Workshop report now available

The report from the workshop Social Protection and Climate Resilience is now available to download.

Why a workshop?

There is growing interest within the international development community in identifying ways to reduce poor people's vulnerability to climate variability and change; in other words, how to make adaptation 'pro-poor'. Social protection offers a promising way through which to build the resilience of poor people, especially in the context of agriculture and food security.

More specifically, the workshop organisers - the World Bank, the UK Department for International Development (DFID) and IDS - agree the time is right to take debate and action on these themes further as:

• Understanding of how social protection can contribute to pro-poor disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation is growing among development agencies and governments.
• There is now a significant pool of field-based experience from which to draw lessons and examples of good practice.

The Event

Around 100 policymakers and practitioners attended the workshop. High-level speakers included: 

• H.E. Girma W/Giorgis, President, the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
• Andrew Steer, Special Envoy for Climate Change, World Bank 
• Dr. Tewolde B.G. Egziabher, Director-General, Environmental Protection Agency, Ethiopia 
• Vijay Kumar, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Rural Development, India
• Lawrence Haddad, Director, Institute of Development Studies 
• Robin Mearns, Lead Social Development Specialist, World Bank 

Workshop Resources

• Download the workshop's Background Paper
• Download the Workshop agenda
• Watch the special video address to workshop participants from Andrew Steer, Special Envoy for Climate Change, World Bank
• Download a photograph of workshop participants
• Download a media release about the workshop, 'Climate change forces development advocates out of their 'parallel universes''
• Read IDS's news story on the workshop, 'How integrating risk management can help poor people'
• Read IDS Director Lawrence Haddad's blog entry, 'When three tribes don't go to war'
• Read World Bank Lead Social Development Specialist, Robin Mearns', blog entry, 'Three tribes within development can work together'

Workshop aims

It is intended that the workshop will lead to:

• Increased awareness of the connections between social protection, disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation, and the potential synergies between them.
• Better understanding of the constraints and challenges faced in combining social protection, disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation policy and interventions.
• A summary of lessons as a way forward to use social protection interventions to help poor and vulnerable people manage risk and adapt to climate variability and change in developing countries.

Sharing learning and good practice

We hope that learning from this workshop can be shared among a broad audience of interested development policy-makers and practitioners.

Join the ASP network and sign up to the ASP newsletter by emailing: asp@ids.ac.uk