Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Insights from Africa, Asia and Latin America

2019 edition
About the contributors
This guide was written by Mairi Dupar, CDKN Technical Advisor and Managing
Editor. She coordinated, and then led, CDKN’s Knowledge Management and
Communications work stream from 2010 to 2017. Extensive review comments
to this edition were provided by Lisa McNamara, who currently leads CDKN’s
Knowledge Management activities; Maria Jose Pacha, who has coordinated CDKN’s
Knowledge Management and Learning in Latin America and the Caribbean since
2015; and Charlotte Rye, previously Communications Officer for CDKN and for
Building Resilience and Adaptation to Climate Extremes and Disasters (BRACED).

The experiences summarised in this volume were the collective work of a much
larger team, who worked creatively and energetically to communicate climate
change across many countries and to document their lessons in project reports.
We drew freely on their documents in the compilation of this guide. Thanks to the
following colleagues for their insights: Jorge Villanueva and Mathieu Lacoste (Latin
America); Claire Mathieson, Simbisai Zhanje and Jean-Pierre Roux (Africa); Elizabeth
Gogoi, Aditi Paul and Mochamad Indrawan (Asia); Ari Huhtala and Geoff Barnard
(Global). However, any errors contained herein are those of the authors alone.
Thanks also to Emma Baker of CDKN for production assistance with this edition.

Correspondence about this guide: cdkn@[Link]

This guide should be cited as:

Dupar, M., with McNamara, L. and Pacha, M. (2019). Communicating climate change:
A practitioner’s guide. Cape Town: Climate and Development Knowledge Network.

ISBN: 978-0-620-84052-1

Design and layout by Ink Design.

Cover image: Women on floor, mapping on flipchart

Photo credit: Red Cross Climate Centre and all creative commons use.
Contents
1 About this guide 4
2 General principles for effective communication 8
Developing a good communications campaign 9

3 Getting the climate change framing right 14

Framing the impacts of climate change and the benefits of adaptation action 15
Framing specific adaptation solutions 19
Framing specific mitigation solutions 20
Linking climate change accurately to extreme weather 22

4 Partnerships for impact 24

Crowdsourcing information to support climate action 24
Turning up the volume of voices that haven’t been heard 26
Mainstreaming climate messages 27
Exposing new angles and telling the human stories through investigative journalism 28

5 Creative presentation 30
Mapping changes in the climate and climate-related hazards 30
Mapping climate-related risks 32

6 Engaging with public policy and its implementation 34

Appealing across government 34
The power of witness 34
Role plays put officials in the ‘hot seat’ 35
Engaging with opposing views 35

7 Making good science go viral 38

8 Walking the walk 40

Case studies (see listing, overleaf) 44

 Endnotes 79
 Case Studies

General principles for good communications

1  Bringing it all together: Integrated communications and engagement on climate
change and gender issues 44

Getting the climate change framing right

2  SRI LANKA: Highlighting coral reefs as an economic and cultural icon at risk from climate change 46
3  UGANDA: Economic framing: Comparing the costs and benefits of early climate action with inaction 46
4  KENYA: Showing that responding to climate change is not bad for business 47
5  VIETNAM: The power of demonstration: Typhoon-resilient housing 47
6  BANGLADESH: Documentary film supports debates on climate migrants’ rights 48
7  BUSINESS: Framing the benefits of climate action for business 49
8  RWANDA: Resilience in the tea and coffee sectors: Smart solutions with wider application 50
9  PERU: The ‘demonstration effect’ from one business to another in the energy sector 51
10  PERU: Making the ‘invisible’ visible by mapping climate risks in Lima 52

Partnerships for impact

11  BRAZIL: Local people map flood risk in Amazon delta 53
12  INDIA: Inspiration from the ‘bottom up’: Water Walks in Madurai 54
13  GHANA: Pupils at the forefront of developing climate resilience 56
14  JAMAICA: Citizens define climate vulnerability 58
15  AMAZON BASIN: Citizen journalism in Amazonia 58
16  INDIA: Himalayan radio programme gives a voice to the most vulnerable 59

2
17  INDIA: Shining the spotlight on ‘missing women’ in India’s climate action plans 60
18  ALL: Exploring new climate realities through participatory theatre 62
19  PAKISTAN: Unusual partners for climate action in Pakistan’s industrial heartland 64
20  SOUTHERN AFRICA: Journalist training makes important connections 64
21  SOUTH AMERICA: Investigative journalism targets climate issues 65

Creative presentation
22  COLOMBIA: Sea level maps convince businesses to join adaptation action in
Cartagena de las Indas 66
23  BANGLADESH: The Surging Seas tool shows widespread exposure to rising water 68
24  INDIA: Engaging with civil servants boosts climate action in India 70

Engaging with public policy

25  KENYA: Climate campaign reaches across government in Kenya 71
26  INDIA: Novel framing and analysis highlights India’s stranded assets 72
27  KENYA: Decision-makers switch on to seriously fun games 74
28  NIGERIA: What Nigeria learned from Ghana 75

Making good science go viral

29  ALL: An outreach programme for the IPCC’s climate science 76
30  NEPAL: Nepal’s climate change centres diffuse climate knowledge at the grassroots 78

3
 1

About this guide

This guide shares tips for communicating climate change effectively. It

is intended for communications practitioners and other champions of
Learn about the origins of this
climate action working in developing countries. If you have ever tried
to explain to colleagues in your organisation, policy-makers, or the
guide and how you can use it
broader public how the climate is changing, how it affects them, and
to improve your climate change
what they can do about it, then this guide is for you. Whether you are in communications.
government, business, civil society or academia, when we refer to ‘climate
communicators’, we are talking about you!

This guide is focused on climate communications in developing countries

because a large amount has already been written and debated on how
best to communicate climate issues in industrialised countries. A large,
body of literature centres on convincing a sceptical or apathetic public in
North America, Europe or Australasia of the reality of climate change.

This guide is written by CDKN’s Knowledge Management and

Communications staff, who have been working, by contrast, in dozens
of low-and middle-income countries in South Asia and Southeast Asia,
sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean since 2010. Our
communications have aimed to raise awareness of:
• the physical science of climate change;
• the impacts of climate change on poverty and development;
• the potential for building resilience to climate change; and
• the opportunities of embracing a low-emission economy.

Further tips on engaging with developing country public and policy

audiences have been contributed by colleagues in research programmes,
including Building Resilience and Adaptation to Climate Extremes and
Infographic: Making informed decisions to prepare for
Disasters (BRACED, [Link]) and the Collaborative Adaptation extreme weather events (Hindi) – CDKN
Research Initiative in Africa and Asia (CARIAA, [Link]).

4 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Audiences in developing countries generally do not need to be convinced that
climate change is happening. They see the evidence before their eyes: in searing
heatwaves and increasing numbers of heat-related illnesses and deaths; in
failing and flooded food crops, and inundated coastal zones.

What these audiences need is to ‘make sense’ of what they are seeing: to
understand their lived experience in a scientific context, to know what the future
climate might hold, and to decide what they should do about it. This guide,
therefore, looks at opportunities to make connections between the big picture
and people’s local experience; between scientific and local knowledge.

By the same token, there is an increasing appetite among communities

and community-based organisations to strengthen their effectiveness in
communicating their own experiences of climate change ‘upwards’ to policy-
makers and ‘outwards’ to other communities and sectors of society, to generate
support for more resilient and sustainable development. This guide contains
many tips on how they can magnify their voices and so leverage positive change.

Two women playing a climate resilience

Our communications tips are sensitive to developing countries’ needs to tackle game in Ethiopia as part of the Africa
persistent poverty and basic development needs (such as the provision of Climate Change Resilience Alliance
project – Thomas White
drinking water, sanitation, education, healthcare, housing and energy), which
are needed for a dignified life. For most people in developing countries, action
on climate change looks different than it does in the industrialised world, where
reducing over-consumption is a towering challenge.

And finally, this guide is geared toward convincing people to take climate action
now, not tomorrow. The reality is that climate change jostles for people’s attention
with many competing stories. It takes ingenuity to bump climate change to the
top of the agenda and ultimately give it the political and public focus it deserves.

1 | About this guide 5

 Public awareness and the effective communication of climate change
Key to this guide information are flagged as critical issues in the Paris Agreement on
climate change.

Top tips This agreement was adopted by 195 nations in 2015. Its central goal is
Top tips for to keep global warming this century well below 2 °C (compared to pre-
communicating climate industrial levels) and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to
change 1.5 °C. The agreement sets out the principles and work areas that signatory
countries should follow to achieve this goal. At the time of writing, 185
countries have ratified the agreement. Article 11 of the Paris Agreement
calls for investment in capacity building, where:
Knowledge builder
Recommended resources
to help you build your
‘Capacity-building under this Agreement should enhance the capacity
and ability of developing country Parties, in particular countries with
knowledge and skills the least capacity, such as the least developed countries, and those that
are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change,
such as small island developing States, to take effective climate change
action, including, inter alia, to implement adaptation and mitigation
Story actions, and should facilitate technology development, dissemination
Case studies of creative and deployment, access to climate finance, relevant aspects of
climate change education, training and public awareness, and the transparent, timely
communications and
public engagements
and accurate communication of information. 1
’
Communicating Climate Change is a contribution toward meeting this
goal of the Paris Agreement.

Cautions We would be delighted to hear from you. Please send your feedback
Pitfalls to avoid when on the guide to the author team, including your examples of effective
communicating about methods for communicating and engaging public and policy audiences
climate change on climate change. Please include ‘Communicating climate change
guide’ in the subject line.

Email: cdkn@[Link]

6 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Kenyans exchange and record
knowledge on climate resilience at
Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre

1 | About this guide 7

 2

General principles for effective

communication

Communicating about climate change has its own unique challenges,

which we discuss in detail in this guide: from cutting through the
scientific jargon in order to represent climate impacts simply and
Learn how best practices in
faithfully, to opening up conversations about climate solutions to be
campaign and social marketing
inclusive and accessible.
strategy can apply to climate
change communications.
In spite of its unique challenges, the job of communicating climate
change can also borrow much from other sectors.

Climate communicators can adopt campaigning and social marketing

strategies used in other areas of science and the public interest – such
as campaigns to eradicate deadly diseases, stop people smoking or
taking harmful drugs, convince people to wear seat belts or get children
into school.

What climate action has in common with these other social challenges
is that it requires changes in public policy, corporate policy and citizen
behaviour, and cooperation among science, policy and civil society.

Good practice strategies for campaigning and social marketing, which

apply to climate action, are outlined here.

Anti-Smoking Poster: Chushan High School artists at

Chushan Bamboo Museum – David and Jessie Cowhig

8 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Developing a good communications campaign
This is a best practice framework which could be applied to any climate communications campaign.2 An example
of how CDKN brought these elements together is given in the case study on gender and climate change (page 44).

Identify and understand your audience On the issue of consultation: Research projects may
55 Start by identifying the stakeholder group(s) have the opportunity to involve the ultimate target
who can affect positive change, what information audiences of the research from the beginning, in setting
and analysis they need and how you can help the research questions and framing how the findings will
meet their knowledge needs. be presented and communicated at the end. This is an
55 Segment the audience and tailor communications emerging ‘gold standard’, often called ‘co-production’
to the specific concerns and needs of different of knowledge. Most climate communications don’t
target groups, to make the content as useful and come with a research budget though, and it’s up to
relevant as possible. the communicator to marshal their key messages and
55 Understand the intended audience’s knowledge evidence on climate change from existing sources. If
and values. Use framing and language that will this is the case, a classic way to test communications
resonate with target audiences and evolve their messages and guide campaign thinking is to use focus
understanding of, and contribution to, an issue. groups representing the key target audiences.
If you are not sure which framings and messages
will resonate best or how to make your Digital
communications most relevant, then consult well. engagement:
webinars, social
55 Work to identify who the best ‘messengers’ are media, website
for your content: Who is most likely to capture
the attention of your intended audience?
(See box, page 11, ‘Mind the messenger’.) Strategic
55 Request audience feedback often, and revise audience scoping,
understanding
and update messaging, content and engagement audience needs
activities to improve when things aren’t Face- and perspective Knowlege
to-face
working well. engagement:
products:
tailored, layered,
meetings, multi-format
events

2 | General principles for effective communication 9

 Tailor knowledge products and use multiple formats
55 Craft knowledge products and services that frame the information in ways that
are tailored and relevant to the stakeholder group(s).
55 Use appropriate language: Translate literally into different languages and/or use
more or less technical language according to the target group’s needs.
55 ‘Layer’ the message: Start with simple, eye-catching headlines, and signpost
to more complex levels of information and analysis: 5-second read, 60-second
read, 10-minute read, 30–60-minute read.
55 Produce diverse formats when the budget allows: Tell the same story, where
possible, in multiple formats to cater to people’s varying personal preferences. For
example, use text, pictures (picture galleries, photo essays, etc.), slide packs, films
and animations, as well as multimedia products that combine all of the above.
55 Make content easy to access, easy to use, easy to share. Make sure content can
be readily understood, applied and distributed by your intended audiences.
Extensive review and consultation/co-authorship can ensure these tests are met,
so supporting uptake and impact.

Recognise how digital and face-to-face communications can amplify

each other
55 Devise digital outreach campaigns that elevate serious climate change
messages in the midst of huge online ‘chatter’ by using well-tested tactics –
such as high-quality imagery, innovative infographics, clear copywriting and
even memes – to make content compulsively shareable.
55 You can give audiences at face-to-face events (meetings, conferences) the
digital tools to spread content to their networks, for an ‘amplifying’ effect
on your communications campaign. Digital tools could include well-crafted
social media posts or slide packs, video or other digital formats (for instance,
on shareable discs) that people can easily distribute in their workplace or
networks. It is also a way to encourage innovation, nudging people to adapt
Face-to-face policy debate and digital your content to their circumstances and build on it.
communications interact – Global NDC
Conference 2017 55 Combine face-to-face engagements in smaller groups with digital outreach via
larger broadcast communications, as a way to achieve both depth and breadth.

10 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Mind the messenger
Climate change as the subject of a public communications or policy advocacy
campaign is like other campaigns; the messenger matters as much as the
message. People listen to, and act on information from, people they can trust.
Trust is important because acting on climate change implies difficult policy
choices and personal behaviour changes.

In CDKN’s focal countries, it’s country engagement leaders have played important
roles as messengers for climate action. Usually country nationals and senior and
trusted policy advisors of government, these individuals have helped to build
government interest in new evidence on climate change, as well as convening
diverse groups of people from industry, academia and NGOs.

Recent events also show that in terms of public outreach and influencing,
messengers who are ‘not the usual suspects’ can be some of the most powerful
messengers of all. Although young people, for instance, previously raised their
voices on climate change, they lacked serious influence in global policy circles
until 2018.

