The Pacific Ecosystem-based Adaptation to Climate Change (PEBACC) project manager, Herman Timmermans is looking at addressing the issue of resilience to communities and to the impacts of climate change.

“We have a multidisciplinary team of experts who are helping us to identify the ecosystems in these areas in terms of where they are, what condition they are in and the trends that are happening.”

Mr Timmermans was speaking during the Mitigation Hierarchy and Biodiversity offsets workshop at the Sofitel Resort and Spa in Denarau on Wednesday

The PEBACC project which was initiated in 2015 in Fiji is currently taking place on the two project sites on the province of Macuata and Taveuni Island through the Eco-system and Socio-economic Resilience Analysis and Mapping (ESRAM) assessment.

“We are trying to look at the different sizes of landscapes to include in our project,” he said.

“Looking at the socio-economic situations in those project areas and also looking at those goods and services that those eco-systems are providing to communities and to economies in those areas and to look at how that addresses the issue of resilience to communities and resilience to impacts like from climate change.

“We also want to better understand how the system is working the socio-economic eco-system, we are trying to get a better understanding of that from the landscapes point of view.”

He said they were also trying to look at the trends that were happening over time.

“We are also looking at what’s likely to happen in 20 to 50 years’ time if these trends continue,” he said.

“Once we understand the socio-economic  eco-system then they need to say, okay this is how its working now, let’s look at projective climate changes that are coming , we put those on top and what it’s going to mean for the system.

“So we’re going to put all those factors together into one assessment , the current situation and then what’s likely to happen with climate change and a lot of information needs to be mapped using Geographic Information System (GIS) maps and so it becomes easier for planners to use that information.”

Edited by Rusiate Mataika

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