By Peter Asare-Nuamah
Climate change adaptation has gained heightened attention in contemporary global development discourse.
This is commendable, given that until recently, global climate change governance mechanisms, particularly the United Nations Framework Convention of Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its associated Conference of Parties (COP), were biased towards adaptation while favouring mitigation as the most effective approach to addressing climate change.
The Paris Agreement, signed in 2015, set the stage for a paradigm shift in climate change response. It recognised that adaptation is crucial for tackling climate change and minimising its adverse negative impacts.
Undoubtedly, adaptation is crucial for developing economies in the Global South, given that they bear the brunt of climate change despite contributing less to its anthropogenic causes. Africa, for instance, contributes less than 3% to global greenhouse gas emissions.
However, the continent experiences some of the worst climate change impacts, such as floods, prolonged droughts, and the spread of invasive pests coupled with rising temperatures and erratic rainfall patterns, leading to drastic reductions in agricultural yields and worsening food security and poverty.
Building capacities
Intuitively, adaptation is essential if climate change's adverse impacts are to be minimised in vulnerable and fragile regions.
Adaptation refers to adjustments in human systems to minimise the adverse impacts of current and anticipated climate change while exploring opportunities.
Given the vulnerability of smallholder agricultural systems and the crucial role agriculture plays as a driver of socioeconomic development in developing African economies, many adaptation interventions have focused largely on building capacities and resilience in agricultural systems.
Crop diversification, planting improved crop varieties and integrated soil and water management practices are some examples of adaptation strategies adopted in smallholder agricultural systems.
Others, such as agroforestry, tree planting and coastal infrastructure, have been implemented as both adaptation and mitigation measures. These are necessary to demonstrate and enhance developing countries’ contributions to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Possible backfire
Even with the potential of adaptation strategies to address climate change, scholars have raised the alarm about the intended consequences associated with many adaptation interventions.
The evidence indicates that adaptation could further enhance vulnerability and be maladaptive. But how do we address maladaptation? Maladaptation refers to adaptation Field's negative and intended consequences (IPCC 2014). Adaptation interventions are planned and implemented with the notion of addressing climate-related problems.
However, the outcomes could further worsen exposure and susceptibility to climate change. For instance, large-scale solar farms in Kenya have increased access to reliable and renewable energy while minimising carbon emissions.
However, the acquisition of lands for large-scale solar projects has deprived smallholder farmers and indigenous communities of access to land for agriculture, which is the main livelihood source, according to the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs.
In Ghana, government support for farmers under the Planting for Food and Job flagship programme increases access to subsidised agrochemicals necessary for agriculture.
While farmers’ increased access to agrochemicals improves their yields and productivity, poor use of agrochemicals in rural farming communities significantly affects farmers’ health and biodiversity by polluting water bodies and killing microorganisms and aquatic species.
Unsuccessful adaptation
Reduced soil microorganisms’ activities negatively affect soil fertility and yields, thereby facilitating more use of agrochemicals and repeating the lock-in negative effect vicious cycle.
Given that adaptation interventions can result in maladaptive outcomes, it is imperative for adaptation planning to evaluate strategies to identify the possible and unintended consequences critically.
Yet, one major challenge facing policymakers and, adaptation intervention planners and practitioners is how best to avoid negative consequences of adaptation. This is because many of the negative effects are observed after the actual implementation of adaptation.
Hence, it is difficult to confidently say that a particular adaptation intervention is completely free from negative consequences. Also, some of the negative effects of adaptation occur in the medium to long term.
Even more troubling is the fact that local communities’ priorities and needs change with changing socioeconomic and environmental conditions. In Ghana, for instance, high unemployment in rural communities has pushed many people into illegal small-scale gold mining as an alternative means to meet their daily needs.
While illegal small-scale gold mining has had adverse environmental and health consequences, those engaged in it care more about meeting their daily needs and less about the negative impact of their activities on water, biodiversity and the environment.
The same applies to farmers who tend to focus more on increasing yields through any available means without necessarily considering their negative consequences.
Implicitly, the outcome of adaptation determines whether it’s a good or a bad response.
This is quite problematic and challenging for policymakers because almost all adaptation interventions are planned and implemented to arrive at positive outcomes for society and the environment.
However, as indicated in the adaptation-maladaptation continuum, maladaptation differs from failed or unsuccessful adaptation. Failed or unsuccessful adaptation can be classified as a bad response to climate change.
Rigorous monitoring
Field Reckien et al. (2023) tested adaptation options to advance an understanding of maladaptation. They concluded that adaptation-maladaptation operates in a continuum, implying that a single adaptation intervention could have both positive and negative outcomes.
Reckien et al. (2023) argue that adaptation interventions targeting diets/food waste, including food security, nature restoration and ecosystem services, and social safety nets, will likely have the highest positive outcomes and the lowest negative consequences.
Conversely, adaptation options focusing on coastal infrastructure, coastal accommodation, insurance and water use exhibit the highest negative outcomes. Yet, no single adaptation intervention is completely free of negative consequences.
Thus, maladaptation cannot be completely avoided, but it can be substantially minimised, and increasing this awareness among policymakers, development agencies, and practitioners is imperative.
The responsibility lies with development agencies, policymakers and practitioners to critically evaluate adaptation interventions before implementing them, effectively engage local stakeholders in planning and implementation, and rigorously monitor and evaluate the outcome of implemented adaptation interventions.
The author, Dr. Peter Asare-Nuamah, is a Lecturer at the University of Environment and Sustainable Development, Ghana, and a Senior Researcher at the Center for Development Research, University of Bonn, Germany.
Disclaimer: The viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, viewpoints and editorial policies of TRT Afrika.