Greta Thunberg, the Swedish high school student, changed all that with her
weekly school strikes to protest inaction on climate change. She has started
a global youth movement and shown what can be achieved by a voice that
is fuelled by passion, conviction and climate science. These qualities and the
novelty of being such a young climate leader (16 years old at the time) have
brought her invitations to speak at United Nations conferences and the World
Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, so far. The movement, and the media
and popular attention it has garnered, are cutting across the global North and
South. The latest, a coordinated ‘student climate strike’ in 2019, involved youth
in 36 cities in India 3, and many others across East, West and Southern Africa,
Latin America and Southeast Asia 4, North America and Australasia. School strike for the climate (top, middle) – flickr ;
Greta Thunberg, climate strike leader (bottom) – AFP

2 | General principles for effective communication 11

 The Climate Knowledge Brokers’ Manifesto
The Climate Knowledge Brokers Group is an informal network of climate change researchers
and communications professionals who produced a universal set of broad guidelines to support
better generation, access to and use of climate knowledge, following the Paris Agreement.

The Climate Knowledge Brokers’ Manifesto was developed by this group ‘with the vision of a
world in which people make climate-sensitive decisions, fully informed by the best available
climate knowledge’.5 It explains that users of climate-related knowledge require access to
information that is tailored to their myriad specific circumstances. The manifesto says that
climate knowledge brokers – intermediary individuals and organisations – play a key role in
filtering, tailoring and crafting information so that it is relevant to the people who need to use it.

[Link]

CLIMATE KNOWLEDGE BROKERS

CLIMATE KNOWLEDGE BROKERS
ADDRESS DIVERSE USER NEEDS

No awareness of issue outreach

Lack of quality information feedback to producers of information

Hidden information finding & interfacing

Informed and aware
users of tailored climate
knowledge, making
Untailored information contextualising & synthesising better decisions

Too much information filtering

12 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Tailoring climate knowledge for
diverse audiences: Knowledge
brokers in action – Mairi Dupar, CDKN

2 | General principles for effective communication 13

 3

Getting the climate change framing right

For climate communications – as with all effective communications – you need

to ‘know the audience’. In developing countries, that typically means highlighting
Learn how to develop one
the development benefits in a climate change story and framing the messages
accordingly. Specifically, tackling poverty is a pressing need and high on the public
or several story angles
and political agenda. Thus the role of climate change in undermining development
that will resonate with
progress, and the potential for inclusive climate-compatible development to lift
your target audiences.
people permanently out of poverty is an important entry point.

Although climate change already affects everyone in some way, it affects the poorest
people the most. These are the people who are homeless or living in sub-standard
housing – often in areas that are highly exposed to climate change impacts such as
floods or extreme heat – with the most marginal and insecure jobs and fewest assets.
Research evidence from across the developing world shows that households which
have risen out of extreme poverty can be knocked back into poverty by the effects
of climate change today, particularly by the shocks of extreme weather events.6

Action on climate change has the potential to simultaneously:

• tackle the many dimensions of poverty;
• create resilience to climate shocks such as extreme weather events, as well
as resilience to the insidious effects of slow-onset climate changes, like rising
sea levels;
• contribute to sustainable economies, as global society will overstep ‘planetary
boundaries’ if economic development is not environmentally sustainable; 7
• provide an opportunity to shift away from reliance on fossil fuels that are
concentrated in the hands of relatively few producer countries, to renewable
energies, in great abundance and available to all;
• offer an opportunity to lay the pathway for future growth and development in
climate-smart products and services; and
Graphic harvest of a discussion on
climate and development challenges,
• present a chance for cities and countries to demonstrate national, regional or
global climate leadership.
Development & Climate Days 2015 –
IIED/Flickr

14 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Communicators have the chance to illustrate these opportunities and
encourage climate action. Our top tips for climate communications
focus on how to make these kinds of opportunities real and meaningful Government and public
for diverse audiences. We suggest approaches for communicating with policy audiences
the general public, policy or business audiences – recognising that
there will be different priorities for each. 55 Highlight the risk that climate change
may undermine the achievement of
For more ideas on making the case for climate-compatible development, major public policy goals, especially
visit the chapter of that title in CDKN’s book, Mainstreaming Climate on eliminating poverty and reaching
Compatible Development .8 fiscal targets.
55 Highlight obligations and opportunities
[Link] for meeting international commitments
to climate action, such as the Paris
Agreement under the UNFCCC.
Framing the impacts of climate change and the
55 Highlight obligations and opportunities
benefits of adaptation action for meeting national commitments to
People want to know how When those places are climate action, such as national climate
climate change is going to affect under threat from climate change strategies, action plans, policies
the places they know, value and change – such as: and laws.
depend upon – whether they 55 Show that prevention costs less than the
depend on their environment for: heavy rainfall, cure. It is better to invest in adaptation
to climate impacts now than to invest
jobs and livelihoods, in relief and reconstruction afterwards
sea level rise, (see case study: Comparing the costs
and benefits of early climate action with
food and energy
inaction in Uganda, page 46).
security,
drought and heat 55 Or, if there has already been a climate-
or weather-related disaster, make the
safe and tolerable living
– people want to know case for ‘building back better’ – investing
conditions,
what measures they can in rebuilding efforts to be more resilient
or for recreation, culture, take to adapt and cope to the next extreme event and to avoid
religion and spirituality. with the impacts. disaster.

3 | Getting the climate change framing right 15

 Are the changes that I’m
experiencing in my environment
Business and economics- part of something bigger?
focused audiences
55 Look for examples of risks to PEOPLE ask
Will there be more changes
company profit – or to a company’s in the future weather and
entire business model – posed by climate in my area?
climate change impacts on assets,
work force, production systems
What future changes should
and supply chains (see case study:
I expect in my area, and how
Responding to climate change is not soon will they occur?
bad for business in Kenya, page 47).
55 Find the stories of risk to
competitiveness – of company, city, How can I cope
region, country – from inattention better now?
to climate change impacts.
55 Highlight that action on adaptation
can create a resilient firm with long-
How can I prepare
term prospects for business growth for the future?
and stability.
55 Demonstrate that assessing climate
risks to the business demonstrates
a robust vision and strategy to And for those in politics, public administration and business:
shareholders, aimed at ensuring the How will the weather and climate affect the
firm’s long-term value. It is about company, jurisdiction or financial portfolio that
being ‘ahead of the curve’ (see case I’m responsible for?
study: Sea level maps convince
businesses, page 66).

16 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 General audiences
55 Find the ‘human interest’ stories – in other words, people’s own An entry point to
words about their own experiences – that tell how climate understanding and
change has negative impacts and undermines development communicating climate risks
progress. By reporting the stories of affected people (or giving
Developing countries are particularly
them the video camera directly, see case study pages 60-61),
vulnerable to the impacts of extreme
you give your audience something they can relate to.
weather. The Global Climate Risk Index
55 Use the most authoritative statistics and analysis you can find 2017 analysed who suffers most from
to back up your stories.
extreme weather events. The report
55 Find the stories about iconic cultural and historical assets shows that

‘
that could be negatively affected by climate change. While
of the ten most affected countries
important to people’s identity and well-being, these assets are
(1996–2015), nine were developing
normally also linked to economic development (see case study
countries in the low-income or lower

’
on Sri Lanka’s coral reefs, page 46).
middle-income country groups. 9
55 Look out for the insidious, small-scale impacts of climate
change that are weakening people’s resilience over time and The Geography of Poverty, Disasters and
affecting their ability to ‘bounce back’ and fulfil their human Climate Extremes in 2030 shows where
potential. It may take careful investigation by a research the poorest and most climate-vulnerable
project or a determined reporter to work with communities people are located. It finds that 325 million
to document these small-scale ‘invisible’ disasters and tell extremely poor people will be living in
their stories (see case study: Making the ‘invisible’ visible by the 49 most hazard-prone countries in
mapping climate risks in Lima, page 52). 2030, the majority in South Asia and sub-
55 Highlight that action on adaptation can prevent the loss of Saharan Africa.10
livelihoods, assets, health and well-being – even loss of life –
from climate change impacts. The good news is: investing to reduce
55 Show the power of positive solutions. People don’t want just climate-related risks up front, before
bad news, they want inspiration! disaster strikes, is a ‘no regrets’ approach
with many social, economic and
environmental benefits.11

3 | Getting the climate change framing right 17

 What can science tell us about local climate impacts?
In terms of communicating how the future climate will affect a specific area, and what those changes will be, it can
be difficult to match people’s information needs to scientific projections of the future climate.

First, climate projections describe plausible future scenarios based on computer models. They are not ‘predictions’
in the way that weather forecasts are. Communicators need to keep this distinction in mind.

Another challenge is that climate information tends to be produced for relatively large scales; bigger than the
neighbourhood, city or district that concerns most individual and organisational decision-makers. Individuals and
organisations want climate information that is relevant to them, and often this means information that is quite
localised, which tells them how climate change will affect their local community, town, city or district.

As explained by Future Climate for Africa researchers:

‘Global climate models (GCMs) are the most widely used method to understand what the climate may be like in
the future as a result of emissions of greenhouse gases (global warming). They are run on supercomputers that
attempt to simulate the complex atmospheric and oceanic processes that determine the climate conditions we
experience. Because they work at a global scale, the resolution of GCM results is typically quite coarse. Each grid
cell is roughly 200 × 200 km.

Regional climate models (RCMs) are applied to smaller spatial areas to produce results with greater local detail.

’
However, RCMs still rely on GCMs for input data and therefore are not necessarily more reliable or more accurate. 12

Nonetheless, most climate models still give enough useful information about future climate trends to help people
make decisions today. Local stakeholders have the scope to take the general information provided by climate
projections, and consider how trends in temperature and rainfall could affect the natural and built environment in
their area.

For example, hydrologists in Jamaica studied, trained and engaged with local communities to understand how
heavier rainfall events expected in the future could affect water flows along river courses and, consequently, people,
property and livelihoods (see case study: Citizens define Jamaica’s climate vulnerability, page 58).

[Link]

18 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Framing specific adaptation solutions
A cardinal rule of good communications is ‘show, don’t tell’. If you can show your target audience what
climate vulnerability and climate resilience solutions look like in real life, then do, rather than just telling
them! The ‘demonstration effect’ will help your audience to imagine how something might work and
galvanise them into action (see also page 51).

All audiences
55 To be highly effective, adaptation interventions are usually very site specific. However, if you can
demonstrate how smart behaviours have saved livelihoods and assets in one place, then it may help
your audience imagine how they could adapt that solution to their circumstances. Find out if there
are best practice examples of climate change adaptation – either close to you or in a similar setting –
which can inspire others.
55 Use the IPCC’s framework for identifying climate risks; which climate hazards are present (e.g. high
rainfall, sea surges, drought), how are people exposed (e.g. living on coasts, or on degraded lands),
and what kinds of vulnerabilities they have which increase their level of risk (e.g. landlessness, social
discrimination, lack of access to credit) to pinpoint the key climate risks your target audience faces
and to find relevant good practice stories elsewhere.
55 Alternatively, find a sectoral entry point: See whether best practices of adaptation and resilience-
building in a particular sector are relevant to your target locality or sector (see case study: Resilience in
Rwanda’s tea and coffee sectors: Smart solutions with wider application, page 50).
55 Be clear on communicating how broader government and/or business policies are important in
helping or hindering people’s ability to develop resilience. ‘Bangladesh’s resilient migrants’ and
‘Typhoon-resilient housing in Vietnam’ demonstrate this (see case studies, pages 47 and 48).
55 The demonstration effect is at its strongest when there is something tangible to show, such as climate-
smart technology. In reality, many adaptation and resilience solutions involve ‘invisible’ institutional
and governance processes or cultural change. Addressing these issues may need more than mass
communications – and may come down to changes in people’s work plans and job descriptions. It can
take creative and more hands-on engagements to instil institutional changes.

3 | Getting the climate change framing right 19

 Framing specific mitigation solutions

Best practices for early For too long, policy-makers were reluctant to acknowledge the costs to
action alerts human health, the economy and the environment of burning fossil fuels
and deforestation – the greatest sources of greenhouse gas emissions that
This guide is about the medium- contribute to climate change.
to long-term task of engaging
audiences to take climate action. Many argued misleadingly that there was a choice between jobs and the
It is not about quick-action alerts, environment, or that we had to burn fossil fuels and cut and convert forests
which may be needed to warn the irreversibly in order to deliver prosperity.
public when an extreme weather
event is imminent. For the latter In recent years, this has been revealed as a false choice. Former heads of state
topic, see the Climate Information and finance ministers from across the world formed the Global Commission
& Early Warning Systems on the Economy and Climate. Their flagship ‘New Climate Economy’ project
Communications Toolkit by UNDP. ([Link]) establishes conclusively that we should
It helps readers to not be talking about ‘jobs versus the environment’ or ‘economy versus
‘ define goals for the issuance of
early warnings, and creation of
the environment’. Instead, the Commission establishes the case for why
environmental protection and specifically, cutting greenhouse gas emissions
improved climate information to limit climate change, are the foundation for strong economies and people’s
products and supportive well-being in the future. We should be talking about how
communications strategies.
’
It includes templates to help you

‘ ‘aeconomy
healthy environment and pathway to zero net emissions = a healthy
package early warning
systems, and engage with
and healthy people.
’
individual media and other What is more, the World Health Organization’s 2018 report to the United
’
relevant actors. Nations climate conference ([Link] finds
that the health benefits of tackling climate change far outweigh the costs.
[Link]
 Meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement would save a million lives per year
org/knowledge-base/
using-climate-information/
through reductions in air pollution alone.
climate-information-
early-warning-systems- Here and in the following pages, find suggestions for framing and substantiating
communications-toolkit the benefits of low-emission development for people, jobs and local and
national economies.

20 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Government audiences
55 Demonstrate how investing in reducing emissions today will Communicating the benefits of
mean fewer costs, economy-wide, to deal with impacts of climate low emissions development
change in the future. The Low Emission Development Strategies
55 Make the case that policies that reduce reliance on fossil fuels may, Global Partnership (LEDS GP) has created a
depending on national circumstances, also improve a country or series of notes on the documented benefits
region’s energy security. For example, in most small island states, of low-emission action. They draw on well-
importing fossil fuel energy makes the country highly economically researched cases from low- and middle-
vulnerable, whereas generating energy from homegrown income countries.
renewable sources would make them far less dependent.
55 Suggest that policies for improved, clean public transit and non- Some of the benefits are specific to low-
motorised transport can lead to better public health, improving emission transport; others describe the
people’s wellbeing and reducing the burden on the health sector. public benefits of low-emission energy and
With good management, such policies can also reduce deaths and land use (agriculture, forestry) approaches:
injuries on the roads, and minimise lost productivity due to traffic • Fight poverty
congestion. • Save money and time
• Gain the competitive edge
• Create green jobs
Business- and economics-focused audiences • Boost ecosystem resilience
• Ensure energy security
55 Competitiveness: Make the case that green jobs will be more
• Make roads safe
enduring, productive and competitive in the long run. Focus on
the growth and value opportunities in low-emissions products
Briefing notes describing how low-emission
and services, including materials efficiency (see case study:
interventions can deliver these benefits can
Framing the benefits of climate action for business, page 49).
be accessed at:
55 Avoid stranded assets: Highlight that investing in new, fossil fuel-
based developments will lead to ‘stranded assets’ which lose their [Link]
transport/?loclang=en_gb
long-term viability and value, in the light of worldwide political
[Link]
commitments to tackle climate change and the ‘direction of travel’ benefits-assessment-of-leds/
set by the Paris Agreement (see the case study on stranded assets,
pages 72–73).

