Adaptation measures to Climate Change in Lithuania
Stasile Znutiene Head of the Climate Change and Hydrometeorology Division
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Why do we need adaptation? • The impacts of climate change will affect various sectors of the economy, especially in areas of agriculture, forestry, biodiversity conservation, human health and even security • The territorial changes will include changes in the sea levels, which will have an impact on fishing, soil depravation will change the way farmers use their land, biodiversity loss will affect hunting, etc.
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Individual adaptation vs. structural adaptation • Individual adaptation to climate change will certainly take place, and will most likely become natural, however without governmental solutions and policies it will not be as effective and might even be harmful, because of lack of information, limited financial abilities and know-how • Costs of fighting climate change (including both adaptation and mitigation measures) will be less than the costs in the event of no measures taken in the long term 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Harmonized adaptation • Adaptation at the EU level • Adaptation at regional, national levels • Adaptation in the areas (Agriculture, Biodiversity and Ecosystem Resilience, The Built Environment, Business and Industry, Emergency and Rescue Services, Energy, Forests and Forestry, Health and Wellbeing, Marine and Fisheries, Spatial Planning and Land Use, Transport, Water Environment and Resource )
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
EU policies on adaptation to climate change • EU Communication on adaptation measures to climate change (Green Paper, 2007; White Paper, 2009) • EU strategy on adaptation to climate change (still under development) • Inclusion of various adaptation measures into other policies (such as agriculture, health, water management, etc.) • EU structural funding (supporting projects related to climate change mitigation, adaptation, e.g. Regional Development Fund, etc.) 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
EU White Paper on adaptation • The aim of EU White Paper is to adopt necessary measures to soften the impacts of climate change in the EU • The White Paper presented by the European Commission proposes an EU framework on adaptation to strengthen the EU's resilience to cope with the impacts of a changing climate • EU Climate Change Impacts, Vulnerability and Adaptation Clearinghouse- a detailed tool to achieve goals set in the White Paper 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
• The White Paper focuses on mainly 4 issues: - Building a stronger knowledge base (gathering and sharing of information on impacts of climate change at the EU level) - Taking climate change impacts into consideration in key EU policies - Burden sharing of various policies measures (guidelines, PPP, market conditions, etc.) - Supporting wider international cooperation and efforts on adaptation 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Measures I: gathering of information on climate change by the year 2011 • To create information coordination mechanism - a common platform for information sharing between the Member States - Clearinghouse national adaptation country page • To create methodologies, data collecting and other measures for common information and database sharing system • To create indexes according to which the information would be collected • To evaluate costs and benefits of various adaptation measures 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Measures II: inclusion of adaptation measures into EU policies • EU adaptation to climate change strategy in 2013 • To evaluate the existing and develop new measures to effectively adopt to climate change in various sectors of the economy (agriculture, water management, human health, biodiversity conservation, forestry, etc.) • To create strategies and guidelines in these sectors creating mechanisms to adapt to climate change 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Other adaptation measures • To include impacts of climate change as a necessary clause in the building standards, insurance, drafting new legislation, etc. • To encourage the participation of private sector, promoting public and private partnership programmes, create financial mechanisms for adaptation to climate change, etc.
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Current adaptation measures • Most important issue when talking about adaptation measures now is the information gathering, sharing, harmonized up to date knowledge on datasets and sharing of best practices from various countries and sectors, building common definitions, taxonomies, etc.
