health.
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Recalibrating Food Production in the Developing World: Global Warming Will Change More Than Just the Climate
Thornton Philip K.; CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) - CCAFS, 2012
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Climate-change mitigation and adaptation in small island developing states: the case of rainwater harvesting in Jamaica: In Sustainability: Science, Practice, & Policy, vol. 8, issue 2 (Summer 2012)
Waite Marilyn - 2012This essay looks at climate change impacts on small island developing states (SIDS). It argues that climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies must be developed to cope with changes such as shifting precipitation patterns, increasing evapotranspiration and expanding saline intrusion into coastal aquifers and wells. Using Jamaica as a case study, the paper examines the utility of rainwater harvesting (RWH) in SIDS and answers questions regarding: 1) how much rainwater can be harvested on the island given present and future precipitation patterns; and 2) how much can RWH realistically c ...
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CCAFS Policy Briefs, 06. Recalibrating Food Production in the Developing World
Thornton P.; CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) - CCAFS, 2012^An analysis of the effects of climate change on 22 critical agricultural commodities and three important natural resources in the developing world reveals a number of cross-cutting themes: The world’s agricultural systems face an uphill struggle in feeding a projected nine to ten billion people by 2050. Climate change introduces a significant hurdle in this struggle.
- Securing and maintaining necessary levels of calories, protein and nutrients for populations around the world will be an exceptional challenge.
- Recalibrating agriculture in the face of climate change is more t ...
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Climate knowledge for action: Global Framework for Climate Services (in Kit form)
Contains:
- Building country-wide support for the Global Framework for Climate Services (GFCS) [Leaflet]
- Climate knowledge for action: a global framework for climate services (WMO-No.1065) [CD-Rom]
- Presentation of the GFCS [1 page]
- Climate information for health [4 pages]
- Climate information for disaster risk reduction [4 pages]
RA VI Operating Plan 2012-2015
Following the advice of the XV Session of the Association, the TT-SPAP developed the regional Operating Plan by compiling the tasks in the Work Programmes of the Working Groups. Thus, the Operating Plan contains concrete tasks and deliverables aimed at assisting RA VI Members to implement their national plans for further development of their NMHSs and improvement of the provision of meteorological, hydrological and climatological services for supporting their national economies and the society. The RA VI Operating Plan is intended to be a living document regularly monitored and adjusted as nec ...
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Green Water Defense for Flood Risk Management in East Asia
The purpose of the ‘Green Water Defense in East Asia’ study is to take stock of advances in management practices, institutional and technological innovations for managing water resources under changing climate. The focus of this note is on green water defense for flood risk management in deltas and other areas vulnerable to flooding.
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Grow in Concert with Nature: Sustaining East Asia’s Water Resources through Green Water Defense
This study will assess advances in management practices, institutional and technological innovations for managing water scarcity sustainably under a changing climate. The impetus for this analysis comes from the World Bank’s concept note ‘Towards Green Water Defense (GWD) in East Asia’ study, specifi cally one of the building blocks of the GWD concept: Managing water scarcity by “producing more with less” or increasing water productivity and reducing undesirable externalities.
Climate Prediction and Monitoring for Egypt
Apart from the northern coast, most of Egypt is desert. However, the northern coastal region experiences some precipitation mainly during winter. We investigate the variability of wintertime (December, January and February) precipitation in North Egypt during the 30-yr interval 1976-2005 and its relationship with the North Atlantic Oscillation during winter and subtropical jet stream.
Climate Prediction and Monitoring for Uganda
Uganda is located between latitudes 1.5 0 S to 4.5 0 N and longitudes 28o E to 35 0 E. It contains complex topography that includes large Lakes, Rivers, Great Rift Valley and Mountains, and supports varied wildlife of scientific and economic value. Due to its Equatorial location, this country is expected to receive abundant rainfall throughout the year. This is, however, not the case as frequent occurrences of years of insufficient rainfall for agricultural activities have been observed. Rainfall over Uganda exhibits large spatial and temporal variability. The inter-annual variability has feat ...
Climate Prediction and Monitoring for Burundi
“The dominant pattern of Burundi rainfall is the seasonal move of the dominant Intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ), the Congo air mass and the interconnection with EL Nino/Southern oscillation (ENSO) phenomena. Much of Burundi experiences a bimodal seasonal distribution of rainfall with maxima occurring in the March- April and November. The Interannual variability of rainfall in Burundi shows interesting association with atmospheric and oceanic phenomena. We investigate the variability of rainfall using OND (October, November, December) and MAM (March, April, May) precipitation in Burundi du ...