3 | Getting the climate change framing right 21

 Linking climate change accurately to extreme weather
General audiences When an extreme weather event such as heavy rainfall, a storm surge,
heatwave or drought causes lots of damage, it inevitably hits the news
55 Health and well-being: Highlight
headlines. This opens opportunities to communicate about climate change
how clean energy technologies
impacts with the public and with policymakers. Such events also open the
deliver the energy that people
door to speak about rebuilding damaged communities with greater climate
need for household, business and
resilience in mind. But in spite of the opportunity, there are some potential
industrial use, while also improving
pitfalls to avoid – because climate change is not always to blame.
personal health and quality of life
and tackling climate change, when
It is important for the sake of credibility and scientific accuracy to be careful
they replace polluting alternatives.
how you link climate change and individual extreme events. First, it’s not
55 Saving money: Show how being
a given that climate change has ‘caused’ a single, extreme event. Weather
more energy efficient almost always
varies naturally, even without the influence of human-induced climate
saves money – or pays back on the
change. Climate change refers to changes in patterns of minimum and
investment in the short term – and
makes economic sense.
55 Conserving habitats and ecosystem
health: Some of the most cost-
effective measures to mitigate
climate change involve conserving
forests and other carbon-rich land
uses (including grasslands, seagrass
meadows and mangroves). These
measures do not just benefit the
climate, they also have major benefits
for ecosystems which may support
rich biodiversity, tourism, fisheries
and other aspects of local economies
and people’s well-being (see www.
[Link] and select ‘climate change’
Drought conditions – UNICEF Ethiopia/Flickr
for more information).

22 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

maximum temperatures and of rainfall, their timing, Extreme event attribution
intensity and duration, and whether and how these It is now possible to make quantitative statements
patterns are shifting over 30-year timescales. about how human-induced climate change
influences the likelihood of an extreme weather
The good news for climate communicators and public event. New methodologies, approaches and tools
understanding is that climate science is advancing. are being developed to improve our understanding
Scientists are now able to undertake ‘attribution of the impact of climate change on the likelihood
analyses’ of individual extreme events, which allows and intensity of an individual extreme weather
them to determine the extent to which an extreme event. This emerging field of climate science is
event has been made influenced by human-induced referred to as extreme event attribution.
climate change (see Knowledge Builder: Extreme event
attribution, right). Scientists use peer-reviewed methods, and a
combination of observational data and climate
Even without such a fine-grained scientific analysis of models, to conduct extreme event attribution analyses.
an individual extreme weather event, there are other
ways that communicators can talk about the increased Historical data is used to determine how likely an
likelihood of weather and climate extremes in the future, individual event is based on current climate records.
based on climate projections for a region. Regional and global climate models are used to
simulate worlds with and without climate change.
For instance, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate These models allow scientists to isolate the climate
Change’s (IPCC) assessments have discussed how certain change effect and can show where this has changed.
kinds of extreme events will become more or less likely
Scientists can now make statements such as this
to happen this century, in certain regions, compared to
historic observations. Scientists can now say, for example,
one on the Kenyan drought of 2016–17: Trends
‘
indicated that the higher-than-usual temperatures
that in West Asia, by the end of the 21st century, a high
could be the result of human-induced climate
daytime temperature that previously would have been
change, but that climate change did not have a
observed only once in 20 years could start to occur every
one or two years.13 ’
strong influence on the lack of rainfall. 14

[Link]
weather-events
[Link]

3 | Getting the climate change framing right 23

 4

Partnerships for impact

Tackling climate change calls for bridging the science/policy/civil society

gap. Effective communications and engagements contextualise people’s
Learn how to develop
lived experiences of climate change with scientific findings and analysis,
so that they can make sense of the events around them. Effective
relationships with the people
engagements help scientists to ‘ground-truth’ their findings with people’s
and organisations who
experiences and – even more fundamentally – steer scientists’ research
will improve the content
toward answering the most pressing climate-related questions that shape
and reach of your climate
people’s lives. And finally, effective engagements catalyse action from the communications.
grassroots community level to the policy level. They help decision-makers
to understand where new or updated policies are needed, whether policies
are being implemented well, or where policies are working at cross-
purposes to local innovation.

Crowdsourcing information to support climate action

Thanks to advances in technology and the falling costs of information
technology, new opportunities now exist for crowdsourcing information
about the impacts of climate change across developing countries. Often
called ‘citizen science’, members of the public can help identify climate risks
and spur democratic debate about adaptation and mitigation strategies.

Informing the community and engaging with them helps to capture

and compile their relevant knowledge to address climate challenges.
Once compiled, this often scattered information may often provide the
basis for a government’s strategy for climate-compatible development.
To successfully gather and build on this knowledge, it is vital to engage
the community in dialogue through events, workshops and information
Women meet to discuss climate risks,
campaigns. In Belize, reliable data and information was scattered and India – dfid
difficult to acquire. WWF-Mesoamerica used locally available knowledge

24 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

and data from socio-economic and ecological research, as well Who can access information and
as from communities living in the cities and towns, to better communication technologies?
understand how the interests of tourism could be reconciled with
Information and communication
the protection of fragile coastal marine ecosystems. A key success
technologies (ICTs) have great potential
of the initiative was the government of Belize’s adoption of an
to involve citizens in pinpointing climate
integrated coastal zone management plan in February 2016.15
change-related problems and solutions, from
See also the stories on local people mapping flood risk in Brazil’s
data-gathering projects and citizen reporting
Amazon River delta (page 58) and citizens defining Jamaica’s
to digital democracy initiatives, where
climate vulnerability (page 58), both of which will be used as the
governments invite public consultation on
basis for early warning systems to reduce the likelihood of future
development plans via digital channels.
disasters. The InfoAmazonia Platform (page 58) uses citizens’
data to highlight environmental abuses. However, when embarking on a major
data-gathering or consultative campaign,
In Madurai, India, art and cultural events, as well as ‘Water it pays to consider who has access to ICTs
Walks’ initiated by the Development of Humane Action (DHAN) and which voices may be privileged through
Foundation, help the community learn more about the links such a process. A recent report from the Web
between the river and their city. The ‘Water Walks’ also provide Foundation for the United Nations16 reveals
people with a platform to share their grievances, knowledge and that the rate of growth in internet access has
solutions with the local government for reviving the river, which slowed more than expected in recent years,
had become poorly managed and more liable to flooding in a and that rural populations and women are
changing climate (see case study: Water Walks in Madurai, page 54). considerably underserved compared to city
dwellers and men.
In Ghana, an imaginative outreach programme in schools first
raised pupils’ awareness of climate trends. Then a competition For this reason, communications initiatives
encouraged secondary pupils to put forward their own solutions in developing countries that rely on ICTs
for climate-resilient rural livelihoods – ideas which are now being need to be carefully planned. Depending on
considered by NGOs in the area for broader implementation (see the project’s scope and initiative, you may
case study: Pupils at the forefront of climate resilience in Ghana, need to make extra efforts to empower and
pages 56–57). involve under-represented groups.

4 | Partnerships for impact 25

 Turning up the volume of voices that haven’t
been heard
Innovative forms of partnership and communication can empower women
and other socially excluded groups to make their voices heard in broader
climate-compatible development processes, and also empower them to
access services (e.g. through ICTs) that were previously unavailable.

The initiative to involve communities in mapping urban climate risks in

Lima, Peru (see page 52), is one example of putting ICT into the hands of
local people to help them articulate and share their experiences of climate
risk better, and contribute meaningfully to possible policy solutions.

Other approaches to amplifying the voices of under-represented groups

include:
• creating radio broadcast slots for teenage and young women and
other groups who are under-represented in public debates in rural
India (see case study: Himalayan radio programme gives a voice to
the most vulnerable, page 59);
Recording women’s responses to climate-smart
agriculture solutions – Nicole Gross-Camp, ESPA • training rural women in the use of video cameras so that they can tell
their stories directly to camera (see case study: Shining the spotlight
on ‘missing women’ in India’s climate action plans, page 60);
• using participatory theatre to challenge power structures and
conceive of new and different solutions to climate vulnerabilities
(see case study: Exploring new realities through participatory
theatre, pages 62 – 63).

As well as such initiatives that intentionally provide a platform for under-

represented voices, there are also opportunities to simply evaluate
different groups’ access to climate information and increase their access
in the short term.

26 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

In Nepal, Local Initiatives for Biodiversity, Research and Development (LI-BIRD)
engaged with key local institutions, such as farmers’ groups and cooperatives, local
forestry groups, women’s groups and Dalit (lower caste) groups, to promote climate- Ideas for getting into the
smart agriculture approaches. 17 They used these partnerships to communicate how mainstream
climate-smart agriculture can involve less labour-intensive farming techniques
and deliver more reliable crops than conventional approaches. Women and Dalits A few of the tools and tactics
are now adopting these measures and improving their economic status. CDKN has used successfully
(among many others) include:
A project to communicate weather and climate data in Namibia found that women • advertorials and editorials on
were disadvantaged by their low literacy rates; they couldn’t read the information the benefits of investing in
distributed by mobile app. As a result, a CDKN-backed project supported the app climate change adaptation
developer to create a voice-recognition interface. The long-term solution is surely and low-carbon economic
better access to education for girls and women, but this short-term solution is growth in national news
helping women farmers already.18 magazines in Colombia
and Peru;
• ‘write shops’ with district
Mainstreaming climate messages planning officials in Indonesia
Climate change needs everyone’s effort to tackle its effects and to limit global to co-produce policy briefs
warming. That means working with partners in the ‘mainstream’; teaming up on the business case for
with organisations, influential individual bloggers and spokespeople who are developing renewable
willing to talk about climate impacts and solutions and who are working outside energy; and
environmental organisations. • case studies for business
school students in Tamil
A project to uncover the ingredients for successful local climate action, undertaken Nadu, India.
by CDKN and ICLEI, found that ‘going beyond the environmental arena or public
sphere to find partners often enriches the process of identifying appropriate
solutions to climate-related challenges’ 19 (see case study: Unusual partners in
Pakistan’s industrial heartland, page 64).

4 | Partnerships for impact 27

 Exposing new angles and telling the human
stories through investigative journalism
Journalists and their editors and producers are undoubtedly
potential allies in raising public awareness on climate change
and engendering well-informed debate and urgent action.
Common myths and lazy story angles on climate change – like the
discredited notion that there is a trade-off between jobs and the
environment – are the enemy of civilised and productive debate.

Journalists in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean have

Finding the community angle on climate impacts –
Mairi Dupar, ESPA given the following reasons for why they sometimes struggle to
publish high-profile climate change stories: 20
• Commercial pressures: Some editors fear that climate
change stories won’t sell papers or sell advertising. The onus
is on reporters to find human interest and development
angles (see the section on Framing, pages 14 – 23) that
convince editors and audiences that climate change really
is a story about people’s lives and well-being – and about
sustainable economies.21
• The perceived complexity of climate change as a
subject: Especially five or ten years ago, climate change
communications from the IPCC and other scientific bodies
were dense and hard to follow. This has improved in recent
years, and many more press statements, headline documents,
videos and slides have become available from the IPCC that
are accessible to laypeople – while also traceable back to their
painstakingly referenced scientific text and proofs, for those
who want to check.

28 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

• Some journalists say that there is a perception that climate
change is an issue driven by interests in the Global North.
The fact that historic greenhouse gas emissions were
created overwhelmingly in industrialised countries makes
some audiences in the Global South simply ‘shut off’
when the topic is raised, they say. The Paris Agreement on
climate change moves beyond this position to recognise an
overwhelming, global, political consensus for everyone to
do their part and for rich countries to help pay for climate
action in poorer countries. A more positive narrative, taken
by many leaders for climate action in the Global South and
picked up in the media, is to stress the competitiveness of
economies that shed polluting fossil fuels and restructure
economies toward low emissions. This storyline highlights
how green jobs can be – and have been – created. (See also:
Frame emissions reductions in terms of both poverty and
climate change solutions, page 35).

Often, it takes in-the-field reporting for journalists to be able to

uncover the compelling human interest stories that will illuminate
a climate change event. CDKN, Future Climate for Africa, and other
organisations have provided small targeted grants to journalists
to enable them to travel out of their offices and tell such climate
stories. See the case studies on investigative journalism in Latin
America and Southern Africa (pages 64 and 65) for more on Consulting communities on climate adaptation solutions –
Regional Institute for Population Studies, University of Ghana
these partnerships.

4 | Partnerships for impact 29

 5

Creative presentation

Data visualisation techniques can be tremendously powerful as a

communications tool. Some of the ways that data visualisation has
Learn how to find or create your own
been used to great effect in the climate change arena are:
• Mapping changes in the climate itself over time (e.g.
temperature, rainfall, sea level rise) and climate-related hazards
visualisations of climate change-related
information, which are often brilliant
at attracting attention and deepening
(e.g. flooding) over time.
• Mapping exposure and vulnerability to climate change
(e.g. poverty, sub-standard housing and infrastructure, crop
audiences’ understanding of the issues.

vulnerability to climate changes and climate-related risks (e.g.

food security risk, risk of incidence and spread of water-borne
diseases, etc).

Mapping changes in the climate and climate-

related hazards
Many reliable maps are now available showing, through colour
keys, the warming of the whole world and of particular regions,
countries and localities over historical time and into the future. Maps
of projected warming show how different possible future scenarios
might look, (i.e., how serious warming might be), depending on
how much action we take to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

Time-series mapping is also a powerful tool to show historic and

possible future changes in rainfall, temperature and sea level rise. As
well as showing direct climate changes such as these, maps can also
present climate-related hazards such as the incidence and severity
of flooding or drought. Of course, these are not only functions of
Attributing extreme events to climate change –
climate change but also a function of latitude, altitude/topography, A CDKN animation
underlying rock and soil composition, and ecosystem types.

30 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Such maps are of wide interest and use at a global scale, Skilful communicators have also shown how you
and particularly useful to decision-makers at a river basin, can combine climate hazard maps with descriptions
national and sub-national scale. Visualisations of past, of solutions. A ‘Nairobi story map’ shows how water
present and (projected) future climate-related hazards shortages will affect Kenya’s capital city, as a result of
can create a potent tool for organising communities both heavy consumption and erratic rainfall expected
and motivating government and business to plan for in the future.22 The problem is connected via a digital
adaptation action. Maps developed by scientists in storyboard to an explanation of how reforesting upper
Cartagena, Colombia, illustrated the intrusion of the sea watersheds can help to restore regular water flows to
onto Cartagena’s historic quarter and tourist resort area the lowlands.
by the 2040s. The maps were instrumental in convincing
businesses to come to the negotiating table to discuss
climate adaptation and its financing (see case study:
Sea level maps convince businesses in Cartagena de las
Indas, page 66).

Several CDKN-sponsored initiatives in Latin America and

the Caribbean have successfully mapped areas at risk of
flooding from extreme rainfall. These have been low-
cost efforts; data about flooding has been captured
on mobile apps by volunteers (citizens, researchers,
students and local government workers). The main
costs have been for scientists to quality check the data
on a software platform and plot the data on maps. The
potential benefits are high, as the data is helping to drive
early warning systems that could help stakeholders
avert future disasters. See the case studies on Jamaica Nairobi story map: exploring climate-related water stress and
solutions
and the Brazilian Amazon, page 58.

