The Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre organised the International Conference on Climate Risk Management from 5 to 7 April 2017 in Nairobi (Kenya). Practitioners, scientists and policymakers from all over the world participated. The aim was to develop recommendations for the IPCC AR6 scoping meeting in May 2017 on the IPCC risk framing framework, required metrics, related research topics and a better integration of practitioners’ knowledge in IPCC reports.
This International Conference on Climate Risk Management, supported by PLACARD, played a very important role in bringing together Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Reduction Community. The Conference offered an excellent opportunity to validate and generate a common understanding of climate risk management. This has resulted in some recommendations.
The group has recommended the AR5 risk framing framework as a good entry point to find solutions to address the risks, but acknowledge that terminology and definitions differences make discussions difficult. Improvements to the framework included showing the dynamic nature of risk, threshold effects and references to governance and capacities to manage the risks.
Climate risk management metrics are requested to inform the management process, to compare and communicate risk to different people. Integration of these climate risk metrics with climate adaptation metrics and emissions pathways metrics is recommended. These metrics should be able to capture vulnerability, exposure, adaptation options and uncertainties.
The relevant research questions to bring further understanding and actions on climate risk management were collected. Research funding agencies are encouraged to integrate them in research programs to ensure a broader knowledge base for future IPCC reports.
Acknowledging the challenges of IPCC reports to reach local practices, the participants developed entry points to engage policy makers and practitioners stronger in the IPCC process and many participants have elaborated ways how they can assist the IPCC to better reach out to the climate practices.