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Report on the discussions on key elements of the potential host agreement for the Climate Technology Centre
This report, prepared by the secretariat, presents the outcome of the discussions on the key elements of the potential host agreement for the Climate Technology Centre (CTC) between the secretariat and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) (on behalf of a consortium of partner institutions), which is the proponent ranked first by the Subsidiary Body for Implementation, at its thirty-sixth session, for hosting the CTC. The key elements of the potential host agreement are contained in the draft memorandum of understanding between the Conference of the Parties and UNEP, which is contain ...
Climate ExChange
Climate ExChange is a fully illustrated 250-page book with over 100 authors relating their work in weather, climate and water services at international, regional, national and local levels. The commentaries draw upon experiences around the world reflecting how people are using climate information to improve their lives. Climate ExChange reflects the progress and challenges in these fields, highlighting good practices in a wide variety of societies and disciplines.
Atlas of health and climate
The Atlas of Health and Climate is a product of this unique collaboration between the meteorological and public health communities. It provides sound scientific information on the connections between weather and climate and major health challenges. These range from diseases of poverty to emergencies arising from extreme weather events and disease outbreaks. They also include environmental degradation, the increasing prevalence of noncommunicable diseases and the universal trend of demographic ageing.
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Engineering the climate: research questions and policy implications
Earth’s climate appears to be changing faster than previously observed. Even with active mitigation and adaptation measures, additional efforts to avoid significant climate disruptions may be needed. Geoengineering the climate is an option that is now gaining scientific, policy, and public attention while raising important environmental, ethical, social, and political challenges.
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The poverty and welfare impacts of climate change quantifying the effects, identifying the adaptation strategies
Although poverty remains widespread in south Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, substantial progress has been made especially in the past three decades. Nevertheless, this report stresses that climate change is likely to reduce agricultural productivity, which will directly affect poor people's livelihood assets including health, access to water and other natural resources, homes and infrastructure. Increasing climatic variability will make poor households even more vulnerable to extreme weather conditions, which could in turn exacerbate the incidence, severity and persistence of poverty in developi ...
Children’s action for disaster risk reduction: views from children in Asia
This publication provides children and youth in Asia a platform to report on progress made towards "the need to protect women, children and other vulnerable groups from the disproportionate impacts of disaster and to empower them to promote resiliency within their communities and workplaces" (as recognized in the declaration adopted in Incheon by the Asia Ministerial Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction in 2010) from their own point of view. Previous surveys conducted with children globally show that their views on local governance for disaster risk reduction often tend to be less positive th ...
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Information and communication technologies (ICTs) and climate change adaptation and mitigation: the case of Ghana
This report focuses on exploring an increasingly important question: ‘How can developing countries effectively integrate ICT tools within climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies?’ The contribution of this report is two-fold. It presents the potential of ICTs towards adaptation and mitigation through the concrete case of Ghana, illustrating the challenges and opportunities faced by developing countries in this field. The report complements this analysis by offering concrete lessons learned and practical suggestions aimed at developing country decision makers and practitioners, ...
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Report of the Adaptation Fund Board: note by the chair of the Adaptation Fund Board
This report responds to the decision requesting the Adaptation Fund Board to report on its activities at each session of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol (CMP), and covers the period from 30 November 2011 to 30 June 2012. It contains information on decisions and actions taken by the Adaptation Fund Board to be noted by the CMP. Disaster risk reduction is one of the sectors targeted in the 14 proposals approved for funding.
Tortillas on the roaster: Central American maize-bean systems and the changing climate
This study predicts the potential impacts that climate change will have on the production of maize and beans, the two most important food crops in Central America. Using state-of-the-art climate models and GIS tools, agronomic research and socio-economic analyses, it makes recommendations to climate change adaptation strategies tailored to El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. The results of the study are intended to fill a critical gap in the knowledge of the impacts of climate change on maize/bean production in Central America, in order for stakeholders to shift from a position of ...
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CGIAR Working paper, 19. Participatory gender-sensitive approaches for addressing key climate change-related research issues: evidence from Bangladesh, Ghana and Uganda
Chaudhury M.; Kristjanson Patty; Kyagazze Florence; et al. - Climate Change Agriculture Food Security, 2012The researchers investigated if and how farming practices are being modified to deal with a changing environment, and the constraints and opportunities these changes pose for both men and women. The field research covered three main research priorities for the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Climate Change (CCAFS), relating to the climate change, agricultural development and food security ‘nexus’: How to enable farmers, both men and women, to visit farms of the future, i.e. visit climate analogue sites; How to ensure equality in access and usage of seasonal weather fo ...
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Air & Climate: conversations about molecules and planets, with humans in between
European Commission, 2012This is a collection of conversations with some of the ‘fathers’ of air pollution and climate change science. Through careful observation and a mix of intuition and critical thought, they have uncovered some of the workings of our planet: its atmosphere and climate. They were generally driven by curiosity and gradually by a concern that mankind might indeed have a devastating impact on Earth and the life it hosts. Their findings were so important that they could not stay in the ivory tower of scientific research. They personally reached out to decision makers and the public at large because in ...