5 | Creative presentation 31
 Mapping climate-related risks
Mapping can be a useful tool to illustrate
Maps of past and current climate change: how different types of vulnerability to climate
free to access and use change impacts – including socio-economic,
environmental and physical vulnerability – are
A first stop for authoritative maps of how rainfall and distributed. Maps can help decision-makers
temperature have changed historically the world over to prioritise where resilience investments are
are the maps of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate most needed. For example, a recent product
Change (IPCC, [Link]) which assess and aggregate of CSIR has been a digital Greenbook
the latest peer-reviewed climate science. Each of the ([Link])­which maps these
IPCC’s assessment reports incorporates historic climate different aspects of vulnerability for every local
change maps and future climate projections into its government authority area in South Africa, as
Summary for Policy Makers. Each report offers graphic files a support to municipal decision-making.
under creative commons licence for download and reuse.
The Fifth Assessment Report maps and files are at: Mapping is an effective way to illustrate the
[Link] changing climate suitability of various wild
species of plants, animals and crops, and the
The IPCC’s Special Report on 1.5 °C of Global Warming (2018)
vulnerability of certain crops to climate change.
provided updated maps, which may be obtained at:
A compelling example is the Carbon Brief
[Link]
interactive infographic showing the difference
A limitation with the maps is that they suggest a narrative in impacts of 1.5°C versus 2°C of average global
of linear change and do not illustrate some of the ‘tipping warming on nature, crops, economies and
points’ that scientists think may occur as a result of changes human health.23 On a country level, data maps
in earth’s systems over decades. Such tipping points could have been created to show how the climate
include the irreversible melting of the Greenland and suitability for key crops is likely to shift markedly
Antarctic ice sheets which would initiate hundreds of years’ in the decades ahead; these have been created
worth of further sea level rise. Tipping points are explained to show shifts in coffee-growing conditions in
in the IPCC’s Summaries for Policy Makers. ‘coffee belt’ countries.24 The ‘Surging Seas’ tool
developed by the World Weather Attribution
[Link]/reports Initiative and CDKN juxtaposes Bangladesh’s
population exposure with sea level rise, under
different climate change scenarios (see case

32 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

study, pages 68–69). Meanwhile, a data dashboard
prepared by Prepdata for the Asian continent,
the Indian subcontinent and even for individual
Indian states, presents an overlay of climate-
related hazards and vulnerabilities. Our case study
describes how the mapping exercise has been part
of the process of raising climate awareness among
civil servants (see case study, page 70).

It is possible, and can be especially influential, to

create risk maps for different sectoral risks. This
provides an entry point for engaging sectoral Carbon Brief interactive infographic showing impacts of global warming at 1.5°C
audiences. For example, Enhancing National compared to 2°C ([Link]
point-five-degrees-two-degrees/)
Climate Services (ENACTS) is an initiative to

‘create a user-focused climate service that

targets national and subnational decision-
makers in Africa. ENACTS’ flagship activity is the
creation of online “maprooms”, which present
weather and climate information in user-
friendly ways (see [Link]
edu/resources/enacts). These include bespoke
online ‘maprooms’ to flag the risk factors for
the incidence and spread of malaria in endemic
countries. In Ethiopia and Tanzania this has
helped officials to pinpoint which districts will
be most exposed to the climatic conditions
that foster the spread of malaria – and to better

’
target malaria control measures. 25

ENACTS project map shows when malaria risks are higher in Ethiopia’s provinces.

5 | Creative presentation 33
 6

Engaging with public policy and

its implementation

Appealing across government

Climate change is a particularly thorny issue for policy design and
implementation because its impacts and solutions affect so many aspects Learn how to apply the
of society and the economy. In governmental terms, climate solutions call for principles in this guide
coordination across ministries and departments, and across national, regional to engagements with
and local administrations. For examples of ‘across government’ approaches to government officials, and
championing climate policy, see case study: Climate campaign reaches across learn about specific tactics
government in Kenya (page 71). Equally, policy-focused climate communications that have worked well.
need to take into account ‘vertical integration’; harmony or alignment between
high-level policies all the way down to local implementation – or vice versa, from
local innovation all the way to high-level policies.

The power of witness

Testimonials from climate-affected people, as well as people on the forefront of
solutions, are a powerful storytelling technique to illuminate climate impacts,
risks and management techniques and to introduce audiences to practical
management tools. If you invite climate-affected people or local leaders to give
first-hand testimonies at a public event or on a media platform, ensure they have
adequate briefing and support to perform at their best.

Yolande Kakabadse, WWF President (right)

Video-based testimonials can be an important tool to substitute for face-to- and Manual Pulgar-Vidal (left), former
face meetings. See, for example, the experiences documented in the case study Environment Minister of Peru, debate
climate compatible development solutions
on Bangladesh’s resilient migrants (page 48), which were screened for and for Latin America – Flickr
discussed with policy-makers.

34 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Witness trips, where affordable, are also important ways of breaking open
new conversations with policy-makers. Whether these are based on climate-
related disasters and the slow-onset impacts of climate change, or on positive Frame emissions reductions
solutions, witness trips can prove pivotal in unlocking new understanding, in terms of both poverty and
commitments and actions (see case study: What Nigeria learned from Ghana,
climate change solutions
page 75; and also the section in ‘Getting the climate change framing right’,
pages 14–23, on the importance of demonstration projects). A word of caution: Withdrawing
fossil fuels can have immediate
public benefits, such as cleaner
Role plays put officials in the ‘hot seat’ air, but could also cause economic
Role-playing games, in a small group environment, are a highly participatory damage to people on low incomes
way to stimulate decision-makers’ thinking on climate-related risk. They are and living in poverty, whose energy
feasible with one small group or a large number of small groups in a shared access and livelihoods depend on
learning space. fossil fuels and who cannot afford
the alternatives. There are many
Dr Pablo Suarez of the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre, who has proven, effective measures that can
pioneered the use of games to raise awareness and commitment to climate protect society’s poorest from the
action among decision-makers, developed this method after what he calls withdrawal of unsustainable fossil
many frustrating years of writing papers, which had more limited impact fuels and help them make the switch
(see case study: Decision-makers switch on to seriously fun games, page 74). to more sustainable alternatives.
So any communication campaigns
about decarbonising the economy
Engaging with opposing views and stamping out fossil fuel use need
Instigating climate protection measures intentionally is one thing. Undoing to be well informed by an analysis of
polluting policies or the financial incentives for polluting behaviour is who wins and who loses from climate-
another. Most governments are still subscribed to tax, subsidy, and other smart measures, and what steps
fiscal measures, as well as state investments, which actively support polluting governments can take to protect
developments such as coal-fired power stations and diesel-fuelled energy the poorest.
access. Strategically, campaigns to mobilise cross-government support for
climate action need to aim at highlighting and dismantling harmful policies
as well as promoting helpful policies.

6 | Engaging with public policy andits implementation 35

 Communicate the ‘public goods’ and the ‘private goods’ created by cutting
emissions
Taking on fossil fuel interests and the forces behind destructive deforestation and land use changes
that drive climate change can involve communicating about the ‘public bads’ – as opposed to ‘public
goods’ – created locally and nationally by greenhouse gas emissions. For example:
• Emissions data from polluting sectors and industries: This is typically collected and
communicated by governments to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) as part of their greenhouse gas inventories and so becomes a matter of public record.
However, the robustness and reliability of the data for many developing countries still needs to
be much improved.
• Evidence on the broader public health costs and public harm caused by climate-related
emissions: For example, where researchers have gathered data on excess illness and death caused
by air pollution.

However, another growing area of evidence is around the financial benefits to governments,
companies and entire industry sectors of divesting from fossil fuels. The increasingly prominent
financial debate around ‘stranded assets’ talks to the economic bottom line of investors,
businesses and governments. It is not just a conversation of the industrialised world, either.
Given the global nature of financial capital, the ‘stranded asset’ debate has far-reaching
ramifications across developing countries. A recent initiative by Indian and UK researchers
(see case study: Novel framing and analysis highlights India’s stranded assets, pages 72–73) shows
how the government of India is going to great lengths to prop up coal power, working against the
many forces that are otherwise ‘stranding’ these assets – but for how long?

36 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Coal fired power station –
© Peter & Georgina Bowater Fotosearch

‘Stranded assets’ as a framing for

policy debate
A landmark 2013 report by the Carbon
Tracker Initiative and Grantham Institute
of the London School of Economics called
Wasted Capital and Stranded Assets found that
in the previous year, US$674 billion had been
invested in essentially ‘unburnable’ carbon.26
A few years later, following the signing
of the Paris Agreement, a study in Nature
estimated that a third of oil reserves, half of
gas reserves and more than 80% of known
coal reserves would need to remain unused
in order to meet the Paris Agreement’s global
temperature targets. Sini Matikainan of
Grantham explains:

‘The value of “stranded assets” might not be

fully reflected in the value of companies
that extract, distribute, or rely heavily on
fossil fuels, which could result in a sudden

’
drop if this risk were priced in.

Other resources for communicators to

understand the concept of stranded assets
and to use the terminology appropriately
include the Carbon Tracker guide.

[Link]

stranded-assets/

6 | Engaging with public policy andits implementation 37

 7

Making good science go viral

Learn how to apply scientific
rigour and communications
It takes a bit of planning to produce high-quality, shareable materials on best practice to your climate
climate change science that will be influential and well used. And it takes a change content.
lot of careful consideration and creative thinking to tap into new knowledge
markets and avoid overlap with existing initiatives. When you do, the results
can be transformative.

CDKN took the key messages of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate

Change’s Fifth Assessment Report and repackaged it in formats that
development professionals and communicators find easy to use and share
in their everyday work. CDKN’s added value was to make this robust science
easier for non-experts to access, apply to their work and share with others.

The IPCC communications toolkit focused on promoting evidence that is

trustworthy and credible, so a key part of the programme was enlisting IPCC
authors to fact-check all of CDKN’s derivative materials before they were
issued. The communications toolkit was extremely popular and continues
to be well used; and it yielded lots of stories about how people are using the
content in their daily work (see case study: An outreach programme for the
IPCC’s climate science, pages 76–77).

Meanwhile, an initiative in Nepal to boost awareness of climate change

took off when a climate change centre offered students small grants for
public education and a mobile public library, thus reaching people who had
not been reached with good climate information before (see case study:
Nepal’s climate change centres diffuse climate knowledge at the grassroots,
page 78).
Future climate trends for South Asia – CDKN
(based on the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report)

38 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Making climate change
content shareable
Think about how you can package
your climate change content in
small, bite-sized pieces that make
it more likely that people will share
it with others or incorporate it into
their own presentations, papers
and articles:
55 Consider how to make complex
concepts understandable at a
glance – both through
straightforward language and
through infographics, with the
help of a clever designer.
55 Make individual image and
infographic files available for
download where possible, with
clear instructions about how
people can use them and who
they must credit.
55 Make your materials creative
commons licenced, so that
people know they are welcome
to re-use them.27

A range of eye-catching infographics has accompanied the promotion of The Caribbean Climate
Online Risk and Adaptation Tool (CCORAL) – Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre

7 | Making good science go viral 39

 8

Walking the walk

Learn how to communicate about climate
change with large and dispersed audiences
It does not make sense to communicate about while minimising your own carbon footprint.
climate change and be part of the problem. Climate
communicators can do much to avoid greenhouse gas
emissions in the course of their work and still create
impactful engagements.

Sometimes it has to do with the way a campaign

is designed from the very start – and, of course,
the budget available. Campaigns that can afford to
mobilise many spokespeople in a decentralised way
to engage others can be efficient and effective and
potentially avoid emissions, compared to a centralised
communications team reliant on core spokespeople
who travel extensively.

Naturally, the rapid expansion of information and

communication technologies (ICTs) has revolutionised
the way that people can access climate information and
the way that climate communicators can interact with
information users. The previous generation of broadcast
communications, such as radio, were one-way. ICTs
enable two-way conversations, including digitally based
peer-to-peer mentorship and knowledge exchange.

Studying global issues in school in India (top) – dfid ;

Discussing climate-smart agriculture (bottom) – Nicole Gross-Camp, ESPA

40 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Low-emission digital platforms that can support climate action
The following suggestions are about how ICTs can support virtual meetings, the strengthening of
professional networks and the exchange of expertise on climate topics, and so replace expensive and
environmentally damaging travel:
• Social media: While many individuals and organisations use ‘open’ social media posts for the
principal purpose of announcing and promoting their content, CDKN and its partners have found
that using closed (invitation-only) Facebook, WhatsApp and similar groups, where members
know and trust each other, has been useful to nurture deeper, ongoing technical and strategic
conversations about climate action.
• Webinars enable real-time interaction, where typically participants may pose questions to
presenters in text or verbally. Recording webinars and making the recordings and associated
publications widely accessible as ‘bundled’ resources afterwards is a good practice. For examples
of webinar ‘bundles’ on low-emission development topics, see [Link]/stories
• ScribbleLive, and similar functionality, provides a moderated way – again in real time, during an
advertised window of time – for experts and practitioners to exchange ideas on specific discussion
topics. Instead of relying on audio-visuals, this is a text-only interface. It has an advantage over
Twitter debates insofar as it supports longer text comments (beyond Twitter’s 140 characters).
• Platforms such as Slack – again based on text – enable an invited group of people, located
in a single office or a remotely dispersed group or network, to participate in one or multiple
simultaneous conversations on topics of interest.
• E-learning platforms, including Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), allow course facilitators
to take registered participants through a planned curriculum over several weeks to cover
designated topics. This method supports learning and elicits comments and insights from
students in remote areas.
• Livestreamed videos – via internet – of public events are a well-established technology and
are supported by an increasing array of platforms. In late 2018, the scale of ambition for remote
participation in mass events reached a new high with the Climate Vulnerable Forum’s 2018
Virtual Conference.

[Link]

8 | Walking the walk 41

 As a diversity of digitally-supported platforms has blossomed, the popularity of different social media and digital
channels has varied considerably by country, region and age group. For example, in some countries, LinkedIn is the
best way to connect with mid-career and senior climate professionals; in other countries, it is Facebook.

For audiences more broadly, access to social media and digital platforms is, of course, limited by internet and mobile
infrastructure in an area, or a person’s or household’s wealth. It can also be limited by social and cultural norms,
which may, for instance, limit access by women28 (see also the section Turning up the volume of voices that haven’t
been heard, pages 26–27).

What is certain is that ICTs offer tremendous potential for extending conversations and building momentum on
climate action in the years to come. The degree to which ICTs do this effectively and inclusively will depend in part
on the inclusivity of development as a whole.

The effectiveness of ICTs will also depend on the roles to be played by the facilitators and curators of climate
knowledge – the ‘climate knowledge brokers’ – to create useful, relevant platforms. Their task is to make tailored,
timely information on the fast-moving and complex subject of climate change more accessible and navigable in a
growing ocean of climate information.

