Prioritisation of climate change adaptation programmes and projects Areeya Obidiegwu and Ray Purcell

2nd Agricultural Climate Change Strategy Currently 4 strategies, 11 strategies, 53 programmes (27of which for adaptation) Unknown number of projects under the 53 programmes Why is there are need to prioritise? to help identify key strategic areas of activity and to help allocate scarce budgetary resources

Current MOAC Approaches to Prioritisation For budget decision making, MOAC priorities determined by a high level Budget Working Group which sets key policy directions (this year land consolidation and Learning Centres) At Departmental level, Departments consider the following criteria for selecting projects for the budget

Current budget decision criteria The fit with Government and ministerial policies Policy directions from the Office of the Permanent Secretary The perceived degree of urgency of a project Government redistribution policy relating to fair distribution of projects across provinces But the prioritisation processes are intuitive rather than systematic (e.g. not based on scoring) and therefore not always transparent

Current climate change prioritisation practices Not a well developed methodological area Qualitative benefits approach has been piloted but found to be skill and discussion intensive and therefore time consuming Involves assessing projects against “with” and “without” climate change and can be conceptually quite difficult and unwieldly for dealing with large numbers of projects Some simple MCA attempts but not well documented

A First Cut Classification UNDP Climate Relevance Index Make available as handout

ADB Approach Scoring methodology for assessing climate change impact, vulnerabilities and technology needs in six sectors: agriculture, coastal resources, human health, transportation, water resources, and disaster risk management (DRM).

ADB Scoring Criteria effectiveness relative costs co-benefits co-costs barriers to implementation feasibility of implementation scale of implementation applicable locations and conditions potential financing and markets  

Criteria Suggestions for Scoring the CC Strategy climate relevance in terms of the Climate Relevance Index policy consistency against NESDP, National Climate Change Master Plan, Govt Action Plans, ADP etc effectiveness, how well the programme reduces climate vulnerability or increases resilience; socio-economic and poverty impact, the type of benefit, numbers, location and typology of beneficiaries co-benefits, other development benefits the programme/project may provide additional to climate change benefits, such as micro-irrigation enhancing land condition co-costs, maladaptation - the number and magnitude of the negative consequences, such as irrigation adversely affecting down stream water supplies or damage to ecosystems feasibility of implementation, capacity to procure and execute finance availability relative to domestic or external funding requirements

Scoring example See Handout on Scoring Framework Example