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Multi-model climate change projections for India under representative concentration pathways: In Current Science, vol.103, issue 7 (10/10/2012)
Climate projections for the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are made using the newly developed representative concentration pathways (RCPs) under the Coupled Model Inter-comparison Project 5 (CMIP5). This article provides multi-model and multi-scenario temperature and precipitation projections for India for the period 1860–2099 based on the new climate data. We find that CMIP5 ensemble mean climate is closer to observed climate than any individual model. The key findings of this study are: (i) under the business-asusual (between RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 ...
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Climate change and agriculture: can market governance mechanisms reduce emissions from the food system fairly and effectively?
Agriculture accounts for 30 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions. How agriculture is practised, therefore, has significant potential for mitigating climate change, providing food security and improving the livelihoods of food producers worldwide. There is growing interest in the use of market governance mechanisms for tackling climate change by giving the financial incentives to make the required changes. The key messages emerging from this study are that economic measures have a vital part to play, but to be effective, emissions from food production and consumption must be addressed to ...
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Extreme weather events and crop price spikes in a changing climate: illustrative global simulation scenarios
Willenbockel D. - Oxfam, 2012Agriculture is highly sensitive to climate variability and weather extremes. Various impact studies have considered the effects of projected long-run trends in temperature, precipitation and carbon dioxide concentrations caused by climate change on global food production and prices. However, according to this study, an area that remains underexplored is the food price impacts that may result from an expected increase in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. The study uses a global dynamic multi-region computable general equilibrium (CGE) model to explore the potential food pri ...
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The recent shift in early summer Arctic atmospheric circulation: in Geophysical Research Letters, vol. 39, L19804
The last six years (2007–2012) show a persistent change in early summer Arctic wind patterns relative to previous decades. The persistent pattern, which has been previously recognized as the Arctic Dipole (AD), is characterized by relatively low sea-level pressure over the Siberian Arctic with high pressure over the Beaufort Sea, extending across northern North America and over Greenland. Pressure differences peak in June. In a search for a proximate cause for the newly persistent AD pattern, we note that the composite 700 hPa geopotential height field during June 2007–2012 exhibits a positive ...
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CGIAR Working paper, 23. Impacts of climate change on the agricultural and aquatic systems and natural resources within the CGIAR’s mandate
CCAFS, 2012The document attempts to distil what is currently known about the likely impacts of climate change on the commodities and natural resources that comprise the mandate of CGIAR and its 15 Centres. It was designed as one background document for a review carried out by the High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition (HLPE) at the behest of the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS) on what is known about the likely effects of climate change on food security and nutrition, with a focus on the most affected and vulnerable regions and populations. A total of 25 summaries covering 22 ...
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Climate change, water stress, conflict and migration
UNESCO, 2012This collection of papers, presented at the symposium ‘Climate change, water stress, conflict and migration’ held on 21 September 2011 in the Netherlands, highlight how climate change, water stress and other environmental problems threaten human security. For example, the paper by Muniruzzaman ilustrates how water ignores political and community boundaries, and how decisions in one place can significantly affect water use elsewhere. India’s plans to build more dams could, for instance, have devastating affects for Pakistan’s agricultural productivity which is highly dependent on water supply f ...
Storm surges and coastal erosion in Bangladesh - State of the system, climate change impacts and 'low regret' adaptation measures
The effects of global environmental change, including coastal flooding stemming from storm surges as well as reduced rainfall in drylands and water scarcity, have detrimental effects on countries and megacities in the costal regions worldwide. Among these, Bangladesh with its capital Dhaka is today widely recognised to be one of the regions most vulnerable to climate change and its triggered associated impacts. Natural hazards that come from increased rainfall, rising sea levels, and tropical cyclones are expected to increase as climate changes, each seriously affecting agriculture, water & fo ...
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Biodiversity: delivering results in Europe and the CIS
World Bank, 2012This publication presents some of the outcomes of GEF-funded work managed by UNDP in Europe and the CIS that aims to conserve biodiversity
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Learning Lessons: ADB’s Response to Natural Disasters and Disaster Risks
ADB, 2012Natural disasters triggered by extreme hazards have increased sharply worldwide since the 1980s, as measured in lives lost, displaced people, and financial cost. Asia and the Pacific have borne the brunt of the physical and economic damage. This brief highlights lessons and recommendations from an independent evaluation report that assessed ADB support for disaster prevention and recovery programs during 1995–2011. The evaluation finds that disaster recovery projects have been much more successful than ADB-supported projects overall. Nonetheless, it also finds that most ADB country programs ha ...
