Climate risks, resilience and adaptation in coastal systems

Abstract

Coastal systems in the low-elevation coastal zone (LECZ: up to 10 m from sea level) are subject to sea level rise (SLR), climatic variability (e.g., El Niño Southern Oscillation), and extreme weather events. The impacts caused by these stressors include coastal flooding, storm surges, inundation, loss of habitats, and coastal erosion, which affect the human and natural systems and various socioeconomic sectors, including settlements, infrastructure, tourism, health and natural resource-dependent livelihood (Cooley et al., 2022; Pörtner et al., 2022). Therefore, minimizing/lowering the exposure of socio-ecological systems to potential SLR in the LECZ is particularly critical to ensure sustainable ecosystem functioning and healthy living (Vafeidis et al., 2011). The coastal systems’ resilience is usually enough to cope with and adapt to typical climatic variability. However, given the current climatic trends and projected changes, there is an increasing need to foster their adaptive capacity, enlarge adaptation options, and reduce their exposure and vulnerability to extreme weather events, alongside minimizing the unsustainable practice of resource management to enhance coastal systems’ resilience (Sharma and Ravindranath, 2019; Cooley et al., 2022). To initiate a fresh climate adaptation and preparedness action or to bolster an existing one against the impacts of the climate stressors and perturbations on dynamic coastal socio-ecological systems mentioned earlier, the stakeholders and policymakers must address the following: 1. The climatic, social, and environmental determinants of vulnerability (Bevacqua et al., 2018; Sharma and Ravindranath, 2019). 2. The exposure of diverse geographical, economic, sociocultural and political factors to climate-related stressors and perturbations (Ara Begum et al., 2022; O’Neill et al., 2022). 3. A climate risk-management approach (vulnerabilities, stakeholders, future scenarios, thresholds, risks, and potential impacts) (Ara Begum et al., 2022).