Nature Based Solutions for Disasters and Climate Change Resilience

Nature Based Solutions for Disasters and Climate Change Resilience

Unprecedented climate challenges are directly linked to human activities, particularly industrialization, unplanned urbanization, deforestation, overfishing, strip mining, and more. In essence, unsustainable human trajectories are the primary causes of extreme weather conditions and various emerging disasters. An illustrative instance is the 2023 floods in Sri Lanka, transforming urbanized areas like Matara, Galle, and Colombo into flood-prone zones. Additionally, climate change poses a significant challenge, exemplified by the threat faced by Pandang in Indonesia due to coastal erosion, along with increased erosion, landslides, storm runoff, and other calamitous events.

However, nature provides multiple immediate solutions for adapting to climate change and managing disasters, ensuring planetary health and ecologically sustainable societies. Nature-based solutions encompass various ecosystem-based approaches to address societal challenges, emphasizing conservation, restoration, and sustainable use in an equitable manner. These solutions promote climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies, including reforestation, blue-green infrastructures, grey infrastructures, greenhouse gas emission reduction, recycling, and more.

While the Paris Agreement primarily focuses on climate change mitigation and adaptation, nature-based solutions play a crucial role in both disaster mitigation and climate adaptation. Countries and related organizations are actively pursuing ecosystem-based disaster risk reduction to establish proper environmental management procedures. For instance, the Swiss Alps, once flood-prone due to extensive deforestation in the 19th century, implemented massive reforestation programs to reduce floods, landslides, and ensure the survival of its people.

In contemporary societies, nature-based solutions hold a significant position, requiring collaboration among policymakers, researchers, leaders, geographers, engineers, and others on the front lines to adapt these solutions and shift the regular flow of socio-economic development toward sustainable trajectories.

Reference: Ecosystem for Disaster Risk Reduction and Adaptation (PEDRR), 2023.

Location: Colombo, Sri Lanka.

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