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Climate Change Adaptation in Grenada: Water Resources, Coastal Ecosystems and Renewable Energy
United Nations, 2012This report presents the results of a study conducted for Grenada under the UNDESA project. The pilot study focuses on three priority areas: water resources, coastal ecosystems and renewable energy systems. The priorities were selected following a systematic approach using analytical tools to help Grenada in the comprehensive assessment of potential impacts from climate change. It identifies the best potential courses of action to hedge for and adapt to these critical impact areas. The analytical work contributes to the knowledge base to support implementation of climate change adaptation/miti ...
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Geoengineering in relation to the convention on biological diversity: technical and regulatory matters
CBD, 2012
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Mediterranean ecological footprint trends
Global Footprint Network, 2012The Mediterranean’s ever-widening ecological deficit and its economic implications is the main theme of the new Mediterranean Ecological Footprint Trends report, the result of a two-year study by Global Footprint Network and the focus of the conference.
Commonwealth finance ministers report 2012-2013
Henley Media Group, 2012This book considers building financial resilience against 'natural' disasters and climate change through an article from Francis Ghesquiere and Olivier Mahul, from the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR). The article discusses the challenges created by 'natural' disasters and climate change to fiscal account management and outline steps that governments should take to overcome them. The article is featured on page 185.
The overall publication includes over 40 articles aimed to foster debate and collaboration in the weeks preceding the Commonwealth Financ ...
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Measuring Glacier Change in the Himalayas: In UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Global Environmental Alert Service (GEAS), September 2012
UNEP, 2012A serious lack of reliable and consistent data severely hampers scientific knowledge about the state of Himalayan glaciers. As a result, the contribution of glacial melt to the Himalayan river basins remains uncertain. This is of grave importance because declining water availability could threaten the food security of more than 70 million people. There is thus an urgent need to improve cross-boundary scientific collaboration and monitoring of glaciers to bridge the knowledge gap and allow policy options to be based on appropriate scientific evidence.
CMDRR forum bulletin, 7th issue, August 2012
DAM, 2012This bulletin gives an account of some important events and initiatives of the CMDRR Forum, Bangladesh. This issue captures: (i) the observance of Environment day, National Disaster Preparedness Day (NDPD) 2012 and the organizing of Climate Change Fair 2012; (ii) 'Capacity building of the community', a workshop on climate change impact and coping mechanism for the sustainable livelihood of people living in Haor; (iii) a seminar on climate change vulnerability and coastal people’s livelihood organized by ADD International; and (iv) District level sharing meetings on disaster risk reduction and ...
Feeling the heat: the human cost of poor preparation for disasters
Islamic Relief Worldwide, 2012This report shows the positive difference Islamic Relief Worldwide is beginning to make in the area of disaster risk reduction (DRR) by highlighting how village disaster committees and earthworks to raise people’s houses have reduced the impact of seasonal flooding in north-western Bangladesh. It shows how irrigated vegetable growing and microfinance loans for small businesses are helping former pastoralists to build new livelihoods in north-eastern Kenya that are less vulnerable to drought. It provides evidence that being better prepared can save money as well as lives and shows that it can b ...
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“Paris Declaration” Green Growth and Climate Change Commitments: the ICT Sector Shows the Way
ITU, 2012The ICT industry is at the forefront of the efforts to tackle climate change and meet resource efficiency challenges with the potential to reduce global CO2 emissions by 15% by 2020 (relative to 1990 levels). A key for the realisation of this strategy is the development of green ICT standards, which has been the focus of the second Green Standards Week (Paris, 17 – 21 September).
Assessment and modelling of climate variability and change in Cameroon (central Africa)
Cameroon is located on the west coast of central Africa. It is home to about twenty millions inhabitants relying upon rain‐fed agriculture for food security. With the increasing pressure of climate change, other activities for sustainable development such as transport, energy, water, livestock and urban settlement are also facing an increasing threat due to extreme climate and weather events. In some cases today’s climate extremes are expected to become tomorrow’s ‘normal’ weather. This assumption stresses the need of understanding the past, the current and hopefully to project local climate b ...
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Developing a climate-smart agriculture strategy at the country level: lessons from recent experience
Since the Global Conference on Climate Change, Food Security and Agriculture held at the Hague in 2010, the concept of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) has gained increasing attention at international and national levels, with several countries initiating related activities. The objective of this paper is to highlight recent experiences with country-level implementation of CSA to identify some key lessons to incorporate in ongoing efforts to expand the use of the approach in developing countries. Section 1 describes the evolution of the concept of CSA since the Hague conference. Section 2 i ...
Climate vulnerability monitor
DARA, 2012The Climate Vulnerability Monitor 2nd Edition reveals that climate change has already held back global development and inaction is a leading global cause of death. Harm is most acute for poor and vulnerable groups but no country is spared either the costs of inaction or the benefits of an alternative path.
