EbA in National Adaptation Plans (NAPs)

As part of the EbA & NAPs FEBA Working Group, the guidance note Building Resilience With Nature: Maximizing Ecosystem-based Adaptation through National Adaptation Plan Processes was launched in early 2021.

Ecosystem-based Adaptation has the potential to generate economic returns and provide multiple benefits, such as improved health, biodiversity protection, food security, and alternative livelihood opportunities, all of which can build resilience to climate change. With over 10 years of application in global and local contexts, EbA has emerged as an essential approach to adaptation that is effective in building ecological, social, and economic resilience. To fully maximize and deliver EbA at the scale and pace needed, it must be put at the heart of countries’ national development and climate strategies. The National Adaptation Plan (NAP) process provides an opening to do just this. By enabling countries to strategically integrate adaptation into their decision making, planning, and budgeting, the NAP process strives to make adaptation part of standard development practice. Produced with IISD and the NAP Global Network, the guidance note is available for download here.

The Guidelines for Integrating Ecosystem-based Adaptation into National Adaptation Plans aim to guide adaptation practitioners at national and local levels on how to take different steps when factoring ecosystems functions and services into countries’ NAP processes and instruments. The Guidelines detail the multiple benefits as well as the challenges of adopting ecosystem-based approaches to climate change adaptation; what information to collect and generate; what expertise to seek; and which stakeholders to engage for successfully integrating EbA into NAP formulation, implementation and review processes.

The Guidelines were developed, in collaboration with the FEBA network, under the National Adaptation Plan-Global Support Programme (NAP-GSP), implemented jointly by United Nations Environment Programme and United Nations Development Programme that supports the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) in advancing their NAPs.

The Guidelines are available to download here and an accompanying web story is viewable here.