Phnom Penh, 3-5 April 2018 – Government representatives from NCSD Climate Change Technical Working Group (CCTWG), and academia and students from national universities, came together to better understand “Climate Change Vulnerability, Impact and Adaptation Assessment” in a training workshop organized by the Department of Climate Change (DCC), General Secretariat of the National Council for Sustainable Development (GSSD), in cooperation with Royal University of Agriculture (RUA), with support from Cambodia Climate Change Alliance. The workshop, attended by over 50 participants, aims to strengthen capacity of government and academia to fully participate in the development and use of vulnerability and adaptation assessments to formulate sound climate resilience development strategies, and to contribute to the identification of adaptation needs that will be part of Cambodia’s Third National Communication to the UNFCCC.
The three-day training workshop focuses on methods and approaches for assessing climate change vulnerability and respective socio-economic and biophysical data requirements, and on climate change scenarios and impact assessment, including the need for downscaling and use of downscaling at local. It also discusses theuse of the results of these assessments in developing climate change responses and climate proofing.
In opening remarks, Mr. Sum Thy, Director of DCC/GSSD, said that the development of good climate change policies and measures needed to be based on best available science and on a clear understanding of the linkages between global policies and national development policies and priorities. Thus, the priority given by DCC to the initiatives such as this training, that aim to increase technical and institutional capacity to conduct the climate change impact assessments.
As a co-organizer,Mr. Kim Soben, Vice Dean of Graduate School Royal University of Agriculture (RUA), underlined the importance of this technical training for the academia and government officials. He added that RUA will further enhance the research policy capacity among academia through the climate change research partnership established with GSSD at the end of 2017.