Commissioned by the world’s most vulnerable countries and backed by high-level and technical panels, the new Monitor estimates human and economic impacts of climate change and the carbon economy for 184 countries in 2010 and 2030, across 34 indicators.
Building urban resilience to climate change: what works where, and why
This document reports on a resilience-building curriculum that includes laying the groundwork for addressing climate change and climate resilience, conducting a climate change vulnerability and risk assessment, and using this assessment and other materials to prepare an initial resilience strategy, developed in 15 cities in 5 countries — Vietnam, Indonesia, India, Thailand and the United States.
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Greening the economy with climate-smart agriculture
Agriculture has to address simultaneously three intertwined challenges: ensuring food security through increased productivity and income, adapting to climate change and contributing to climate change mitigation. To accomplish this, food systems have to become, at the same time, more efficient and resilient, at every scale from the farm level to the global level. Radical changes are needed in agricultural and food systems. These changes can play an essential role in greening the economy and contributing to sustainable development. This paper considers the intertwined challenges of food sec ...
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Climate change adaptation in Grenada: water resources, coastal ecosystems and renewable energy
This study attempts to encourage practical implementation of climate change adaptation programmes and their integration into national plans for sustainable development. It argues that the assessment process must evolve over time to fit continuously changing climate change impacts, conditions, priorities and national sustainable development criteria. The publication summarises initial analysis, findings and proposals of three critical areas for Grenada: water resources, costal ecosystems and renewable energy systems. The study concludes with a number of recommendations. For example, in terms of ...
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The critical decade: Queensland climate impacts and opportunities
Queensland’s climate is already changing and is likely to change further in the future, posing significant risks for the state. The next chapter of the climate story is about how Queenslanders, and Australians, can find solutions that minimise the risks of climate change while providing extra benefits for our health, community, economy and environment.
The global partnership for development: making rhetoric a reality - MDG Gap Task Force report 2012
United Nations (UN); United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) - United Nations, 2012As a pressing priority, this report calls for affordable access to new technologies for climate change mitigation and adaptation and disaster risk management, recalling the commitment of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at the conference held in Durban from 28 November to 11 December 2011 and the need to make sure the Green Climate Fund and the Technology Mechanism become operational in 2012.
Ocean-Based Food Security Threatened in a High CO2 World : a Ranking of Nations’ Vulnerability to Climate Change and Ocean Acidification
Emissions from human activities are changing the ocean’s chemistry and temperature in ways that threaten the livelihoods of those who depend on fish and seafood for all or part of their diets. The changes may reduce the amount of wild caught seafood that can be supplied by the oceans and also redistribute species, changing the locations at which seafood can be caught and creating instability for ocean-based food security, or seafood security. This report ranks nations based on the seafood security hardships they may experience by the middle of this century due to changing ocean conditions from ...
Projection of crop yield in Bhutan under climate change using PRECIS regional climate model
Bhutan is classified as one of the forty-eight least developed countries with farmers comprising more than two-thirds of its total population. The agriculture sector, which is a significant contributor to the country’s gross domestic product, has been vulnerable to extreme climate events in recent decades. As an effort to address the potential challenges it will face under climate change, this thesis projects the yields of three primary crops grown in Bhutan, rice, wheat and maize, for the period 2030 to 2050, based on climate projections by the PRECIS regional climate model.
In this st ...
Coastal communities and climate change: maintaining future insurability
Lloyd's, 2012This report looks at the impact of climate change on flood risk at a number of coastal locations around the world, considering sea-level rise, the effect of wind speed on storm surges and, at one location, changes in land use. It investigates the impact on: (i) an unprotected property with no flood defences on a Caribbean island, the coasts of which are exposed to hurricanes and their associated storm surges; (ii) a building on the coast of a northern European country protected by flood defences against up to a 1-in-100 year storm surge event; (iii) a property on the coast of a northern Europe ...
Southern African rainfall physical mechanisms and projected Climate Change with a special focus on Zimbabwe
Aimed at understanding the physical mechanisms driving rainfall systems in southern Africa with a particular focus on Zimbabwe, this research is a step towards improving the representation of those systems in Climate Models leading to improved Rainfall projections. Because RCMs such as PRECIS are good at resolving subtle systems which modify local climates and possibly mask the anticipated anthropogenic induced (rainfall) change, its use in regions such as Zimbabwe that have complex terrain is crucial. Understanding the physical mechanisms that control rainfall in the current climate also prov ...
Capturing Recent Climate Variations in the Extreme Southern Caribbean with Projections for the Near and Medium Terms: A Downscaling Approach for Trinidad and Tobago
To mitigate adverse effects of future extremes in climate in the extreme southern Caribbean and Trinidad and Tobago require a sound understanding of the science of the climate, along with realistic and region specific projection outputs; in order that an effective response can be provided by respective regions. As a step towards achieving this, downscaling GCM outputs through RCMs is useful at the local and regional scales because it can provide finer detailed and more user friendly output required for planning. Moreover, it is an avenue through which more profound understanding of the ...
