New Practice Guide: Nature-Based Solutions Must Play a Crucial Role in Asia-Pacific Economic Development

July 24, 2022 at 12:00 p.m. PDT, CORVALLIS, OREGON, USA

The loss of biodiversity, ecological integrity, and ecosystem services has been steady and consistent over the past century, even as our economies have been hungrier to consume more of our natural capital. Human-driven climate change has added to these pressures. Efforts to set aside ecosystems and buffer them in protected areas have had limited success.

As noted by many researchers, increasingly frequent and intense climate extremes like recent super typhoons in East Asia or emerging megadroughts in western North America directly affect the size and population health of many species. While more gradual shifts, such as the timing of precipitation patterns and steady sea-level rise apply persistent but growing pressures.

Moreover, species and ecosystems respond dynamically to climate change. Traditional approaches to conservation such as protected areas can actually constrain the need for natural systems to adjust their timing, location, and behaviors in response to climate shifts, further weakening sensitive ecosystems - even as we try to help them.

In June 2022, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) published Integrating Nature-Based Solutions for Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Management: A Practitioner's Guide authored by; John Matthews of Alliance for Global Water Adaptation and Ernesto Ocampo Dela Cruz.

Is there another pathway that can align the health of ecosystems with the health of our economies? Signs of a major recent shift have been appearing, through a number of sources, that signal a new pathway, such as  in Fiji, where as a result of COVID-driven supply chain issues, Fiji was unable to obtain  construction materials for gray infrastructure necessary to slow coastal erosion caused by climate change.

Fiji’s government decided to shift  from a traditional set of solutions that “hardened” Fiji’s coastline to a resilient NBS that used local materials, could be implemented and maintained by local companies and agencies and at lower cost. According to Amit Singh, a regional water and climate adaptation official, Fiji decided to skip the process of piloting, “We went straight to scale, at a larger scale than we had originally planned.” and  Fiji is now looking to replicate resilient natural solutions to  other similar problems. These pathway patterns aren’t unique to Fiji, other actors are looking to make resilient green infrastructure part of system solutions.

The Asian Development Bank, which spent over 23 billion USD across the Asia-Pacific region in 2021, including 6.6 billion USD focused on climate change. This  Practitioner’s Guide takes a process-based approach to a longstanding problem: how do we ensure that innovative green and traditional gray project investments can be compared effectively and fairly? based on cost, performance and longevity?

John Matthews, lead author of the Practitioner’s Guide, says the systems we use to ‘compare’ green versus gray solutions are inaccurate comparisons: “How we analyze costs and benefits are skewed towards pouring concrete and setting rebar. We normally call a project lasting decades, even centuries, successful based on just one or two metrics. We ignore the full environmental and social impacts of the project. Once you look at how green options can help solve complex development problems, they look more cost effective and resilient. The Practitioner’s Guide is intended to help finance institutions introduce green investment solutions to clients early and  ensure these options stay on the table, for a real discussion about tradeoffs and advantages.”

“If we can help investors, banks, and decision makers see the full picture of resilience, we can align the interests of ecosystems with successful economic development,” John said.

The ADB has long standing experience in the NBS space, having spearheaded a partnership with China around “sponge cities” that placed improved and restored wetlands and resilient land management solutions at the center of strategies to reduce flood risks to China’s exploding urban populations.

The US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) launched a similar NBS initiative with Engineering With Nature (EWN) in late 2021 and has worked directly with communities globally such as the city  of Udon Thani, Thailand’s second city. By designing a series of new urban lakes, which the city’s Mayor says makes Udon Thani a better place to live, ecosystems can help ensure sufficient water for both energy production and irrigation needs and divert water from sensitive neighborhoods, lowering the rising disaster risk of the Mekong River flooding.

Publication: Integrating Nature-Based Solutions for Climate Change Adaptation and Disaster Risk Management: A Practitioner's Guide, Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 IGO license (CC BY 3.0 IGO). © 2022 Asian Development Bank. Published in 2022. ISBN 978-92-9269-533-0 (print) 978-92-9269-534-7 (electronic) 978-92-9269-535-4 (ebook). DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.22617/TIM220215-2.