A multi-stakeholder scenarios approach with multiple plausible, narrative

and numerical, stories about future contexts can help policy makers work

with future uncertainty that may influence adaptive capacity in their re-

gions. However, in many scenarios processes, it is not clear whether the

scenarios have had an impact on decision-making.

Socio-economic scenarios to develop and test agriculturaladaptation policies in the Andes and Central America

Introduction Participatory regionalscenario development

Quantification of scenarios

Stakeholders and decision makers from the public and private sectorincluding research organizations create a set of multiple regionalscenarios (in this case for Central America and the Andes)

How can we guarantee a successful use of scenarios for targeted policy guidance?

In the case of Honduras and Colombia we started with a draft version of

a plan, stakeholders developed the scenarios; tested the plan across sce-

narios and made recommendations for a more robust plan

Figure 1: A draft version of a plan or policy is tested and improved

through scenarios (Joost Vervoort, 2014)

Scenarios use for policy and investment guidance

Draf Plan Develop scenarios Test planin scenarios

Robust Plan

Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.Action plan for the Climate Adaptation Strategy for Agriculture and Livestock.

1. Scenarios are most powerful when they are used to test and develop specific decision pathways, such as government policies and action plans.

2. Develop a strong relationship withdecision-makers to build trust and identify draftpolicies and information needs.

3. Tailored scenarios are used directly withstakeholders: A multidisciplinary and multilevel team of experts and decision makers reviews, develops andadjusts the policies up to their finest details.

4. It requires openness and flexibility on the side of the decision-makers and the facilitating researchers to put changed policies into action.

How can we make sure that scenarios have an impact on

decision-making thatencourages Climate Smart

Agriculture?

Secretariat of Agriculture and Livestock (SAG).Strategy for risk management and climate change adaptation (2015-2019) for the sector of agriculture and livestock.

The CCAFS scenario exercise resulted in the integration of a completely new strategic focus, 4 other new elements and

multiple other improvements on activity level. The strategy is now being implemented.

Main elements of the scenario exercise

Decision makers tailored the regional scenarios for Central America to

Honduras´ context and received regional model results that were of

interest

Tested the robustness of the strategy in multiple future scenarios: What

are main barriers and enabling factors that should be taken into

account? What strategies are robust enough to succeed in several future

scenarios?

Set up recommendations to improve the effectiveness of the strategies´

milestones, objectives and action points

Impact of the scenario exercise

An entirely new strategic objective within the strategy; focused on

training for farmers in adaptation measures in increase production

capacity

Other elements that were added to the strategy were the improvement

of agro-climatic information systems; early warning systems; and land

use planning

Its original focus on stimulating aquaculture production was expanded

to other types of livestock

CASE Honduras CASE Colombia

Figure 2: Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), define five possible paths that human societies could follow over the next century (Palazzo A et al, 2014). Each of the regional CCAFS scenarios is compared and then linked to an SSP: New Maya collapse; Freedom fighters without freedom; 14 Baktun, the beginning of the Mayan prophecy; Crowded.

Future scenarios in the face of climate change

International Model for Policy Analysis of Agricultural Commodi-ties and Trade (IMPACT) of the International Food Policy Research Insti-tute (IFPRI) model is designed to examine alternative futures for global food supply, demand, trade, prices, and food security (Rosegrant et al, 2012) .

Each of the regional CCAFS scenarios is compared and then linked to one of the five Shared Socioeconomic Pathways, the new global scenarios

developed by the IPCC-related research community, of which each have adifferent impact on the radiative forcing levels that define climate change

(O´Neill et al, 2014)

Global Biosphere Management Model (GLOBIOM) created byInternational Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) is used to analyze the competition for land use between agriculture, forestry, and bioenergy, which are the main land-based production sectors (Havlík et

Soci

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icch

alle

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es f

or

mit

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Socio-economic challengesfor adaptation

SSP 5:

SSP 2:

SSP 1:

(Mit. Challenges Dominate)ConventionalDevelopment

(Intermediate Challenges)Middle of the Road

SSP 3: (High Challenges)

Fragmentation

(Low Challenges)Sustainability

SSP 4: (Adapt. Challenges Dominate)

Inequality

Baktun14

Freedomfighters without

freedom

Crowded

New MayaCollapse

The stakeholder generated scenarios are quantified using two agricul-tural economic models, each with different assumptions; GLOBIOM (Havlik et al, 2014) and IMPACT (Rosegrant and Team 2014) .

The stakeholder generated scenarios are quantified using two agricul-tural economic models, each with different assumptions; GLOBIOM (Havlik et al, 2014) and IMPACT (Rosegrant and Team 2014) .

To provide inputs for this quantification, drivers like population, GDP,tecnology, impacts on yields, farm input costs and others are evaluated for each scenario, in terms of scenario logic, direction of change and volatility. These semi-quantitative results are then linked to the global Shared-Socio-economic Pathways (O´Neill et al, 2014).

A set of four socioeconomic, environmental and climatescenarios for the Andes region was created in 2013 by experts and decision makers from Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia that work in agriculture, livelihoods and environment. Theinitiative took place in collaboration with the United NationsEnvironment Programme’s World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC).Quantified model results were used to create land use in maps of the region that show changes in biodiversity, ecosystem services in the scenarios.

A draft version of the action plan for the Climate Adaptation Stra-tegy for Agriculture and Livestock was tested for robustness in each of the four regional scenarios. Recommendations of improvement were made by a multidisciplinary team of experts of each country. These will be presented to the Ministry of Planning and Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in April 2015. The sectorial strategy is of priority for Colombia and thus will beapproved in 2015.

Amplify the scope of the strategy towards biodiversity andecosystem services in order to guarantee future food security.Include a section regarding territorial planning in order to guarantee future fertile land for agriculture. This in the light of future increase in urbanization. Several future scenarios show a shift in markets towards the Andes region. Therefore efforts should be made to strengthen the government’s international relations and south-south cooperation in the region.

Main recommendations of improvement

A set of four socioeconomic, environmental and climate scenarios for the Central America was created in 2013 by experts anddecision makers of Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama.

Detailed narratives are developed for each scenario

These are based on future factors of change that are relevant and un-certain for the scope of agriculture, food security, environment and liveli-hoods.

Authors: Marieke Veeger (University of International Cooperation, Costa Rica) and Joost Vervoort (Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford, United Kingdom)