Climate Adaptation

While global warming will affect people and the natural environment everywhere, developing countries are more vulnerable than rich countries. Due to their location, low incomes, and limited institutional capacity, as well as their greater reliance on climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture, the poorest countries and people—those least responsible for climate change and least able to cope with it—are suffering earliest and are poised to suffer most.

Water & Climate Change Risk & Vulneraiblity Climate Adaptation Floods & Droughts

While much of the adaptation effort will occur autonomously—as individuals, households, and businesses respond to the changing climate—or through government-led investments, the international community can provide the policies, knowledge, infrastructure, and markets to make it happen in the most cost-effective way. This mainstreaming of climate concerns into national and sectoral policies is crucial for ensuring the sustainability of climate initiatives.

World Bank Response
The World Bank’s primary focus on growth and poverty reduction can increase climate-change resilience in low-income countries by helping these countries to diversify their economies. A growing number of the Bank’s investment projects explicitly recognize the challenges posed by climate change and tackle the issue with specific adaptation components. Many developing countries have begun to consider hydrologic variability in their water policy and strategy, and many are incorporated climate changes in investment programs. Some have initiated planning and are taking action to adapt their water sector to climate change. The Bank’s analytical work is helping to build knowledge on adaptation.

 

Niger: Drought

• An Adaptation Mosaic: Emerging World Bank Work in Climate Change Adaptation
• Responding to Climate Change in Latin America
• How Might Climate Change Affect Economic Growth in Developing Countries?