Good Practices in Building Innovative Rural Institutions to Increase Food Security
Continued population growth, urbanization and rising incomes are likely to continue to put pressure on food demand. International prices for most agricultural commodities are set to remain at 2010 levels or higher, at least for the next decade (OECD-FAO, 2010). Small-scale producers in many developing countries were not able to reap the benefits of high food prices during the 2007-2008 food price crises. Yet, this upward food price trend could have been an opportunity for them to increase their incomes and food security. The opportunity that high food prices could have provided as a pat ...
Lesotho Climate Change Projections
Lesotho is a small mountainous country is southern Africa. Lesotho is a temperate region that has four distinct seasons; spring, summer, autumn and winter. It is among countries that are vulnerable to climate change impacts. As such, future climate projections are vital to the country. Lesotho has submitted her first and the only report (FNC) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 2000. The report includes vulnerability and adaptation (V&A) assessment developed using the first generation low resolution Global Climate Models (GCMs) output. This study was aimed ...
Himalayan Glaciers: Climate Change, Water Resources, and Water Security
National Academies Press, 2012Scientific evidence shows that most glaciers in South Asia's Hindu Kush Himalayan region are retreating, but the consequences for the region's water supply are unclear, this report finds. The Hindu Kush Himalayan region is the location of several of Asia's great river systems, which provide water for drinking, irrigation, and other uses for about 1.5 billion people. Recent studies show that at lower elevations, glacial retreat is unlikely to cause significant changes in water availability over the next several decades, but other factors, including groundwater depletion and increasing human wat ...
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Food Security: Near future projections of the impact of drought in Asia
This analysis suggests that climate change will affect us all sooner than we expected. The aim of the report is to encourage further debate and instigate action among policy makers and business leaders.
The Global Water Crisis: Addressing an Urgent Security Issue
Bigas Harriet; Axworthy Thomas S.; UN University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH); et al. - UNU, 2012In March 2011, high-level experts from around the world were invited to Toronto, Canada, to meet with members of the InterAction Council about the status of the world’s freshwater supply as it relates to global security issues (see List of Participants in this volume). These experts reported that that the global water crisis is real and that there is urgency in addressing the growing number of security risks associated with threatened water supply and quality. They also, however, expressed hope and identified opportunities that can be realized by the timely triggering of change in policies, in ...
Case Study: Communicating Modeled Information for Adaptation Decision Making
By examining the HighNoon project in north India, this case study explores how adaptation-relevant information can best be packaged and disseminated to different users and audiences at the state, district, and block levels. It also explores what kinds of information are of most interest to various stakeholders and how different types of information can contribute to adaptation decision making.
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Investment decision making under deep uncertainty - application to climate change
While agreeing on the choice of an optimal investment decision is already difficult for any diverse group of actors, priorities, and world views, the presence of deep uncertainties further challenges the decision-making framework by questioning the robustness of all purportedly optimal solutions. This paper summarizes the additional uncertainty that is created by climate change, and reviews the tools that are available to project climate change (including downscaling techniques) and to assess and quantify the corresponding uncertainty. Assuming that climate change and other deep uncertainties ...
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Climate change, agriculture and food security in Tanzania
The consequences of climate change for agriculture and food security in developing countries are of serious concern. Due to their reliance on rain-fed agriculture, both as a source of income and consumption, many low-income countries are considered to be the most vulnerable to climate change. This paper estimates the impact of climate change on food security in Tanzania. Representative climate projections are used in calibrated crop models to predict crop yield changes for 110 districts in the country. The results are in turn imposed on a highly-disaggregated, recursive dynamic economy-wide mo ...
Climate and clean air coalition to reduce short-lived climae pollutants (CCAC)
The Coalition's initial focus is on methane, black carbon, and HFCs. At the same time, Partners recognize that action on Short lived climate pollutants must complement and supplement, not replace, global action to reduce carbon dioxide, in particular efforts under the UNFCCC.
The Coalition's objectives are to address short lived climate pollutants by: Raising awareness of short lived climate pollutant impacts and mitigation strategies; Enhancing and developing new national and regional actions, including by identifying and overcoming barriers, enhancing capacity, and mobilizing ...
Knowledge Centre on Cities and Climate Change
This Knowledge Centre on Cities and Climate Change (in short: K4C) helps you to keep track of what is happening in the field of cities and climate change, by serving as a platform for sharing experiences and best practices, as well as facilitating exchange of innovative initiatives.
K4C provides you with access to hundreds of publications and reports and a world map provides you with an overview of cities, countries and regions for which good practice examples and documents are available. Moreover, through K4C you can get in touch directly with institutions and communities that are prom ...
