BoholAnalysis

(This is an excerpt of the paper "Its Just a Buzzword from Above...." which Michael Canares presented in the most recent conference of the Development Studies Association of the United Kingdom, held at the University of Ulster, Coleraine Campus, Northern Ireland on September 2-5, 2009) The review of local development plans of 60% of the municipalities in Bohol, Philippines revealed that climate change concerns are not incorporated into the plans. What the plans contain are environmental projects and policies that are not necessarily related to climate change issues, or drafted not with climate change mitigation and adaptation in mind. There has never been a climate change vulnerability assessment conducted, nor discussions related to mitigation and adaptation policies. Thus, it would seem that climate change as a global problem is never a local concern, precisely because of the reason that there are significant knowledge gaps that constrained problem recognition and solution.