BAS I C BASIC Vulnerability and Adaptation in Coastal Zones of India Lessons from Indias NATCOM...

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Vulnerability and Adaptation in Coastal

Zones of IndiaLessons from India’s

NATCOM

D.Parthasarathy, K.Narayanan, and A.Patwardhan

Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay

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B A S I CAssessment of vulnerability of coastal zones to

climate related natural hazards

Climate related hazards in coastal zones tropical cyclones, sea level rise, temperature and precipitation changes

Trends & patterns of incidence of these hazards identified General impacts of tropical cyclones on human socio-

economic systems in the coastal zones

Identification of districts most vulnerable to extreme events (storms & severe storms)

Profile of coastal zones of India: Important and critical region for India, endowed

with a coastline of over 7500 km 3 of 4 major Indian metropolitan cities are

located in the coastal region (Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai).

Total area occupied by coastal districts: 379610 sq. km, with an average population density of 455 persons per sq. km, (about 1.5 times the national average of 324)

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Socio-economic and geophysical features of the Indian coastline: Historical assessment of key climate related issues in the Indian coastal zones.

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Exposure – Uncertainty – Risk

Vulnerability - Adaptation

Components of exposure - population and housing stock classified by material of construction

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B A S I CEXPOSURE

Vulnerability encompasses exposure to risk, hazards, shocks and stress, difficulty in coping with contingencies, and access to assets.

Vulnerability refers to a situation when certain groups in society are more vulnerable than others to shocks that threaten their livelihood and/or survival.

This has two elements: the severity of the impact of the shock (the more severe the impact if

the risk is not managed, the higher the vulnerability), a person’s resilience to a given shock (the higher their resilience,

the lower their vulnerability): resilience is an indicator of adaptive capacity.

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VULNERABILITY

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Socio-economic dimension of vulnerability

Socio-economic status of a group closely linked to the adaptive capacity of that particular group.

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Many factors contribute to social and economic vulnerability at the level of a region

rapid population growth, poverty and hunger, poor health, low levels of education, gender inequality, hazardous location, and lack of access to infrastructure, resources and

services, including knowledge and technological means.

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Vulnerability derives from:

(i) exposure to risks and shocks and (ii) an inability to manage these risks and shocks (adaptive capacity) due to:

• inadequate assets, • infrastructure and • social protection mechanisms

(eg. social insurance and assistance)

Socioeconomic context of vulnerability in costal zones of India:

Focusing on indicators that measure both the state of development of the region as well as its capacity to progress further.

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Variables considered in NATCOM for examining the socio-economic context of vulnerability infrastructure development (banks, schools & teachers,

hospitals, roads) agriculture development (crop production and area for major

crops, cropping pattern changes, fertilizer consumption and net area irrigated)

Assessing the vulnerability by region (districts) in the coastal zones of India.

Main focus on the macro level and vulnerability to current natural hazards.

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Large variation in extent of vulnerability over the districts covered in the study

Clustering in terms of vulnerability indicators

Clusters of districts with low infrastructure and demographic development (regions of maximum vulnerability)

Growth in provision of infrastructure very low: outpaced by growth rate of population

Results

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Most vulnerable districts have low infrastructural availability and a high population density

any occurrence of extreme events is likely to be catastrophic in nature

Clustering of disasters: storms, floods, and droughts

Climate change and economic decline / stagnation

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B A S I C Limitations of the study

Development of scenarios: Apart from climate scenarios essentially what is required is a socioeconomic scenario

critical for designing the adaptation options for reducing future vulnerability to climate change.

A more comprehensive set of development indicators required for assessing generic adaptive capacity in finer detail

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Limitations …

• Identification of event specific adaptation options that suits the socioeconomic structure of a particular area

• Identifying ways of merging adaptation policy with local developmental policies

•Unable to focus on all districts in the coastal zones due to time constraints

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Limitations regarding comparability of different districts across states due to reallocation of district boundaries over time

Vulnerability assessment confined to one type of extreme events: storms, severe storms, and cyclones.

No stress on climate variability pattern

Role of institutions not considered

Limitations …

Thank you

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