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Climate Change and Price Volatility: Can We Count on the ASEAN Plus Three Emergency Rice Reserve?
ADB, 2012On 12 July 2012, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Plus Three intergovernmental agreement establishing the ASEAN Plus Three Emergency Rice Reserve (APTERR) entered into force. In this paper, lead author Roehlano Briones, a senior research fellow at the Philippine Institute for Development Studies, assesses the effectiveness of APTERR as a mechanism for addressing food security in light of the rising challenges of climate change and price volatility. Using Riceflow, a model of the global rice economy, he studies the possible impacts of APTERR releases on the rice market by simu ...
Impact of climate change on children in Nepal : research report
Plan International, 2012This study assesses children and key stakeholders' perception of the impact of climate change on children's well-being and evaluates children's access to disaster risk management and climate change adaptation information. It also records the current adaptation practices and suggests ways to address some key climate change issues. The study addresses the existing dearth of research in demonstrating the best way to reduce the adverse effects of changing climate, particularly on the most marginalised and vulnerable people in South Asian countries, including Nepal. It is intended to policy makers ...
Building resilience to disasters in the Western Balkans and Turkey
WMO, 2012This brochure describes; (i) UNISDR and WMO's joint programme Building resilience to disasters in the Western Balkans and Turkey; (ii) its objectives, in line with the priorities set by the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015 - Building resilience of nations and communities to disasters; (iii) the project activities, which focus on disaster risk reduction capacity building, knowledge management and disaster risk transfer and community based disaster management for UNISDR, and on risk assessment, meteorological and hydrological forecast, enabling climate risk management in decision-making, and ...
Progress report - An update on worldwide GCOS projects: in Meteorological Technology International, May 2012
The Global Climate Observing System has accelerated its program to help implement a number of renovation projects in developing areas around the world.
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Green Accounting and Data Improvement for Water Resources
Winpenny James; United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) - UNESCO, 2012 (UNESCO Side publications series-No. 02)Water makes a critical contribution to all aspects of personal welfare and economic life. However, global water resources are coming under increasing pressure. It is widely recognized that over the next few decades global drivers such as climate change, population growth and improving living standards will increase pressure on the availability, quality and distribution of water resources. Managing the impacts of these drivers to maximize social and economic welfare will require intelligent policy and management responses at all levels of collection, production and distribution of water. The go ...
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Crop yield response to water
Steduto Pasquale; Hsiao Theodore C.; Fereres Elias; et al. - FAO, 2012 (FAO irrigation and drainage paper-No. 66)Food production and water use are inextricably linked. Water has always been the main factor limiting crop production in much of the world where rainfall is insufficient to meet crop demand. With the ever-increasing competition for finite water resources worldwide and the steadily rising demand for agricultural commodities, the call to improve the efficiency and productivity of water use for crop production, to ensure future food security and address the uncertainties associated with climate change, has never been more urgent.
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IAEA Annual Report 2011
IAEA, 2012"The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has released its annual report for 2011. The report highlights, inter alia, its research activities on climate change issues in the oceans, isotope applications in hydrology and climate studies, and nuclear energy as a mitigation option.
The report indicates that the Agency strengthened its research activities to monitor radionuclides in the marine and terrestrial environment, and to study climate change issues in the oceans, in particular to study the impact of ocean acidification and climate change on oceanographic processes, ecos ...
An evaluation of India's national action plan on climate change
This document evaluates the design of the eight missions of India's National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC), which were created to advance India's development and define its approach to climate mitigation and adaptation: (i) National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture; (ii) National Mission for Enhanced Energy Efficiency; (iii) National Mission for a Green India; (iv) National Mission on Sustainable Habitat; (v) National Mission for Sustaining the Himalayan Ecosystem; (vi) National Mission on Strategic Knowledge for Climate Change; (vii) National Solar Mission; and (viii) National Wate ...
SMOC, 160. Evaluación del Estado de Necesidades para Observaciones Climáticas en América del Sur 2003‐2011
Centro Internacional para la Investigación del Fenómeno de El Niño (CIIFEN); Organización Meteorológica Mundial (OMM); Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) - OMM, 2012La Secretaría del Sistema de Observación Climática Global (GCOS), junto con el Centro Internacional para la Investigación del Fenómeno de El Niño (CIIFEN) ha iniciado un proceso para organizar un taller de “Estrategia de Implementación” para los países de América del Sur. Para lograr esto, fue realizado un taller en el cual asistieron representantes de las instituciones involucradas, usuarios, aliados estratégicos y posibles donantes, con el fin de discutir acciones para continuar con la implementación GCOS Regional Action Plan for South America del 2004. La presente evaluación contiene inform ...
