Earth Today | Adaptation Fund shares lessons from Jamaica, other project sites

IN A bid to support implementation of projects on the ground, the Adaptation Fund has put out a new publication with information and knowledge gathered from its Portfolio Monitoring Missions (PMMs), including Jamaica.

The PMMs were first introduced by the fund in 2012 as learning missions to collect, organise and analyse project data and knowledge from project sites. Key lessons from the missions have provided valuable information that supports projects and the fund's Knowledge Management (KM) Strategy, which was approved by the Adaptation Fund board in October 2016.

Including Jamaica, the new publication captures lessons learned and best practices from its first 13 PMMs, among them Argentina, Cambodia, Colombia, Ecuador, Egypt, Georgia, Honduras, Mongolia, Nicaragua, Senegal, Turkmenistan, and Uruguay.

The publication provides key findings and practical guidance for implementing entities to enhance project effectiveness grouped under eight different themes, including stakeholder engagement and community ownership, gender responsive interventions, innovation, among others.

One of the key lessons from the publication is the importance of collaboration between project-implementing entities and bene-ficiaries, as well as NGOs on the ground - which increases community ownership and effectiveness of the project-planning process. For instance, the Adaptation Fund's project in Nicaragua empowered communities to play a role in collecting and analysing relevant climate change information and allows participants to develop ownership to make decisions on the sustainable use of water and land resources.

Long-term sustainability

Gender empowerment is also one of the main findings that add value to projects at all levels. In the Adaptation Fund's Honduras project, women's participation in the design of the work helped to integrate the community and ensured long-term project sustainability.

"While each country has its distinct national system and political climate, lessons learned from other projects can provide valuable insights into their project implementation," said Cristina G. Dengel, KM officer of the Adaptation Fund.

"The publication is also providing useful tips for potential project replication or scaling up," she added.

The Adaptation Fund also recently launched a new Knowledge and Learning microsite, which is a user-friendly online repository of knowledge, data and information for the fund's partners, stakeholders and the public to share learning resources related to climate change adaptation. The publication can be downloaded through this website as well.

"The launch of this publication and the Knowledge and Learning microsite are strongly aligned with the fund's strategic pillar of learning and sharing, and they are important tools that empower the most vulnerable communities to build effective adaptation actions based on valuable experiences from the fund's concrete and localised adaptation projects," said Mikko Ollikainen, manager of the Adaptation Fund.

The fund has, since 2010, committed US$532 million to 80 concrete adaptation projects in the most vulnerable communities of developing countries, serving 5.8 million direct beneficiaries. It also pioneered the innovative climate finance modality Direct Access, which helps build national capacities and fosters country ownership in climate change adaptation. Jamaica is among the beneficiaries of that modality.