A global assessment of policy tools to support climate adaptation

Figures & data

Table 1. Overview of policy tool types used in this paper.

Category	Definition	Examples from GAMI dataset
Direct regulation	Law or policy mandating or restricting actions	National water policy (Alam, 2015), zoning ordinance (Bowden et al., 2019)
Plan	Strategy or plan (voluntary or mandated)	Hazard mitigation plan (Boyer et al., 2017), climate action plan (Noblet & Brisson, 2017)
Economic instrument	Use of taxes, subsidies, insurance, or other financial mechanisms	Flood insurance (Thistlethwaite, 2017), agricultural subsidy (Burnham & Ma, 2017)
Information-based instrument	Activities to raise awareness or promote particular actions through provisioning of information	Early warning system (Kaján, 2014), training on water conservation techniques (Yaffa, 2013)
Capacity building	Activities to help individuals be more effective at adaptation	Providing seeds for farmers (Stoilova et al., 2019), constructing irrigation infrastructure (Zhang et al., 2016)
Network	Community networks or inter-organizational collaborations to develop or implement adaptation responses	Water user association (Villamayor-Tomas & García-López, 2017), regional adaptation collaborative (Khan et al., 2018)

Figure 1. Frequency of tool description by region and sector. Circles depict the percentage of papers in a region/sector combination that describe each tool. (Poverty: Poverty livelihoods & sustainable development; Health: Health, well-being & communities; Cities: Cities settlements & key infrastructure; Food: Food fibre & other ecosystem products; Water: Water & sanitation; Ocean: Ocean & coastal ecosystems; Terrestrial: Terrestrial & freshwater ecosystems).

Table 2. Odds ratios (ORs) predicted by logistic regression models of factors associated with tool use.

	Regulation	Plan	Economic	Information	Capacity	Network
(Intercept)	0.06***	0.21***	0.06***	0.19***	0.02***	0.13***
Sector
Cities	2.48**	1.87*	1.26	0.74	1.89	1.50
Food	1.01	0.91	1.75*	1.34	2.03*	1.30
Health	1.01	0.62*	1.05	1.07	1.14	0.78
Ocean	1.00	1.07	0.51	1.00	0.31	0.65
Poverty	1.66*	0.91	1.39	0.93	1.38	1.08
Terrestrial	0.97	0.95	1.18	0.61	2.27*	1.15
Water	0.89	1.65	0.89	0.80	0.73	0.59*
Region
Africa	0.46**	0.43**	0.92	1.42	1.83	0.78
Asia	1.11	1.11	1.14	1.12	1.68	0.92
Oceania	1.53	1.43	0.97	1.17	1.12	1.49
Central/South America	1.29	0.86	0.98	0.80	1.89	0.95
Europe	1.21	1.13	1.15	1.09	0.22*	0.94
North America	0.78	0.93	1.48	1.58	1.25	1.05
Small Island States	0.56	1.39	0.80	0.82	0.43	0.44
Actor
International	1.40	2.42**	2.06**	0.66	2.73**	1.36
National Government	2.67***	2.07**	2.86***	1.29	1.56	0.83
Subnational Government	1.02	0.76	0.78	1.38	0.76	0.96
Local Government	2.36***	1.98**	0.82	0.76	1.19	1.47
Corporation	1.96*	0.54	1.02	0.71	0.68	1.14
Small/Med Enterprise	0.99	0.72	1.29	1.14	1.17	1.11
National Civil Society	0.51*	0.92	0.67	1.27	1.40	1.98**
Local Civil Society	0.87	0.93	0.94	2.27***	1.10	2.73***
Individual	0.89	0.56*	1.31	1.23	1.72	0.93
Hazard
Sea level rise	0.71	1.19	1.32	0.67	0.81	0.79
Flooding	0.82	0.71	1.47*	1.18	1.08	1.26
Heat	1.40	1.68*	0.99	0.96	1.01	0.97
Precipitation variability	0.95	0.79	1.11	1.57*	0.82	0.82
Drought	1.25	1.16	1.29	1.05	1.09	1.21
Ocean temperature	2.22	2.07	0.20	0.68	3.65	1.73
Arctic Ice	1.36	0.22	0.48	3.96**	1.31	1.57
General Climate	1.27	1.21	0.85	0.89	0.85	1.29
Autonomous adaptation	0.20***	0.13***	0.28***	0.15***	0.24***	0.27***
AIC	750	702	1011	1107	637	1012

Significance codes: ***p < 0.001; **p < 0.01; * p < 0.05; n = 1549. AIC = Aikake’s Information Criteria, a common measure of model goodness-of-fit.

Figure 2. Tools by the targeted marginalized group.

Table 3. Ordered logistic regression predicting depth, scope, and speed of adaptation by tool use.

	Depth	Scope	Speed
Direct regulation	2.24***	2.66***	0.99
Plan	2.04***	2.65***	0.94
Economic instrument	1.19	1.57**	1.22
Information provisioning	0.96	1.27	0.85
Capacity building	2.23***	2.11***	1.12
Network	1.80***	1.38	0.81
Intercept Low/Med	1.33	0.96	0.72
Intercept Med/High	4.36	3.30	1.69
AIC	1750	2168	1363
n	1279	1424	801

Significance codes: ***p < 0.001; **p < 0.01; *p < 0.05.

Table A1. Variables from the GAMI dataset.

