Adaptation in the Netherlands Bas Clabbers Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality the Netherlands

Adaptation strategy No specific adaptation strategy or policy plan  integrated in other policy areas Sector specific vulnerability assessments (most common in water sector) Adaptation policies most strongly developed in water sector (both planning and implementation) Adaptation is or should be integrated in other policy areas Kind of policies: biodiversity (EHS), spatial planning, water management Mainly no regret strategies (strategies that are beneficial anyhow) Adaptation to what? Urbanisation and sealing the surface, optimizing agricultural practices (drainage: groundwater and surface water levels), causing more floods. Regeneration of rivers Vulnerability assessments, including climate variability: we use the results for calculating the risks of e.g. dike bursts Water: map of the Netherlands shows why

The Netherlands Around 50% of the country lies below sea level and it lies on the delta of three rivers (Rhine, Maas or Meuse and Schelde) Lowest point: Zuidplaspolder – 7 m. Highest point: Vaalserberg 322 m. Favour infiltration and retention Assign emergency flood areas Raise beach levels Reinforce dikes Coastal defence

Floods in January 1996

Flooding caused by extreme drought (August 2004)

Resulting in …

Adaptation strategy (continued) Research dominates policy agenda in other sectors (e.g. spatial planning, agriculture, nature) Costs of adaptation are largely unknown and not budgeted for Special research programmes and integrated in sectoral research programmes. Recent start of a programme on adaptation in spatial planning 18M€) Costs: the share of adaptations costs in the total costs is unknown (adaptation to what?)

Hurdles Uncertainties of impacts of climate change National policy versus local/regional implementation Transboundary measures are sometimes needed Climate change is only one of the influences on different policy areas Mid-term focus of most policy areas versus long term impacts The climate changes gradually Uncertainties: trust that we will be able to manage the problems as we did in the past and we do now (saline groundwater, flush it away with fresh water) National vs. local: Regulation for water pollution. Capacity of local sewage systems is sometimes insufficient with extreme rainfall, discharge to surface water or to the sea National vs. local: emergency flood areas Transboundary measures: Infiltration or catchments of water upstream / diminish water discharge; ecological network not connected to Dutch network Only one of the influences: Zuidplaspolder. Political, economical and good governance (agreements with other provincial governments). Only one of the influences: no regret strategies Mid term focus: administration for four years and short and mid term orientation of most policies Gradual change: disasters wake people

Concluding remarks An overall national adaptation strategy may not be needed Hurdles in national adaptation strategies might be even bigger in an international strategy or instrument Joint research and sharing experiences on methods and tools might be useful Hurdles: especially the tension between national policy and local implementation Sharing information, particularly at this point in time: research dominates policy agenda