Graphic harvest from

discussions at the ‘Development
and Climate Days’ 2018 – IIED

42 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Case Studies

Caribbean climate expert presents findings at the

United Nations – Mairi Dupar, CDKN
 CASE STUDY: GENERAL PRINCIPLES FOR GOOD COMMUNICATIONS

1  Bringing it all together: Integrated communications and engagement on

climate change and gender issues

CDKN’s 2016–17 gender and climate action campaign

is a case study of how CDKN applied the following
• Select outreach channels and frame messages
specifically for different audience groups:
fundamentals of an integrated communications We recognised that development audiences
strategy to a climate and development issue: who were already quite strong on gender
• Establish a clear objective and overarching
purpose: We wanted to demonstrate how
mainstreaming may need engagement on the
climate aspects of the research, while climate
women’s empowerment is integral to effective policy-orientated audiences may need special
climate action. Our overarching purpose was engagement on the gender mainstreaming
driven by new and compelling evidence on aspects. As a consequence, our exhibitions and
the links between women’s leadership and event presentations targeted:
better outcomes for climate-resilient • development stakeholders for whom the
development, emerging from research in intersection of gender and climate issues
Peru, Kenya and India. would be new and interesting, e.g. Habitat III
• Identify key audiences: We identified a wide
range of audiences. We saw that development
conference; Resilient Cities Congress
• climate policy stakeholders for whom the
programme managers (including NGOs and gender mainstreaming recommendations
civil society organisations), funding agencies, would be especially important, e.g. the United
researchers, academics and decision-makers Nations Framework Convention on Climate
at all levels of government, as well as media Change (UNFCCC) Conference of the Parties;
and ‘influencers’, could all benefit from the Global Green Growth Week.
new evidence and be part of the solution.
We wanted to reach these audiences in the
• Craft communications products and services
appropriate to different audiences’ levels of
research countries (Peru, Kenya and India) as technical understanding and time availability,
well as international audiences who could learn and in multiple formats, to suit people’s different
from this important experience and apply the needs and preferences, to suit people’s different
principles elsewhere. needs and preferences, as follows:

44 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

1. We produced an authoritative series of research
reports, principally for academic audiences. Each
country report was a 60- to 120-minute read and was
written as a reference guide with a full explanation of
our results and methodologies.
2. We produced the report 10 things to know: Gender
equality and achieving climate goals to make
international findings more readily accessible to
programme managers and busy executives, as
well as country-by-country policy briefs to support
conversations with national audiences in each of the
study countries.
3. We translated policy briefs into Spanish and French, to
reach wider audiences.
4. We delivered webinars, led by research experts, to
invite universal engagement from the international
development community.
5. We created a slide pack with notes to empower
everyone on the CDKN team, from chief executive to
programme officer, to deliver the key messages with
confidence.
6. We mounted a social media campaign in partnership
with the research partners to drive digital traffic to the
online resources.

[Link]
development/

CASE STUDY | GENERAL PRINCIPLES FOR GOOD COMMUNICATIONS 45

 CASE STUDIES: GETTING THE CLIMATE CHANGE FRAMING RIGHT

2  SRI LANKA: Highlighting coral 3  UGANDA: Economic framing:

reefs as an economic and cultural Comparing the costs and benefits of
icon at risk of climate change early climate action with inaction

In Sri Lanka, warming seas are negatively affecting A series of reports published by CDKN and its
the country’s coral reefs, with implications for the partners in 2015 – accompanied by films, press
important tourist industry. This message provided a releases, a colourful brochure and outreach events –
strong wake-up call to government decision-makers. made the case that immediate investments in
In a short video interview, Buddika Hemashantha adaptation action would cost Uganda 1/20th of the
explains how this issue became one of the driving price tag than if the government waited ten years,
forces for Sri Lanka’s low-emission, climate-resilient until 2025, to take action.29
development strategies.
[Link]
[Link]
mainstream-low-emission-development/

The people of Uganda and the country’s main economic

sectors, such as agriculture, are highly vulnerable to climate
Sri Lankan coral reef – iStock change – Mountain Partnership

46 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 4  KENYA: Showing that responding to climate 5  VIETNAM: The power
change is not bad for business of demonstration: Typhoon-
resilient housing
In 2014, CDKN supported the Kenya Private Sector Alliance (KEPSA) in
communicating climate change to the private sector. The International In Da Nang, Vietnam, 244 houses were built
Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) conducted a detailed analysis using ‘climate-adapted’ design principles
on the implications of climate change for five Kenyan business sectors – developed by a CDKN-supported project by
including tourism, agro-processing and manufacturing – and developed The Institute for Social and Environmental
briefing notes for KEPSA on ‘Climate Change and Your Business’. Transition-International (ISET-International).

The communications products showed that responding to climate change In 2013, Typhoon Nari made landfall in Da
could be good for the bottom line and create opportunities for the private Nang, putting the houses to a severe test. All
sector, such as new products and services in response to new market 244 houses remained intact while numerous
demands created by climate change. households around them suffered heavy
damage. Convinced by the visible evidence
Kenyan businesses could take advantage by becoming leaders in of disaster resilience, the Da Nang city
sustainability and creating a positive, climate-friendly image for their government has decided to integrate climate
companies. It was shown how Kenyan firms are producing and distributing resilience into their building policy.31
energy-efficient products such as improved cooking stoves and efficient
lights, sustainable energy technologies such as solar and wind, and mobile
phone applications that
enable farmers to access
insurance products and
make successful claims.30

Kenya’s cut flower industry – Flood-resilient housing, Vietnam – Chris Goldberg

Felix Masi

CASE STUDIES | GETTING THE CLIMATE CHANGE FRAMING RIGHT 47

 CASE STUDIES: GETTING THE CLIMATE CHANGE FRAMING RIGHT

6  BANGLADESH: Documentary film supports debates on climate migrants’ rights

In Bangladesh’s delta region, the intrusion of sea water

from rising sea levels is having a negative impact on
farming. It is becoming more difficult for farmers to
grow enough to eat, let alone sell their produce for a
living. Individuals and families have begun migrating
in response to environmental pressure. Some migrate
seasonally to jobs in inland cities and send remittances
back to their families in the rural areas; others uproot
their families permanently.

In this context, migration can mean many things, and it is

not necessarily a disaster; it can be an effective strategy
for coping with climate change. The documentary film
Living on the Go followed researchers into the delta
Flooding in Bangladesh’s delta region forces some residents
to hear the climate migrants’ stories first hand. The
to migrate seasonally or permanently – UK Department for film also followed migrants to the cities to uncover
International Development
some of the gaps in labour rights and protections that
they encountered there. By providing this evocative
insight, the film has supported public policy debates
on the circumstances of Bangladesh’s climate migrants,
both nationally and internationally.32 It was screened
to Bangladesh government decision-makers and
international donors at policy roundtables in the capital,
Dhaka, and screened for global audiences at the Paris
Climate Summit in 2015.

48 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 7 BUSINESS: Framing the benefits of climate action for business

Businesses want to hear about climate change in their language. They want
to focus on risks they must manage and opportunities they may exploit to
shore up their business development.

One initiative sought to present the science in the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment
Report so that it was in the language of business and presented actionable
recommendations for businesses.33 For example, a briefing note, slide
pack and infographic looked at the emissions-savings potential of
buildings. It showed how measures to tackle climate change would
deliver major benefits for building owners and managers and others in
the construction sector:

‘The buildings sector offers near‐term, highly cost-effective opportunities

to curb energy-demand growth rates … In 2010, the world’s buildings
Infographic for business audiences – CISL, WBCSD,
BIE, GBPN

accounted for 32% of global final energy use and 19% of all greenhouse gas
emissions. Widespread implementation of best practices and technologies

’
could see energy use in buildings stabilise or even fall by 2050.

This initiative was careful to frame climate mitigation actions in terms of the
financial benefits and economic security they would deliver for companies:

‘ Mitigation options offer multiple co‐benefits:

• Higher asset values
• Lower energy bills
• More jobs
• Improved energy security
• Improved productivity of commercial building occupants
• Better living and working conditions for owners and tenants 34
’

CASE STUDIES | GETTING THE CLIMATE CHANGE FRAMING RIGHT 49

 CASE STUDIES: GETTING THE CLIMATE CHANGE FRAMING RIGHT

8  RWANDA: Resilience in the tea and coffee sectors: Smart solutions with
wider application

By their very nature, tea and coffee crops are vulnerable to

climate variability and change. They grow in subtropical to
temperate, wet conditions, but the plants can be damaged by
unseasonably heavy rains, or harmed by pests and diseases that
spread in a changing climate.

The government of Rwanda has been relying on a major

expansion of the country’s tea- and coffee-growing areas to
drive future economic and social development. Climate change
puts these plans at risk, but there are many wise steps that
government and industry leaders can take to protect crops from
current climate variability and manage climate-related risks in
the future.

Tea plantations like this one may need to become more

climate resilient – World Bank In a policy brief and a compelling film, the Future Climate for Africa
(FCFA) programme documented some of the smart measures
that farmers and estate managers can take to safeguard tea and
coffee crops and local livelihoods, in the short to medium term.

The brief and film present a pragmatic approach to climate-proof

tea and coffee sector plans from the early design stage, through
implementation and project finance. The approach, developed
by Paul Watkiss and the Tea and Coffee Climate Mainstreaming
Project, in association with the Government of Rwanda, holds
promise for Rwanda but also offers lessons to tea and coffee
regions elsewhere in the world.35

[Link]

50 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 9  PERU: The ‘demonstration effect’ from one business to
another in the energy sector

A project to promote greater energy efficiency and emissions savings by Peruvian

businesses started with technical studies on how to save energy in selected Energy management
companies and followed with a business-to-business outreach programme. The
project:
• Identified and assessed energy efficiency opportunities for seven
companies in Peru, by carrying out reviews of the operations and
procedures, and developing strategies to implement change.
• Built the capacity of specialist energy consultants in Peru, e.g. to carry out
energy audits and develop business cases to cut energy use.
Data availability

• Piloted an energy efficiency workshop for groups of small and medium

enterprises (SMEs) to help them manage their energy demands and
identify savings. The pilot targeted groups of SMEs that are either suppliers
or customers of larger corporates, and was designed to to be replicable.
• Disseminated the results nationally to the Peruvian private sector, in
business language, and also presented the results at the World Climate
Operational
maintenance
Summit (a business-led event held in association with the UNFCCC
Conference of Parties).

An easy-to-use summary of the firms’ energy saving opportunities offers

practical pointers, such as, for example, how unblocking air conditioning filters
and condensers can increase the performance of appliances. Not only are such Staff engagement
solutions useful for the businesses that received the energy audits, but they are and awareness
relevant for other businesses in Peru and the developing world.36
The project highlighted these
By showing businesses what was possible, based on their peers’ experience, the operational energy management
opportunities for Peruvian
project encouraged higher ambitions for energy efficiency in Peru and beyond.
businesses – Carbon Trust

CASE STUDIES | GETTING THE CLIMATE CHANGE FRAMING RIGHT 51

 CASE STUDIES: GETTING THE CLIMATE CHANGE FRAMING RIGHT

10 PERU: Making the ‘invisible’ visible by mapping climate risks in Lima

According to the action research team that pioneered the cLIMA

sin Riesgo (Climate without risk) project, collaborative mapping
is a vital tool to capture spatially the natural and man-made
conditions that shape people’s different aspects of vulnerability.
The project team explains that they have worked with public
agencies in Lima’s low-income neighbourhoods and directly
with many residents to undertake ‘the collection and analysis
of spatialised quantitative and qualitative data, its visualisation
and communication in an accessible way, as well as the
development of evidence-based tools for discussion at policy
level. Additionally, mapping provides a basis to enable the
Researcher monitors community’s climate risks – design of co-produced interventions, contributing to the creation
cLIMA sin Riesgo project
of synergies between climate compatible development, the
management of the urban territory and the prevention of risk.’ 40

Among these tools, there are maps created with the help of
drones, 3D representations of the areas studied, methods
for community-led data gathering and monitoring using
applications on smartphones, and methods of visualising that
information online. Having reassessed the contributions of this
research each year, and created a consolidated legacy from the
experience in Lima through cLIMA sin Riesgo, these tools have
been deployed in Freetown in Sierra Leone and also in Karonga in
Malawi under a project entitled Urban ARK. The aim is to continue
consolidating and expanding the application of mapping tools
and processes that have the capacity to change lives.

[Link]

52 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 CASE STUDIES: PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT

11 BRAZIL: Local people map flood risk in Amazon delta

An action research project, ‘Medios de Vida’, in the

Amazon delta aimed to monitor, measure and support
• The app was at first difficult to download and
complex to use, and it was converted into a
local action to adapt to climate-related risks, such as simpler system that was easy to download.
flooding. The project developed a mobile phone
application, AquiAlaga (‘it floods here’), to enable
• The app originally functioned only when users
were connected to the internet; it was modified
citizens to collect data on flooding from excessive so that it could still be used off-line.
rainfall and tidal surges. The citizen science effort
became pivotal in creating an evidence base of risks,
• The app was first linked directly to a database,
which enabled some users to delete data
nurturing local understanding of climate-related accidentally and when they did so, the whole
problems, and informing public policy. app broke down for all users; this linkage was
subsequently removed and a new protocol was

‘The design of the app was carried out in a

participatory manner, with representatives from
adopted for updating the database.

various [local government] secretariats and other The project then worked with the Brazilian Ministry of
organisations giving their opinion on what the app Defence to convert part of its website, the Management
should be used for, how it should be used, and what and Operational Centre of the Amazon Protection System,
information would be the most relevant.
’
– Maria Jose Pacha, Knowledge Coordinator of the
into a user-friendly app. Now an early-alert system for
dangerous weather and hydrological events is widely
Climate Resilient Cities which formed part of this accessible to the public via the Ministry.
initiative.
[Link]
[Link]
Initial road-testing of the app also highlighted ways to
optimise its accessibility to local people, and therefore
increase its use.

