1. AIACC Project AF14: Strategies for Increasing Community Resilience in Sudan: Lessons for Climate Change Adaptation  A joint project of the Sudan Higher Council for Environment and Natural Resources and SEI-Boston  Project Goal: To contribute to efforts to build the resilience of vulnerable communities to climate change.

2. AF14: Major Objectives  Identify SL and environmental management (EM) strategies that are effective at increasing the resilience of vulnerable communities to climate-related shocks  Assess these in the context of underlying conditions and of climate change  Share lessons for promoting climate change adaptation with the research, planning and policy-making communities

3. AF14: Project Approach The project will look at:  Vulnerable communities within Sudan.  Vulnerability and level of adaptation to current climatic conditions.  Community-based strategies for coping with and adapting to climate-related stressors.  Underlying conditions (socioeconomic, political, ecological) that promote or inhibit these strategies.

4. Want to understand:  what SL/EM strategies can do for a community What measures and strategies used? To what effect?  what factors are needed to support or enable SL/EM strategies What national and local policies, conditions, etc. are behind successful strategies? General steps: –Identify and confirm “successful” SL/EM experiences –Explore the nature of this success – use indicators to determine the way in which the community is resilient –Ask “why?” - what factors/conditions made it possible for strategies to be implemented, to take hold and to persist –Distill lessons on how to build community resilience to climate impacts AF14: Project Approach

5. Developing a Research Strategy 1) Defining Research Goals To illustrate the ways in which certain SL/EM measures increase a community’s resilience to today's climate-related shocks To illustrate how such measures can be effectively implemented and supported for lasting impact. 2) Defining Methodological Approach Locally –derived resilience indicators will be developed e.g (grain stores, household assets, access to credit etc..) Qualitative experimental information will be collected on the local and national factors that enabled SL/EM measure implementation.

6. Developing a Research Strategy (ctd.) ) Defining Research Scope Climate stressor :for each case study, a discrete climate –related event –past or ongoing- will be identified around which case study will be constructed Agric.system :Each case study will focus on agric. System and dependent communities within a particular region that has been exposed to a climate stressor SL/EM strategy: Identification of SL/EM will occur tandem with identification of agric. system

7. Developing a Research Strategy (ctd.) 4) Defining Indicators and Data Needs A generic set of indicators of system resilience will be developed by the project. These indicators will then be adapted on a case by case basis on the specific local content of each case study Case study researchers will adapt indicators with community input during initial reconnaissance of site visit

8. Developing a Research Strategy (ctd.) Selecting Case Studies: Criteria involved : Past and on going climate related events (prolonged drought),representative to national & regional future C.C. conditions. Specific examples of community-level SL/EM measures that have been applied in Sudan (replicable). Specific examples of community –level SL/EM applications considered successful (by Gov.,NGOs,CBOs) Clear research objectives, available data and feasible field work strategies.

9. Research methods  Interviews  Role playing  Group discussion,PRA  Stakeholder participation (results screening)  Multicriteria assessment

10. Expected outputs  A series of 4 case studies reports  A series of three project synthesis reports  A peer reviewed publication of one or more synthesis documents  A series of four training modules  Three regional training workshops  A dedicated web page  A regional network

11. Potential Stakeholders Include:  Communities in drought-prone regions  NGOs,  Research and scientific communities  Relevant gov. institutions (local & national)  Disaster management organizations  AIACC, IPCC and climate change community  Funding and donor organizations

12. Potential Decisions  Community-level planning decisions  Local gov.adaptation planning  National adaptation and development planning (e.g NAP and NAPA)  Regional and international planning (Sahel, LDCs)