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Report on the workshop on equitable access to sustainable development
UNFCCC, 2012A workshop on equitable access to sustainable development (EASD) was organized by the secretariat, under the guidance of the Chair of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA), and was held on 16 May 2012 in Bonn, Germany. The workshop provided an opportunity for participants to exchange views on EASD and equity in general, including on the following: the context for equity and EASD; the definition of equity; application of the equity principle; and possible next steps. Discussion points included the following: decoupling carbon dioxide emissions f ...
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The connection between climate change and recent extreme weather events
What do we know about the connection between climate change and recent extreme weather events, such as the heat waves, drought, and fires? This fact sheet summarizes scientists' statements that climate change has already primed the pump for extreme weather events.
Perspectivas de investigación y acción frente al cambio climático en Latinoamérica
Briones Fernando; Red de Estudios Sociales en Prevención de Desastres en América (LA RED) - LA RED, 2012This report explores practical approaches to building urban resilience, focusing on tools and methodologies that can facilitate the use of risk information in public infrastructure investment and urban management decisions as integral elements of reducing disaster and climate risks. It demonstrates that risk-based methodology focused on building urban resilience can be implemented within a range of contexts, with risk assessments as crucial tools for decision-makers. It encourages national, local and city level governments to invest in geospatial risk information, as well as making risk inform ...
Sea level rise and the Freely Associated States: addressing environmental migration under the compacts of free association
Dema Briana - Columbia Law School, 2012This paper is concerned with rising sea levels that have the potential to submerge coastal regions and displace millions of people. It reports on how current international legal frameworks applicable to refugees and immigrants will offer little protection to citizens of Freely Associated States (FAS) displaced by rising sea levels. The FAS are sovereign nations (Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and Palau) that have negotiated Compacts of Free Association with the United States, under which the U.S. provides the states with certain types of assistance. It addresses how current refugee and immigrat ...
Explaining extreme events of 2011 from a climate perspective
Peterson Thomas C.; Stott Peter A.; Herring Stephanie; et al. - U.S. Government printing office, 2012This report focuses on a way to foster the growth of explaining the causes of specific extreme disaster events in near-real time. It provides an assessment on causes of historical changes in temperature and precipitation extremes worldwide to provide a long-term perspective for the events discussed in 2011. It encourages the development of an objective criteria for defining extreme weather and climate events ahead of time, and applying predetermined methodologies to minimize risk. This report should help develop the means of communicating assessments of the extent to which natural and anthropo ...
Information for climate change adaptation: lessons and needs in South Asia
This wokring paper aims to identify barriers to information use for climate adaptation in South Asia. It serves as background for a South Asian regional workshop that will bring together adaptation information users and producers to inform likely new investments in the information base for climate adaptation. This paper aims to support progress toward the regional workshop's objectives by: (i) identifying barriers to effective information production, access, and application in the South Asian region; (ii) posing a practical vocabulary for characterizing relevant information types; (iii) articu ...
Horn of Africa Risk Transfer for Adaptation (HARITA) quarterly report: October 2011–December 2011
Swiss Re, 2012This report discusses the Horn of Africa Risk Transfer for Adaptation (HARITA) project, which is an integrated risk management framework to enable poor farmers in drought-prone areas of Ethiopia to strengthen their food and income security through a combination of improved resource management (risk reduction), insurance (risk transfer), and microcredit (prudent risk taking). It addresses the critical need to build rural resilience for climate change adaptation to address global poverty, focusing on farmers who depend on agriculture for their livelihoods. It specifically demonstrates how cash-p ...
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Annual disaster statistical review 2011: the numbers and trends
In 2011, 332 natural disasters1 were registered, less than the average annual disaster frequency observed from 2001 to 2010 (384). However, the human and economic impacts of the disasters in 2011 were massive. Natural disasters killed a total of 30 773 people and caused 244.7 million victims worldwide (see Figure 1). Economic damages from natural disasters were the highest ever registered, with an estimated US$ 366.1 billion [...]
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Adapting to climate-change induced water stress in the Nile basin
This summary report addresses the need for national and intergovernmental projects to reduce the impact of climate change on the Nile River basin. It indicates that any future changes in water quantity and quality caused by climate change will have a negative impact on economies, environment, and livelihoods in the Nile region. Provided in this summary report is information to help governments decide a better course of action for dealing with high population growth and rising levels of water scarcity, such as creating measures that will have both a local effect and positively impact countries. ...
Technical Report Series, 01. Climate and Meteorological information requirements for water management : a review of issues
In providing better understanding between climate and water management, this review will, where relevant, adopt the approach of a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats). As well as some recent initiatives noted in the preceding section, the basic data requirements and methods for water management are covered in the WMO Guide to Hydrological Practices (Ref. 7). In Volume I, Chapters 2, 3 and 4 deal with the climate observations required for water management, whilst Volume II deals with applications and management activities. Table II.4.1 from that publication is a part ...
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