CASE STUDIES | PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT 53

 CASE STUDIES: PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT

12 INDIA: Inspiration from the ‘bottom up’: Water Walks in Madurai

The city of Madurai in Tamil Nadu, southern India, is families, often housed in informal settlements, still depend
struggling to adapt to a complicated set of development on the river for agriculture, animal husbandry, drinking
risks, made worse by climate change. water and sanitation. Their vulnerability is significantly

‘Madurai developed as a collection of villages on the

banks between the main river Vaigai and the minor
multiplied by their dependence on the river and they are
disproportionately impacted by its degradation.
river Kiruthumal. As the population grew and the city The Future Proofing Cities India project, led by Atkins with
developed, the river served the needs of the inhabitants
the Development Planning Unit of the University College
for bathing, washing and agriculture, as well as for cultural
London, the Indian Institute of Human Settlement (IIHS)
life and religious ritual. It also served the important role of
and the DHAN Foundation, examined rapid urban growth
high-quality groundwater recharge and as a flood carrier.
in Madurai with the aim of developing strategies for
Until the 1970s, the Kiruthumal River flowed full sustainable development and resource scarcities, while
throughout the entire year. With a bed width of between reducing multi-dimensional poverty.
20 to 50 feet, it supplied an intricate network of water
The project began with a diagnostic of the city’s risks and
tanks and canals. The remnants of the old villages can be
vulnerabilities to climate change and then involved an
seen along the river, and many of the historically important
action planning phase: moving beyond expert-dominated
temples were surrounded by wide and full water tanks.
top-down solutions, towards co-production of knowledge
However, the pattern of development in Madurai and solutions with a wide range of local stakeholders.
during the late 20th and 21st century has significantly
During fieldwork, an innovative new way of understanding
affected the quality of the Kiruthumal River and its
and finding solutions to the complicated risks facing
ability to serve the needs of inhabitants. This essential
the river emerged. The fieldwork included a series of
‘blue-green infrastructure’ is now severely disrupted by
conducted tours along the river corridor. More than 50
urban development encroaching onto the river, blocking
participants, including journalists, officials, academics
of channels and the concreting of the river bed.
and activists, toured 15 km of the corridor. These ‘Water
A toxic mix of plastic and industrial waste clogs the flow Walks’ brought these decision-makers face to face with life
and chokes cattle to death, and many of the historically and as it is lived close to the river: how sewage frequently
functionally important tanks are now completely dry. Yet contaminates the drinking water; how the foul smell

54 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

makes houses unpleasant for residents and visitors; The Water Walks have been a catalyst for the growing
how residents often need to wade through waste water social movement in Madurai, and they are now a regular
during flooding incidents; the prevalence of diseases occurrence. The Water Walks, and the problems that are
such as diarrhoea and skin infections; the infestation of documented, are frequently reported in the local media as
mosquitoes, fleas, rodents and snakes; and the systemic part of the growing river restoration advocacy campaign.
causes of the degradation. There are a growing number of social groups who gather
to clean up and protect water tanks and channels, such
By bringing people from the community and institutions as “Wake up Madurai”, a volunteer collective who work
together to focus on the lived experience of the degraded
river corridor, the Water Walk rapidly became not just a
selflessly to help conserve water bodies.
’
means of documenting impacts and vulnerability, but also Excerpted directly from ‘Water Walks in Madurai’,
a forum for interaction and deliberation. It was true action- authored by Elizabeth Gogoi.37
planning in action. Ideas generated during the Water Walk [Link]
were then explored in the multi-stakeholder workshops
that followed. The Water Walk, initiated by the project, has
already left an enduring impact.

An evocative film on the state of the river and its impact

on inhabitants was also created by the architect Balaji.
This artistic response to the river as experienced during
the Water Walk further stimulated creative solutions to the
current state of the river, building resilience for those who
live in the corridor.

This led to the emergence of collective action planning,

bringing together diverse viewpoints and lived realities and
generating an awareness of the interactions between the
disrupted water system, the poor sewage system, the lack
Residents of Madurai discuss ways to clean up the river and restore green-
of effective waste collection and disposal, the water scarcity
blue infrastructure during a water walk – DHAN Foundation
and flooding.

CASE STUDIES | PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT 55

 CASE STUDIES: PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT

13  GHANA: Pupils at the forefront of developing climate resilience

‘Inmorethefrequent
Upper West region of Ghana, dry spells are becoming
as a result of climate change, and are affecting
farming, the primary livelihood in the area.

In this region, the Adaptation at Scale in Semi-Arid Regions

(ASSAR) project has focused on building community
members’ resilience for food security by developing
knowledge and capacity in the Lawra and Nandom districts.
The project used a Transformative Scenario Planning (TSP)
model 38 to envisage the future of agriculture and food
security in the Upper West region. TSP workshops brought
a diverse range of stakeholders together, who identified that
disaster risk reduction, ecosystem management, sustainable
food and livelihood adaptation, improved market systems
Project stakeholders discuss climate solutions – ASSAR (Adaptation at and climate smart water management would be key to
Scale in Semi-Arid Regions) project
the region’s water security to 2035. The project designed
capacity building and communications activities around
each strategic area, to work with target audiences and
vulnerable groups according to their needs; this included
teenagers in Lawra and Nandom Districts.

An ASSAR Small Opportunities Grant (SOG) was used to

develop a competition for senior high schools to raise
awareness about local climate and environmental challenges,
and promote the development of solutions by students.
The Climate Change Adaptation Through Youth Innovation
(CATYI) competition promoted dialogue and information
exchange among students and enhanced their capacity to
identify and communicate local adaptation issues.

56 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

The ASSAR team first toured senior high schools in the region
to raise awareness about climate and sustainability issues,
then invited students to form teams and submit solutions
to address the five strategic challenge areas. A total of six
teams from Birifoh, Lawra and Nandom Senior High Schools
were selected to make oral presentations in the finals. Judges
selected the winners as follows:
• Save the forest (ecosystem management) by the Pundits
Team (Nandom Senior High School)
• Assisting women to establish woodlots for fuelwood
(ecosystem management) by the Tierebio Fuelwood
Growers Team (Lawra Senior High School)
• Extraction and improvement of groundnut oil and cakes
(kulikuli) (sustainable livelihood empowerment) by the
Mwinnebangfo Team (Lawra Senior High School). Project stakeholders discuss climate solutions – ASSAR

The competing schools received cash prizes, educational

materials and certificates. The ultimate winners, the team
from Nandom Senior High School, won a three-day trip to the
capital city, Accra, which featured visits with the University of
Ghana and key national institutions, including the Ministry of
Environment Science Technology and Innovation (MESTI) and
environmental NGOs.
’
Excerpted from Ansah, P. and Scodanibbio, L. (2019).39

CASE STUDIES | PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT 57

 CASE STUDIES: PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT

14 JAMAICA: Citizens define climate vulnerability 15 AMAZON BASIN: Citizen

journalism in Amazonia
An initiative by the University of the West Indies helped communities
to understand the risks of current weather patterns and future climate InfoAmazonia provides timely news and
reports on the endangered Amazon region.
change in their watersheds. The project team initially trained technical staff
Using Google Earth software, the project has
from different stakeholder organisations in Jamaica to use a mobile data
created an interactive map of the Amazon
app to collect disaster data, and particularly to document how flooding
Basin that contains layers of information
is affecting communities. They followed this up by training local parish
combining satellite images, news, information
disaster coordinators and community representatives to use the app. and multimedia reports about climate
and development from both professional
After an initial briefing, participants headed out to the field to practise and citizen journalists. The map features
collecting data on the app, then returned to the lab and uploaded information and stories that have helped the
and organised their data on an online platform. Data on the CARISKA public and policy advocacy groups accurately
platform involves GIS databases (parish, river, road, flood location, report and respond to the region’s need to
critical infrastructure and hazard maps) as well as different map layers to combat forest fires and deforestation, adapt to
display. Course participants helped to populate all these data categories. environmental change and build a sustainable
economy. InfoAmazonia actively encourages
The outreach initiative has helped the public to submit data and stories through
communities to understand where the GeoJournalism platform. [Link]
flooding risks are currently most [Link]/#submit.
acute. When they compare the
[Link]
present-day situation with the
projections for future rainfall and sea
level rise, they can assess whether
extra flood resilience efforts will be
needed.41

[Link]

Jamaican inland flooding – iStockphoto

InfoAmazonia platform

58 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

16 INDIA: Himalayan radio programme gives a voice to the most vulnerable

‘Inonsome of the most arid parts of India, isolated communities that depend directly
their immediate environment for food and livelihoods are experiencing the
worst impacts of climate change. Farmers are observing long-term changes in their
local climate patterns, winter and summer weather has become more erratic, and
extreme events such as flash floods and droughts are more frequent and intense.
Although local communities are well aware of these changes, they see them as either
aberrations or consequences of land use changes and environmental degradation.
’
A Sustainable Environment and Ecological Development Society (SEEDS)-CDKN
project looked at what kinds of local multi-stakeholder platforms could stimulate
action on disaster risk reduction and adaptation, both within and outside of their
communities.

‘Ina local
Barmer, Rajasthan, SEEDS helped start a community radio programme with
NGO called Unnati. Malnutrition, illiteracy, child marriage and abuse
are very high among adolescent girls in western Rajasthan, where the Human
Development Index for women and female children is among the lowest in the Weather station results reported by
world. Unnati trained a group of local adolescent girls from a highly vulnerable and community in Leh, India – SEEDS India
marginalised community to develop, edit and broadcast ten radio programmes
of 15 minutes each on climate change and disaster-related issues facing western
Rajasthan. The twice-weekly programme covered a range of topics on climate
change, disasters, local adaptation and risk-reduction solutions, and government
policies, and included expert interviews and some cultural entertainment. The
radio programmes were broadcast from 2013–14. A huge success, the broadcasts
helped communities express their views on development decision-making and
connect with policymakers through interviews. Also, they brought cutting-edge
research outputs and information directly from experts to local communities, and

’
vice-versa.
Excerpted directly from Sharma, S., Chauhan, S. and Kumar, S. (2014).42

CASE STUDIES | PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT 59

 CASE STUDIES: PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT

17 INDIA: Shining the spotlight on ‘missing women’ in climate action plans

‘India’s economy is predominantly agrarian and

increasingly female dominated. About 80% of
all economically active women are employed by
the agricultural sector. As men migrate to urban
areas for employment opportunities, partly
because farming is now a riskier business, the
women are staying behind and keeping homes
and farms afloat.

According to the government’s own assessment,

the agriculture sector is facing serious risks due to
Agricultural work in rural India – Elizabeth Gogoi
the current impacts of climate change: increasing
temperatures, erratic rainfall patterns and a higher
number and severity of floods, droughts and
cyclones. A number of studies project that, unless
India adapts to the impacts of climate change,
there is a probability of 10–40% loss in crop
production in India by 2080–2100 due to global
warming. Economic growth, food security and the
fight against poverty stand to lose.

‘Women are at the front line of these impacts, not

only due to their involvement in the agriculture
sector, but also because they face the burden of
Marketing produce, India – Elizabeth Gogoi
the household tasks such as fetching water, fuel
wood and fodder.’

60 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

CDKN commissioned a film from Indian filmmaker leaves, 100 INR fine (GBP 1) … and the defaulting
Krishnendu Bose to document women’s concerns and person deposits her sickle, and we auction it. This way,
opportunities to incorporate climate resilience into we women protected our forest.’
farming practice – and especially to investigate how
State Climate Change Action Plans could be more The women have also formed a cooperative, taking
‘gender aware’. knowledge from local NGOs, and gather dry leaves to use
for organic farming. The products are then shared within
Instead of simply recording rural women, Dr Bose and the community, contributing to food security. At the
his team at Earthrights embarked on a project to train same time, they are bringing to life traditional farming
women farmers in the use of the video equipment practices as they have seen how commercial farming has
and record their own views. They gained the trust of a been affected by climate change. These strong, proactive
group of local women in the hill state of Uttarakhand women are taking charge of their community.
and trained them in basic filmmaking techniques. The
Nayi women then told their story about how women ‘The 2005 rule said that a woman could become the
can be leaders in the fight against climate change. sarpanch (village leader). The men protested against
this. But a woman sarpanch was elected. This is good
The women have benefited from a state government for the forest. And we women benefit from it. Now
initiative to set up panchayats (forest community even men have started supporting us.’
governments), which bring together forest
department officers and villages to jointly manage Their message to the government is that this is just
village forests. A third of the members of the executive the first step. For true empowerment, other power
committee, and half of the general body members, are hierarchies must be tackled, such as providing women
mandated to be women. with land ownership. Enhancing such capacities will
help women, as well as the rest of their communities,
‘In 2005, after the policy came in, we together with the cope and better adapt to climate change and fight
panchayat (village government) and sarpanch (village
leaders) made our own rules and regulations … cutting
environmental degradation.43
’
Excerpted from Gogoi, E. (2015).
grass would be 500 INR fine (GBP 5) … chopping green

CASE STUDIES | PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT 61

 CASE STUDIES: PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT

18 ALL: Exploring new climate realities through participatory theatre

‘The use of participatory theatre (or ‘Theatre

of the Oppressed’ – TO) as a transformative
social learning tool has proven to be a
highly effective yet underappreciated
mechanism for knowledge co-production,
empowerment and communication. In
contrast with top-down approaches,
TO creates supportive environments
where people from diverse backgrounds
come together to experience, understand,
analyse and challenge unjust realities.

The TO is a methodology conceptualised

Theatre of the oppressed performance in South Africa – by Augusto Boal in the 1970s, where the
Daniel Morchain, Oxfam audience has an opportunity to walk into
the play as ‘spect-actors’ (spectators who
become actors) and change the outcome
of the story being told. They do so by
bringing their values and priorities into it,
effectively shifting a given narrative from a
situation where only the dominating views
are welcomed and where only business-as-
usual solutions are pursued, to one where a
vision of just, liberatory and hopeful futures
is possible and encouraged.

62 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

In research, just as in development practice, TO can help validate the relevance of transdisciplinary
processes by promoting an equal appreciation of different sources of knowledge and facilitating
their integration.

TO sessions can be run as follows: Start by performing the play, ideally based on a script that
specifically addresses the interests of the audience. After a brief reflection of what the audience has
just experienced, a re-enactment of the play follows, only this time spectators become ‘spect-actors’
and interact with the ‘real’ actors on stage. The actors will now have to improvise, based on the new
information that the ‘spect-actors’ bring to the story. In doing so, everyone contributes to reshaping
the story being told and questions its assumptions. This new narrative, being produced in real time,
will offer glimpses as to what needs to be done differently, and what voices need to be brought to
the fore, in order to address the challenges presented in the play. The TO session can then conclude
with group discussions and/or plenary feedback.

Theatre of the Oppressed helps us engage with and communicate issues as complex as climate change
primarily as humans, before we engage as technical experts, as stakeholders bound by the roles we
play in our organisations, or as individuals restrained by established structures and social norms.

‘This was a great way of landing a message that we have seemingly struggled to get across using
other methods. The session grabbed your attention and involved the audience actively, bringing
out participants’ own views and passion to find ways of moving the issue forward. It certainly had an
impact!’

Ken De Souza, Research Manager, Climate, Energy and Water Research Team, Research and Evidence
Division, DFID.44

Excerpted from Morchain, D. and Bosworth, B. (2019).45

CASE STUDIES | PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT 63

 CASE STUDIES: PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT

19  PAKISTAN: Unusual partners 20  SOUTHERN AFRICA: Journalist training

for climate action in Pakistan’s makes important connections
industrial heartland
CDKN and the Republic of South Africa’s Department of
In the burgeoning industrial centre of Sialkot, Environmental Affairs trained journalists from Zimbabwe,
Pakistan, climate champions Ecofys and PITCO Mozambique, Zambia, Malawi and South Africa on the key
found a strong partner in the Sialkot Chamber messages from the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report (AR5), and a
of Commerce and Industry, which gave them government official provided South Africa’s official response. This
an entry point to its membership of industry filled an important gap.