Variable	Options	Description
Geography	Africa Asia Australasia Central & South America North America Europe Small Island States	Countries assigned to geographic regions in accordance with the IPCC assessment reports; Papers may be associated with multiple regions if they described adaptations in multiple locations
Sector	Terrestrial & freshwater ecosystems Ocean & coastal ecosystems Water and sanitation Food, fibre, and other ecosystem products Cities, settlements, and key infrastructure Health, well-being, and communities Poverty, livelihoods, and sustainable development	Coders selected all that apply; each had a further description in the coding book to provide examples for coders.
Actors	International or multinational governance institutions Government (national) Government (sub-national) Government (local) Private sector (corporations) Private sector (small enterprises) Civil society (national, multinational, international) Civil society (sub-national or local) Individuals or households	Coders selected all that apply.
Equity (Targeting)	Women Youth Elderly Low-income Disability Migrants Indigenous Ethnic minorities Other None	Coders asked whether adaptation responses were designed or specifically intended to affect any of these groups (or select none).
Hazards	Sea level rise Extreme precipitation and inland flooding Increased frequency and intensity of extreme heat Precipitation variability Drought Rising ocean temperature and ocean acidification Loss of Arctic sea ice General climate impacts Other No information or not assessed	Hazards listed based on major threats identified in IPCC assessment reports. Coders asked to identify the threat(s) to which the adaptation description in the paper was responding/was intended to address.

More information available in GAMI Protocol 3 (Lesnikowski et al., 2021).

Table A2. Transformation potential coding.

Depth	Depth relates to the degree to which change reflects something new, novel, and different from existing norms or practices.
High	High depth (in-depth) change is more transformational: it might involve radically changing practices by altering frames, values, logics, and assumptions underlying the system. This might involve deep structural reform, complete change in mindset, radical shifts in perceptions or values, and changing institutional or behavioural norms. Adaptation actions are increasingly radical (depth of change), including altering of values, re-framing of problems, and dramatic changes in practices.
Medium	Medium (moderate) depth describes incremental changes: a shift away from existing practices, norms, or structures, but only to a limited degree. Perspectives, values, and practices are changing to involve novel or more radical approaches (depth of change). Changes in risk perception may be medium depth.
Low	Low (limited) depth follows business-as-usual practices, with no real difference in underlying values, assumptions, or norms. This includes practices that are largely expansions of existing practices. Adaptations largely are incremental by expanding existing practices, with limited evidence of novel change beyond business-as-usual practices (depth of change).
Scope	Scope refers to the scale of change – geographic or institutional.
High	High (broad, large) scope refers to large-scale and system-wide changes that involve an entire organization, a country or large region, and large populations. Broad scope efforts may be multi-dimensional, multi-component, and/or multi-level. Development of networks, inter-organizational coordination are more likely to lead to changes of broad scope. Adaptation is implemented at or very near its full potential across multiple dimensions. Adaptations are widespread and substantial, including most of the possible sectors, levels of governance, actors (e.g. nationally implemented legislation or policy), or reflect widespread changes in behaviour (scope of change). For example, this may include numerous cities or national-level changes, or institution-wide change. It may also address shifts in underlying norms and behaviours across entire populations.
Medium	Medium scope could describe multiple communities or households acting without coordination, a single sector taking action, or a small regional action. Adaptation is expanding and increasingly coordinated. There are growing efforts that exceed business-as-usual practices and challenge the fundamental attributes of the social-ecological system. There is some expansion and/or mainstreaming of change (scope of change) to include a wider region, or involvement of coordinated, multi-dimensional, multi-level adaptation.
Low	Low (small) scope might refer to local initiatives, activities taken by individuals or households. Adaptation is largely localized. There are primarily disjointed adaptation initiatives, with limited evidence of coordination or mainstreaming across sectors, jurisdictions, or levels of governance (scope of change). This could be a single city or government department.
Speed	Speed of change refers to the dimension of time within which changes are happening.
High	High (fast) speed adaptation actions are either (a) those described as being fast for their type of action (e.g. building a bridge in a year might still be considered fast) or (b) those that can take place and see results within 1–3 years.
Medium	Medium (moderate) speed adaptations are those that occur or see results over 3–5 years. Adaptations are increasingly exceeding business-as-usual behavioural or institutional change to reflect accelerated adaptive responses (speed of change).
Low	Low (slow) speed adaptations are those that take 5 years or more to be executed or to see results. Adaptations are largely slow, consistent with existing behavioural or institutional change, and limited evidence of accelerated adaptive response (speed of change). Change is evident, but not rapid.

Table A3. Total papers in dataset by region and sector.

	Terrestrial	Ocean	Water	Food	Cities	Health	Poverty	All sectors
Africa	42	16	42	375	24	113	321	492
Asia	55	44	76	376	56	167	252	524
Central & South America	9	4	12	48	10	11	26	69
Europe	14	13	30	30	47	31	3	116
North America	40	29	27	80	42	69	45	175
Oceania	7	24	14	26	8	41	24	81
Small Island States	7	22	12	19	7	26	16	43
Multiple Continents	20	14	20	37	26	39	29	87
All Continents	187	145	222	972	215	472	700	1549

Note: A single paper may be listed in multiple sectors. Small Island States papers are double counted with other regions. Poverty: Poverty livelihoods & sustainable development; Health: Health, well-being & communities; Cities: Cities settlements & key infrastructure; Food: Food fibre & other ecosystem products; Water: Water & sanitation; Ocean: Ocean & coastal ecosystems; Terrestrial: Terrestrial & freshwater ecosystems.

Figure A1. Phi correlations between presence or absence of tool types. Analysis uses the subset of papers that described at least one tool type, to remove spurious (0,0) data points.

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