Sustainable Resource Governance and Climate Change Adaptation in Action

In the Andean countries, CDE provides scientific support to two major programmes of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation: The Andean Forests Programme (Spanish: Programa Bosques Andinos, PBA) and the Applied Research Project for Climate Change Adaptation (Spanish: Proyecto de investigación aplicada para la adaptación al cambio climático, PIA-ACC).

The Andean Forests Programme (PBA)

PBA is a regional initiative that helps people living in and around the Andean mountain forests to reduce their vulnerability to climate change and to gain social, economic, and environmental benefits from the conservation of Andean forest landscapes. In order to achieve this goal, knowledge is generated, systematized, and disseminated by a broad network of researchers and organizations. The programme’s main goal is to promote the validation and strengthening of sustainable forest management practices, the generation and use of scientific information, and the upscaling and replication of scientific evidence and best practices in policymaking processes at local to global scales. A related additional goal is to raise regional, national, and local interest in the conservation of Andean forests and to promote synergies between strategies for climate change adaptation and mitigation. CDE’s contribution to the PBA includes developing a research agenda based on a dialogue and collaborative initiatives within the research community focused on the current status of scientific knowledge about social and ecological dynamics and their impacts on Andean forest ecosystems. 

Applied Research Project for Climate Change Adaptation (PIA-ACC)

PIA-ACC aims to generate knowledge that will help to increase the resilience of those people in the Bolivian Andes who are most vulnerable to the impacts of extreme and gradual climate change due to their exposure to high levels of material, social, and spiritual poverty. The project focuses on four main thematic areas: (1) integrated natural resource management and biocultural diversity, (2) food security and food sovereignty, (3) disaster risk reduction, and (4) intercultural climatic modelling. Within the PIA-ACC, CDE supports the implementing Bolivian universities in developing research agendas, establishing research partnerships, developing capacities for transdisciplinary research, managing knowledge, and disseminating research results.