Ecosystem-based adaptation: question-based guidance for assessing effectiveness

This booklet sets out guidance for assessing the effectiveness of an ecosystem-based approach to climate change adaptation. It describes a process, based around asking a detailed set of questions, that can be used by project managers and researchers to shape project design, assess the progress of an ongoing project or draw conclusions about the effectiveness of a project that has ended.

Policy and decision makers are increasingly recognising that nature-based solutions or ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) may often provide the most cost-effective and broadly beneficial solution to adapting to climate change.

The assessment process has been developed as part of a four-year project called ‘Ecosystem-based approaches to adaptation: strengthening the evidence and informing policy’ coordinated by IIED, IUCN and UNEP-WCMC as part of the International Climate Initiative (IKI).