‘There
associations. This partnership allowed them to
is a lack of resources and funding to adequately pursue

’
communicate the potential of renewable energy
in-depth stories on climate change.
sources to representatives of most small and
medium companies in the area. The chamber agreed Organiser Claire Mathieson noted that small, targeted amounts
to proceed with developing photovoltaic solar of funding can make all the difference in enabling journalists to
collectors, which will be a cost-efficient, reliable and get out and cover stories that would not happen otherwise. She
very low-carbon option for ensuring regular power added:
supply, compared to diesel alternatives.46
‘While the IPCC’s Fifth
Assessment Report was not
necessarily “news” – as it was
published months prior to the
training and outreach events
– the speakers could be
quoted and their views were
story-worthy and often heard
for the first time. Journalists
found feel-good stories to be
better received than doom Journalists and trainers discuss
and gloom pieces. Sharing connection between climate change
and extreme weather – Raising Risk
Medium-sized business in Pakistan – Shutterstock story ideas on these angles Awareness project
’
was invaluable. 47

64 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

21 SOUTH AMERICA: Investigative journalism targets climate issues

CDKN Latin America ran a project to increase the capacity

of investigative journalists in the region to cover climate-
compatible development issues. Investigative journalists from
Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia and Brazil were trained on
key aspects of development and climate change, promoting a
deeper understanding that they could apply to their work.

The Institute of Press and Society (IPYS) – a well-established

regional organisation – ran training workshops and
supplementary webinars, while CDKN established a Journalistic
Fund to which participants could bid, competitively, for money
to support their journalistic investigations. This enabled
journalists to get out of their offices and into the field to uncover
new and different stories.

As a result of the Journalistic Fund, 11 investigations were

completed and published. Outlets included: Vistazo magazine
Amazonia region – SPDA
(Ecuador), El Comercio and Poder magazines (Peru), Semana
magazine (Colombia), Pagina Siete (Bolivia) and Estadao
(Brazil). A compilation of all the pieces was also published
and distributed in Desarrollo y Cambio Climatico: Reportes
Periodisticas desde America Latina.

The informal network of journalists said they learned a lot from

one another. This exchange was followed by training on the
international climate negotiations in 2014 and further training
in 2016 to explain the significance of the Paris Agreement and
its related national climate plans.48

CASE STUDIES | PARTNERSHIPS FOR IMPACT 65

 CASE STUDIES: CREATIVE PRESENTATION

COLOMBIA: Sea level maps convince businesses to join adaptation

22  
action in Cartagena de las Indas

The story of how diverse groups worked term competitiveness. One of the most important
together in the coastal city of Cartagena de las framings used in communications to get business
Indas, Colombia, to come up with Latin America’s on board was to highlight the issue of Cartagena’s
first climate change adaptation plan is a story of future competitiveness: if companies simply
‘unusual partnerships’. It is also a story about chose to ignore the rising seas and associated
the power of maps and data visualisations to risks, they would reduce their future value. Some
coalesce conversations on a city’s future. of the most vital tools in bolstering this case were
the data visualisations and maps of near-term sea
Cartagena’s historic centre is a UNESCO level rise, which scientists at INVEMAR were able
World Heritage Site which, as well as being to make, based on historic climate records and
an important source of pride and beauty to future climate projections.49
Colombians, generates millions of dollars
annually in tourism revenue. The coastal city also Later, the CDKN team commissioned drone
has an economically important working port. footage of the city, producing breathtaking views
The city is, however, highly exposed to climate of the World Heritage Site as well as Cartagena’s
change, having already felt the impacts of storm low-income neighbourhoods and industrial
surges, coastal flooding, erosion and sea water areas, all of which are exposed to climate
intrusion, with the threat of more to come as a hazards. This different perspective on the city
result of a changing climate. has also provided an important tool for raising
awareness and starting public conversations on
CDKN formed an alliance with marine and coastal issues and solutions.
research institution INVEMAR, the Cartagena city
authority, the local Chamber of Commerce and Film: Cartagena – Thriving in a
other interest groups. The team invested heavily in changing climate
cultivating buy-in among civil servants (they out- [Link]
stay politicians) and made the case to businesses
for taking adaptation action to boost their long-

66 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Map showing areas of Cartagena to be impacted by sea level rise by mid-century – INVEMAR

CASE STUDIES | CREATIVE PRESENTATION 67

 CASE STUDIES: CREATIVE PRESENTATION

23  BANGLADESH: The Surging Seas tool shows widespread exposure

to rising water

The Surging Seas tool helps communities, planners and leaders better understand sea level rise and
coastal flood risks. It was adapted for use in Bangladesh and translated into Bengali to make it more
accessible. A workshop in Dhaka brought together the technical team that had produced Surging Seas to
train a wide range of stakeholders from government and NGOs. They exchanged ideas, local stakeholders
learned how to use the tool, and together they identified ways to improve the tool in the future.

Surging Seas tool

shows extent of coastal
flooding – World
Weather Attribution
Initiative and CDKN

68 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 Lowest (5th percentile, top) and highest (95th percentile, bottom) likely number of people
currently living under the projected high tide line in 2100 in Bangladesh divisions, under
emissions scenarios Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 2.6 (large, immediate cuts to
global emissions) and RCP 8.5 (global emissions continue to rise unabated).

The technical team also produced

an ‘exposure report’ (see graphic on
right), which estimates the population
and land that would be at risk of
inundation in the period 2050–2100
under worst-case and best-case
greenhouse gas emission scenarios.
The figures on the left, top and bottom,
describe the range of outcomes for sea
level rise and flooding under a best-
case scenario (RCP 2.6), under which
global emissions are cut massively
and immediately; the figures on the
right, top and bottom, describe a
range of outcomes for sea level rise
and flooding under a worse-case
scenario (RCP 8.5) under which global
emissions keep increasing at current
rates.

[Link]

bangladesh-surging-sea/

[Link]

spirals/

Exposure of Bangladesh’s population to sea level rise under different climate scenarios –
World Weather Attribution Initiative and CDKN

CASE STUDIES | CREATIVE PRESENTATION 69

 CASE STUDIES: ENGAGING WITH PUBLIC POLICY

24  INDIA: Engaging with civil servants boosts climate action in India

Madhya Pradesh was one of the first Indian states to develop a State Climate Change Action Plan (2012), following
from the national plan issued two years earlier. Climate leaders in the Madhya Pradesh state government soon
realised that one of the greatest challenges to implementing the Action Plan was civil servants’ low awareness
of and commitment to it.

To remedy the situation, the state government and CDKN commissioned policy briefs that talked about the
relevance of the Action Plan for different economic sectors, and presented the messages in an attractive, easy-
to-read format.

Producing a Madhya Pradesh climate change dashboard is one of the most recent knowledge initiatives - this wider snapshot shows
climate hazards and vulnerabilities across Asia – Prepdata

70 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 25  KENYA: Climate campaign reaches across
government in Kenya
One briefing note summarises the entire Action Plan,
nine further notes discuss its application to specific ‘AClimate
major lesson learned from the process of developing Kenya’s
Change Framework Policy and Bill is the importance of
sectors (forests, water, health, etc) and one addresses
cross-cutting issues, such as gender and technology stakeholder involvement and engagement. Governments often
development.50 A science brief summarises the focus on stakeholders from outside government at the expense of
state’s key vulnerabilities to climate change. those within government. The Kenyan experience underlines the
importance of bringing on board both categories of stakeholders.
As part of a process of engaging local stakeholders Within government, the involvement of Parliament, county
to implement the Action Plan, the project also governments and key national government ministries such
invited local and national experts to write as the National Treasury, and Devolution and Planning, have
supporting articles, which were published in a proved invaluable. It is also informative that membership of the
special compendium. The partners distributed the National Climate Change Council cuts across the whole spectrum
materials widely in government departments and of stakeholders, with representation from both government and
these publications remain go-to references – both non-state actors.
’
in print and on the website of the Madhya Pradesh Stephen King’uyu, Coordinator of Kenya’s National Climate Change Action Plan
Knowledge Management Centre on Climate Change:
[Link] [Link]

org/2016/06/
kenya-spearheading-
More recently, new alliances have enabled the state low-emissions-
government to offer further tailored information to development-africa
decision-makers in Madhya Pradesh. For example,
the ‘Partnership for Resilience and Preparedness’
programme with World Resources Institute (WRl)
has developed a Madhya Pradesh online dashboard.
This interactive dashboard encourages government
departments, research and academic institutes to
explore robust scientific information on climate
impacts and vulnerabilities – all of which can support Stephen King’uyu, government
development planning and practice. of Kenya – LEDS GP

CASE STUDIES | ENGAGING WITH PUBLIC POLICY 71

 CASE STUDIES: ENGAGING WITH PUBLIC POLICY

26  INDIA: Novel framing and analysis highlights India’s stranded assets

One framework – developed by ODI, Global

Subsidies Initiative and Vasudha Foundation –
• the cost competitiveness of renewable energy
alternatives;
highlights the links between government • financial distress in distribution companies;
interventions in industry and greenhouse gas • air pollution regulation;
emissions. The organisations apply this concept • water scarcity; and
of ‘stranded assets’ to India’s coal power sector,
but the same framing could be used in research
• coal shortages.

and communications on fossil fuel investments in

other sectors and countries.
‘Aimpacting
number of these drivers are already significantly
India’s power sector. 40 gigawatts of
commissioned and under-construction coal-

‘In 2015, under the UNFCCC’s Paris Agreement,

governments committed to keeping global
fired power capacity are already “stressed” which
presents an ongoing systemic financial risk
temperature increases to 2  °C and to pursue for the government and the financial system
efforts towards a more ambitious 1.5 °C target. dominated by the Indian public sector. The
Global decarbonisation efforts may increase government of India is intervening in coal power
the risk of asset stranding – that is, loss of value, – across the value chain, from coal mining to
revenue or return on investment – in fossil fuel power production and distribution – in several
production assets. This is particularly relevant
to coal assets, as it is estimated that phasing
ways …
’
out inefficient coal power plants alone could These include financial support to the tune of
contribute to halving power sector emissions billions of dollars’ worth of public finance and
globally.
’ national subsidies. In so doing, the government
is delaying the influence of market signals and
They find that five major current and future factors delaying the costs to coal power project developers
are driving India’s coal power generation industry and investors of the environmental and wider
toward being ‘stranded assets’: climate impacts of their activities.

72 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

‘Experts find similar patterns of government
intervention in the coal power value chain
Five major drivers of stranded
elsewhere – e.g. European Union, United assets in India’s coal power sector
States, China, South Africa, Indonesia and
South Korea. It will be critical for governments
in these countries and regions to carefully
manage their interventions in the power sector
to avoid fossil fuel subsidies and support their Cost competitiveness Air pollution
wider commitment to energy access, and a of renewable energy regulation
transition to low-carbon energy sources. 51
’
Excerpted and adapted from Worrall, L., Whitely, S.,
Garg, V., Krishnaswamy, S. and Beaton, C. (2018).

[Link]
 Water scarcity Coal shortages
india-s-stranded-assets-how-government-
interventions-are-propping-coal-power

Financial distress in power

distribution companies

Government interventions are undermining

these signals and giving a lifeline to coal

CASE STUDIES | ENGAGING WITH PUBLIC POLICY 73

 CASE STUDIES: ENGAGING WITH PUBLIC POLICY

27 KENYA: Decision-makers switch on to seriously fun games

Games are a way of getting people’s brains more deeply engaged in climate
challenges, according to Dr Pablo Suarez, game designer at the Red Cross
Red Crescent Climate Centre. A typical game puts the participant in the
role of a decision-maker who must guess the coming season’s weather and
its effect on crops and food security. They also have the option to make
different kinds of ‘investments’ to protect their assets. Then participants
are subject to rolls of the dice to see how the climate and weather unfold.
Pablo said, ‘You have to think about trade-offs, thresholds and delays. You
have to think about what happens if you do or if you don’t take action.’

The games, and the practical, reflective discussions they encourage, are
appropriate for community or policy settings. The Climate Centre team
has delivered them in settings that range from subsistence farmers
developing contingency plans for flooding, to World Bank staff integrating
games into their risk assessment methodology.
Seriously fun game at Sendai Disaster Risk Reduction
Conference – Climate Centre.
Dr Pablo Suarez’s creative partner and wife, Janot Mendler de Suarez, even
took the games concept into the ‘gender dimension’, following the success of
the first round of game design.

‘With support from PopTech and the Red Cross Climate Centre, I worked
with the Kenya Red Cross (KRC) to design a game that staff and volunteers
could use to open conversations about gender implications of climate
change with rural farming communities,’ she said. ‘Existing gender
asymmetries include land ownership (over 90% of the land belongs to
men), and unequal access to credit or fertiliser. Such unequal access
means that women often derive less benefit from farm work than their
male counterparts.’

74 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

 28 NIGERIA: What Nigeria learned from Ghana

In one game about crop-planting decisions, Peer-to-peer exchanges and related communications (blogs, articles) can
Janot has introduced male and female be a fruitful way of engaging decision-makers in climate solutions. For
roles through the assignment of coloured example, in 2018, a team of Nigerian experts on mini-grids (small electricity
bracelets to the players: grids that are independent from the main grid and can be powered by
renewable energy) travelled to Ghana to better understand how Ghana is

‘Those given a brightly coloured bracelet

to wear play as ‘men’; all those with no
scaling up its low-carbon mini-grids programme.

bracelet play ‘women’ and find themselves Victor Osu, of Nigeria’s Rural Electrification Authority, said:
starting the game with fewer beans – the
currency of the game. As the game plays
‘When we started this project, there were three key questions we
wanted to answer about the mini-grids power system in Ghana:
out, women reap a smaller harvest than • How are the enabling policies regulated?
the fictional men … The Kenya Red • What is the implementation methodology used?
Cross now plans to train facilitators to • How can this implementation be sustained?
use this game in rural communities. The
game should deepen understanding ‘[The trip enabled us to] to understand
within affected communities about the whole framework that Ghana has
climate risk strategies to cope with the put in place for developing mini-grids.
changing weather patterns affecting Being there in person was so important.
agriculture. With luck, it will help open That said, even outside of normal 9–5
deep discussion about the differential meetings, we’ve started our own internal
implications of climate change for women communications channels where we
and girls, compared to men and boys, and call to discuss our mini-grids problems
what these additional pressures mean for and check that everyone is on track with Ghanaian professionals visit a

’
successful Nigerian mini-grid –
their life choices. 52 their strategies – often on weekends and Charlie Zajicek, LEDS GP

[Link]

’
Sundays. 53

games/games [Link]

from-ghana

CASE STUDIES | ENGAGING WITH PUBLIC POLICY 75

 CASE STUDIES: MAKING GOOD SCIENCE GO VIRAL

29 ALL: An outreach programme for the IPCC’s climate science

The IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) was released in down’ the essential messages of the assessment and
2013–2014. It was made up of reports on the physical present them largely in graphical format. Since launching,
science of climate change impacts, adaptation and the kit has had over 28 000 visits.
vulnerability, climate change mitigation and a final
synthesis report. CDKN ran a wide-ranging outreach Those who registered to use the communications toolkit
programme to bring the report’s findings to developing report that they are using it for:
country governments and other stakeholders, so that the
latest state-of-the-art climate science could be better journalism university
education
incorporated into their decision-making.
publications 10% 17%
Often policymakers want to access country and region- 13%
specific climate information quickly. The IPCC’s country
information is tucked away in the long chapters of the 28%
reports, but CDKN pulled out the information and made it
32%
more readily available. The original AR5 runs to well over external internal
5 000 pages. awareness raising organisational
including policy-makers capacity building

CDKN produced four regional summaries of the AR5

science, in a colourful and appealing format: ‘The IPCC’s Interviews with these toolkit-users revealed:
Fifth Assessment Report: ‘What’s in it for Africa?’‘What’s in it
for South Asia?’, ‘What’s in it for Latin America?’ and ‘What’s
• An NGO worker described the materials as his ‘armour’
to contribute to national plans and forums on how to
in it for Small Island Developing States?’. Each of these mitigate the effects of climate change.
summaries is just 24 to 28 pages long. • One ministry representative in Rwanda said she
would use the material for community sensitisation
CDKN also launched an online communications toolkit programmes.
with the IPCC’s key messages for countries and regions,
which contains slide packs, free infographics and image
• An academic said he would use the materials to
prepare the national UNFCCC delegation of Uganda
resources for communicators to use. Our slide packs ‘boil for climate talks.