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Adaptation measures from other programmes • Projects funded under European Research Framework Programme or under the European Regional Development Fund provide the basis for the impact and vulnerability assessment and development of adaptation measures • Adaptation measures could also be learnt from the disaster prevention, risk assessment, development of alert systems and management of good practices 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Adaptation measures in Lithuania Under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) till 2012, Article 4, all necessary measures at regional and national levels must be taken to create strategies to adopt to climate change
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Questions to be answered at national level • What are the current and estimated impacts of climate change to each sector? • What would be the costs of adapting/not adapting to climate change in each sector? • What would be the impact of such measures to other sectors, what is there correlation? 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Lithuania’s adaptation strategies • UNFCCC Implementation National Strategy until 2012, 2008 • Law on Financial Instruments for Climate Change Management , 2009 • National Strategy for Climate Change Management Policy from 2013 till 2050 and the Plan of Implementation Measures from 2013 till 2020 underpreparation by May 2012; • Integration of adaptation measures in various national strategies in different sectors (energy security, human health and safety measures, good agriculture practice, etc.) 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Strategies to include climate change adaptation • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
National Energy (Energy Independence) Strategy, 2010 National Energy Efficiency Programme, 2011 The Long-term Economic Development Strategy of Lithuania until 2015, 2002 Economy Stimulation Plan, 2009 National Sustainable Development Strategy, 2009 National Reform Programme in the Context of Europa 2020, 2011 Long term Lithuanian Transport System Development Strategy, 2005 State Strategic Waste Management Plan , 2008 National Renewable energy sources development strategy and Action Programm, 2010 Law on the Use of Renewables, 2011 Lithuanian Baltic See Costal Zon Management Program, 2001 Lithunaian Landscape Policy and Programme for 2004-2020,2005 Draft National Environmental Strategy, to adopted by 2012 Draft National Forest Developement Program until 2020 Draft Lithuanian Rural Development Strategy for 2014-2020 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Law on Financial Instruments for Climate Change Management • Development of National Climate Change strategy by 2012, including measures to adapt to climate change and minimize CO2 emissions by sectors (Article 3), as well as the Plan of implementation measures by 2013 • Establishment of Special Programme for Climate Change, where revenues from the sales of various carbon emissions (EUAs, AAUs, other) must be used for environmental projects, including to projects which promote adaptation measures 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Measures of climate change adaptation in agriculture- CAP • To adopt the farm land, production materials, and land management to the impacts of climate change • To increase the competitiveness of farming territories • To increase the standards of environmental protection • To increase the standards of good farming practice • To increase the standards of sustainable land and water usage • To build the knowledge and capacity of farmers • To establish the insurance system for the compensation of crop damages 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Measures of climate change adaptation • Biodiversity and Ecosystem Resilience To evaluate of impacts for the protected species and develop protection program • Forests and Forestry To develop Sustainable Forestry Managment Programme To establish the insurance system for the compensation of forest damages 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Measures of climate change adaptation
• Emergency and Rescue Services To improve and modernise meteorological and hydrometeorological surveilance system To develope emergency situation managment plan • Health and Wellbeing To ensure health protection decreasing the risk of climate conditions To establishe information and worning system about hydrometeorological conditions 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Measures of climate change adaptation • The Built Environment • Business and Industry, Energy • Marine and Fisheries • Spatial Planning and Land Use, Transport To include climate change adaptation measures into general territorial plan and regional and special plans To include climate change adaptaion measures in urban development infrastructure project • Water Environment and Resource To reduce water level inrease, extremal conditions impact on Baltic sea costal zone To develop cost zone management plan 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Emission reduction target and the economic growth • Increase of GHG not exceeding 15% until 2020 compared to 2005 levels in non-EU ETS sectors is a challenging and extremely ambitious task for Lithuania • When the economy grows (GDP) by an average of 7.4 % per year, the GHG emissions increase of an average 4.5% annually (4.2% in agriculture) • In 2008 the GHG in agriculture – 5 mln. t CO2eq or 20.5 % of total the GHG in Lithuania • With an aim to reach +15% target by 2020, annual increase of GHG should be around 1% in all non-EU ETS sectors • This is possible only if the annual GDP growth is around 1.7%, which means Lithuania would not be able to reach the EU-15 GDP average level 12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
Climate change mitigation • It is very important to address climate change mitigation, rather than only focus on adaptation measures, as the costs of adaptation are higher than the mitigation measures, and would bring more positive effects • Climate change policies, both mitigation and adaptation, should be included in various sectors of the economy, reaching an overall countries target and sharing the burden equally between institutions • Sectoral GHG reduction strategic policy making would ensure better results in climate change adaptation
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
THANK YOU
12/22/2011
Ministry of Environment