76 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

• One of the participants reportedly used his new
knowledge to build a stakeholder engagement
platform for taking forward the investment plans
proposed at the city and district level in Madurai,
Tamil Nadu, India.
• Most of those with research backgrounds said
they would use the material for proposal writing
and to inform their research.
• Interviewees emphasised the value of easy-to-
use summaries of the climate science. Almost
all of those originally surveyed said they would
refer to climate change more frequently in their
future work.

The idea of the AR5 communications toolkit was

borne from the press kits that organisations typically
prepare as part of media and marketing campaigns.
However, this kit – by being promoted far beyond
the conventional media to communicators and
educators of all types – has reached more deeply into
organisations and helped influence their practices. It
has helped tens of thousands of people to become
messengers for good climate science (see Box: Mind
the messenger, page 11).

[Link]

Infographic from the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report

communications toolkit – CDKN

CASE STUDIES | MAKING GOOD SCIENCE GO VIRAL 77

 CASE STUDIES: MAKING GOOD SCIENCE GO VIRAL

30 NEPAL: Nepal’s climate change centres diffuse climate knowledge at the grassroots

An initiative to promote better understanding of climate change in Nepal

took off at local levels, thanks to a modest small grants programme via the
Nepal Climate Change Knowledge Management Centre. The grants were
given to students to innovate ways to spread climate information at the
local level. Programme organisers noted that there was a lot of information
about climate change in the capital, Kathmandu, but little outside, and so
local people jumped at the chance to access and share information.

The Knowledge Management Centre also organised a Mobile Library

Campaign for Climate Change Awareness, which visited community
schools in ten remote districts of Nepal. Of the campaign, Dinesh Raj
Bhuju, Bimala Devkota and Pawan K Neupane wrote:

Nepali students’ imaginations have been fired by the

climate outreach campaign – Shutterstock ‘The Centre organised the campaign targeting students and teachers
at community schools in ten remote districts of Nepal. In pursuit of
sensitising the young minds on issues related to climate change, the
challenge was to develop concise and portable related materials. We
displayed the self-explanatory posters and short films in simple Nepali
language. We also organised inter-school climate change quizzes
and panel discussions on local FM radios. The interaction between
experts with students, teachers and policy-makers helped to make the
campaign effective. As there was high demand for the posters, NCCKMC
reproduced handy-sized posters and distributed to the schools for

’
wider use. 54

After participating, Kumari Suwal, a ninth-grade student in Panchthar

district, said that she and her friends came to understand the basics of
climate change and its impacts and hoped for more, future campaigns.

78 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

Endnotes
1. UNFCCC (2015). The Paris Agreement. Retrieved from [Link]
agreement/the-paris-agreement

2. Sourced from internal planning documents for CDKN and Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation
programme, Mairi Dupar (2015–17).

3. Retrieved from [Link]

[Link]

4. Retrieved from [Link]

5. Bauer, F., & Smith, J. (eds). (2015). The Climate Knowledge Brokers Manifesto: Informed Decision Making
for a Climate Resilient Future. Vienna: Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Partnership (REEEP).
Retrieved from [Link]

6. See the World Bank series of reports, ‘Shockwaves’, by Rosenberg, Julie and Stephane Hallegatte,
(2015). ‘The impacts of climate change on poverty in 2030 and the potential from rapid, inclusive
and climate-informed development.’ Retrieved from [Link]
en/349001468197334987/The-impacts-of-climate-change-on-poverty-in-2030-and-the-potential-from-
rapid-inclusive-and-climate-informed-development

7. Planetary boundaries is a concept involving Earth system processes which contain environmental
boundaries, proposed in 2009 by a group of Earth system and environmental scientists led by Johan
Rockström from the Stockholm Resilience Centre and Will Steffen from the Australian National University.
An introduction to the concept is retrieved from [Link]
[Link]

8. Dupar, M. ‘Making the case for climate compatible development’ in Bickersteth, S., Dupar, M., Espinosa, C.,
Huhtala, A., Maxwell, S., Pacha, M. J., Sheikh, A. T. & Wesselink, C. (2017). Mainstreaming Climate Compatible
Development: Insights from CDKN’s First Seven Years. London: Climate and Development Knowledge
Network. Retrieved from [Link]/mainstreaming

Endnotes 79
 9. Kreft, S., Eckstein, D., & Melchior, I. (2017). Global Climate Risk Index 2017: Who suffers most from extreme
weather events? Weather-related loss events in 2015 and 1996 to 2015. Berlin: Germanwatch. Retrieved from
[Link]

10. Shepherd, A., Mitchell, T., Lewis, K., Lenhardt, A., Jones, L., Scott, L., & Muir-Wood, R. (2013). The geography
of poverty, disasters and climate extremes in 2030. London: ODI. Retrieved from [Link]
publications/7491-geography-poverty-disasters-climate-change-2030

11. Tanner, T., Rentschler, J., Surminski, S., Mitchell, T., Wilkinson, E. & Peters, K. (2015). Unlocking the triple
dividend of resilience: Why investing in DRM pays off. London: ODI. Retrieved from [Link]
tripledividend

12. Conway, D., Vincent, K., Grainger, S., Archer van Garderen, E. & Pardoe, J. (2017). How to understand and
interpret global climate model results. Cape Town: Future Climate for Africa.

13. Climate and Development Knowledge Network. (2012). Managing climate extremes and disasters in Asia:
Lessons from the SREX report. CDKN. Retrieved from [Link]/srex.

14. World Weather Attribution Initiative and Climate and Development Knowledge Network. (2017). Building
capacity for risk management in a changing climate: A synthesis report from the Raising Risk Awareness project.
Princeton and London: WWA and CDKN.

15. Bood, N. & May, P. (2016). Trouble in paradise – New initiative transforms tourism in Belize and its threat to the
environment. London: CDKN.

16. The report of the Web Foundation regarding the slowdown in rates of access to the internet globally is
described in ‘Exclusive: Dramatic slowdown in global growth of internet access’. The Guardian. (18 October
2018). Retrieved from [Link]
slowdown-in-global-growth-of-the-internet

17. Thapa, K., Bhatta, K., Bhattarai, B. & Gurung, K. D. (2017). Climate-smart agriculture: Learning from threeagro-
ecological regions of Nepal. London: CDKN.
CDKN (2017). Film: Farmers of the future. Retrieved from [Link]

80 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

18. Reframing Rio. Film: Life Apps. Once a Nomad – Namibia. tve with the support of CDKN.
Retrieved from [Link]

19. Reil, A. & Dupar M. (2016). ‘Joining forces – how to make local climate partnerships a success’.
Retrieved from [Link]

20. The reasons were cited by journalists in the Southern African regional climate training (see Box: Journalist
training in Southern Africa).

21. From discussions at the CDKN South Asian Journalist Fellowship training workshop, Kathmandu, Nepal, 2013.

22. Retrieved from [Link]

0dd1aa83

23. Retrieved from [Link]

degrees

24. Scott, M. (2015). ‘Climate and Coffee’. Retrieved from [Link]

CoffeeGrowingCountries_large.jpgSee also Financial Times (2017). ‘Special Report: The coffee bean belt’.
Retrieved from [Link]

25. Owusu, A., Thomson, M. & Woyessa, A. (forthcoming, 2019). ‘NMA ENACTS: An example of a co-produced
climate service’ in WISER co-production manual.

26. Grantham Institute (2013). ‘$674 billion annual spend on “unburnable” fossil fuel assets signals failure to
recognise huge financial risks’. Retrieved from [Link]/GranthamInstitute/news/674-billion-annual-
spend-on-unburnable-fossil-fuel-assets-signals-failure-to-recognise-huge-financial-risks-2/

27. For more on the different categories of licence available, see: [Link]

28. Sarpong, E. (2019). ‘Half the world’s people are still offline’. Retrieved from [Link]
org/2019/02/half-of-the-worlds-people-are-still-offline-how-do-we-connect-them-as-quickly-as-possible/

Endnotes 81
 29. CDKN (2017). ‘Study shows that inaction on climate change will cost Uganda 20 times more than
adaptation’. Retrieved from [Link]
change-will-cost-uganda-20-times-more-than-adaptation/

30. CDKN (2015). ‘Briefing series launched to communicate climate change to the Kenyan private sector’.
Retrieved from [Link]
kenyan-private-sector/

31. To read more about the ‘Sheltering from a gathering storm’ project and its achievements in protecting
homes from damage in Vietnam after Typhoon Nari, please read: [Link]
com/2013/11/08/lesson-from-typhoon-nari/ and [Link]
vietnam/

32. The film was screened at policy round tables with government decision-makers in the capital city Dhaka,
and was also selected by the United Nations Office of Migration to be screened and publicised to delegates
at the UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP21) in Paris in 2015.

33. An initiative spearheaded by the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, Cambridge Judge
Business School and the European Climate Foundation, with other sectoral organisations, see [Link]
[Link]/business-action/low-carbon-transformation/ipcc-climate-science-business-briefings

34. University of Cambridge, Buildings Performance Institute Europe, World Business Council for Sustainable
Development, Global Buildings Performance Network. The IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report: Implications for
buildings. Retrieved from [Link]
climate-science-business-briefings/pdfs/infographics/[Link]

35. Watkiss, P. (2015). Mainstreaming climate into sector development plans: The case of Rwanda’s tea and coffee
sectors. Cape Town: Future Climate for Africa. Retrieved from [Link]
mainstreaming-climate-information-into-sector-development/
Read more about the film and find it on the Future Climate for Africa website: [Link]
[Link]/news/adapting-rwanda-growing-rwandas-tea-coffee-sectors-changing-climate/

36. Carbon Trust (2015). Enhancing private sector engagement in energy efficiency in Peru: A project funded by the
Climate and Development Knowledge Network and delivered by the Carbon Trust with the support of Südesco
Energy and Peru 2021. London: Carbon Trust.

82 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

37. Gogoi, E. (2014). ‘Water Walks in Madurai’. Retrieved from [Link]
madurai. For more information, see the CDKN Inside Story on Climate Compatible Development: Kumar, M.
& Vasimalai, M. P. (2017). Future proofing of an Indian City: Lessons from Madurai. London: CDKN. Retrieved
from [Link]

38. Retrieved from [Link]

39. Ansah, P. & Scodanibbio, L. (2019). ‘Ghana climate research reaches deep into farming communities.’
Retrieved from [Link]
communities/?loclang=en_gb

40. cLIMA sin Riesgo. ‘Disrupting urban “risk traps”: Bridging finance and knowledge for climate resilient
infrastructural planning in Lima’. Retrieved from [Link]
episodic-risks/

41. The information about the training workshops is from internal project reports, with thanks to Dr Arpita
Mandal, University of West Indies, Mona campus. For more about the overall project, see: Mandal, A.,
Smith, D., Wilson, M., Taylor, M., Nandi, A. & Otuokon, S. (2016). Climate change and flood risk: Challenges
for Jamaican towns and communities. London: CDKN.

42. Sharma, S., Chauhan, S. & Kumar, S. (2014). Local approaches to harmonising climate adaptation and
disaster risk reduction policies: Lessons from India. London: CDKN. Retrieved from [Link]
content/uploads/2014/05/Leh-Barmer-Inside-Story_WEB.pdf

43. Gogoi, E. (2015). ‘Giving a voice to the missing women in India’s climate plans’. Retrieved from
[Link]
Also, view the film Missing’ online: [Link]
indias-climate-plans

44. Referring to a Theatre of the Oppressed performance directed by Daniel Morchain and supported by
the ASSAR project: [Link]

45. Morchain, D. & Bosworth, B. (2019). Retrieved from ‘Theatre of the Oppressed: Challenging top-down
approaches to climate change.’ Retrieved from [Link]
oppressed-challenging-top-down-approaches-to-climate-change

Endnotes 83
 46. Osornio, J. P. & Bosquet, M. (2016). Renewable energy solutions for Punjab’s industrial sector – Evaluating the
NAMA approach in Sialkot City, Pakistan. London: CDKN.

47. Narrative courtesy of internal project documents, Claire Mathieson, CDKN Africa.

48. Narrative courtesy of internal project documents, Jorge Villanueva, CDKN LAC.

49. Adams, P., Castro, J., Martinez, C. & Sierra-Correa, P.C. (2014). Embedding climate change resilience in coastal
city planning: Early lessons from Cartagena de Indias. London: CDKN. Retrieved from [Link]
resource/embedding-climate-change-resilience-in-coastal-city-planning-early-lessons-from-cartagena-de-
indias-colombia/

50. CDKN (2012). ‘Knowledge management for Madhya Pradesh State Action Plan on Climate Change’.
Retrieved from [Link]
on-climate-change-sapcc/

51. Worrall, L., Whitely, S., Garg, V., Krishnaswamy, S. & Beaton, C. (2018). India’s stranded assets: How the
government’s interventions are propping up coal power. London: ODI. Retrieved from [Link]
publications/11185-india-s-stranded-assets-how-government-interventions-are-propping-coal-power

52. Mendler de Suarez, J. (2012). ‘The climate and gender game’. Retrieved from [Link]
climate-and-gender-game/

53. LEDS GP (2018). ‘Scaling up mini-grids: What Nigeria learned from Ghana’.
Retrieved from [Link]/2018/09/scaling-up-mini-grids-how-nigeria-learned-from-ghana

54. Bhaju, D. R., Devkota, B. & Neupane, P. (December 2013). ‘The story behind Nepal’s Climate Change
Knowledge Management Centre’. Retrieved from [Link]
nepals-knowledge-management-center/

84 Communicating climate change: A practitioner’s guide

About CDKN
The Climate and Development Knowledge Network
works to enhance the quality of life for the poorest
and most vulnerable to climate change.
We support decision-makers in designing and
delivering climate compatible development.
Please visit: [Link]

This work was carried out with the aid of a grant from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of
the Netherlands and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Canada,
as part of the Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN) Programme. The
views expressed herein do not necessarily represent those of the Ministry of Foreign
Affairs of the Netherlands, or of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC)
or its Board of Governors, or of the entities managing CDKN.

Copyright © 2019, Climate and Development Knowledge Network. All rights reserved.

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