Main policy recommendations

The policy recommendations draw on the overarching recommendation in the last Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability (AR6) (IPCC, 2022) that the world needs to move from the prevailing incremental form of adaptation to more transformational adaptation. On a more concrete and instrumental level, the recommendations draw on the four aspirational goals for adaptation within the EU adaptation strategy (European Commission, 2021): smarter, more systemic, faster, and more internationally oriented adaptation. While not all Nordic countries are EU member states, all report to the European Environment Agency on their adaptation efforts. The EU strategy thus provides an aspirational framework for adaptation across the Nordic countries.

To enable operationalization, when relevant the recommendations are directed at different levels of governance across the Nordic countries, including national governments, national authorities, and local-level authorities (including municipalities and counties).

The five main policy recommendations are summarized in the figure below.

Figure 1. Visual summary of policy recommendations

Enhance the transformative potential of adaptation

The Nordic countries are uniquely positioned to take a transformative approach to adaptation as they have historically been on the forefront of transformative social movements based on justice and equality. Now is the time to show foresight and courage in climate change adaptation. Transformational adaptation is defined by the IPCC as “Adaptation that changes the fundamental attributes of a socio-ecological system in anticipation of climate change and its impacts”. Besides avoiding risks and taking advantage of opportunities, it presents an understanding of adaptation as a mechanism for mobilizing societal resources for the enhancement of equitable, just, and sustainable societies. Transformational adaptation indicates a particular depth and quality of change, guided by values of equity, justice and compassion for humans and nature.

Reframe adaptation as transformation (All governance levels): In all Nordic countries, adaptation is framed as a response to climate change to avoid the risks and take advantage of the opportunities that result from a changing climate. Yet climate change science suggests that transformation is becoming inevitable: transformation will be either by design or by disaster. This points to the need for reframing adaptation as transformation. Reframing adaptation as transformational and sustainable adaptation can help to ensure that adaptation efforts align with and support equitable and just change within the Nordic countries and globally. This is not primarily a technical exercise of changing the language of strategies and plans. Rather, it requires a deep-rooted cognitive and cultural shift within the adaptation community and beyond, both nationally and locally. This shift includes aiming more at proactive than reactive measures and at addressing the drivers of vulnerability, including the ‘new’ transboundary climate risks. Such a shift will need to be supported in various ways, for instance through programmes and platforms that help identify the linkages between adaptation and sustainability and how to work in an integrative way within specific sectors and locations.
Support the alignment of adaptation with other societal goals (All governance levels): While the benefits of taking an integrative approach to adaptation are increasingly recognized, in all Nordic countries there is a lack of knowledge about how to do so. For example, there needs to be more clarity on how to align adaptation with climate change mitigation and the other SDGs in a way that creates synergies and avoids conflicts. The integration of adaptation within other societal goals requires cross-sectorial conversations and collaboration explicitly aimed at operationalizing integration and developing strategies for such work. It could involve the inclusion of “integration criteria” in reporting and funding applications, to enable integration to become the “new normal”. Such “box-ticking” must be backed up by institutional capacity building to ensure that authorities have the skills and resources necessary within their sector. Aligning adaptation with other societal goals invites a conversation about societal priorities. More transformational adaptation will likely involve critically questioning the current prioritization of economic growth as the overarching goal for societal development. It will be important for the Nordic countries to ensure that economic development does not undermine adaptative capacity, in the Nordic region and beyond, recognizing economic activity as interdependent with social and ecological wellbeing in a multi-generational perspective.

Close the knowledge-action gap

The Nordic countries have some of the best conditions for generating state of the art knowledge on climate change. Nevertheless, there are challenges in most countries with translating existing knowledge into action and making knowledge sufficiently actionable. Smarter adaptation is about enabling knowledge-based decision-making. It emphasizes the need for anchoring decisions in the latest science and enhancing the understanding of the interdependencies between climate change, ecosystems, and their services.

Establish mechanisms for systematic knowledge generation (National authorities): Despite the existence of relevant knowledge institutions, most Nordic countries lack mechanisms for systematic knowledge generation on climate change-related risks and vulnerabilities, including the socio-economic costs and benefits of action and inaction, and the inclusion of relevant user groups in co-production of knowledge. Funding for climate change-related research is predominantly directed at mitigation, while research on adaptation receives a fraction of the funding. Similarly, natural science research tends to be prioritized over social science research. This results in a persistent “black box” of how authorities and individuals can effectively, sustainably, and equitably respond to climate change. Systemic knowledge-generation should also include transboundary climate risks as well as the insight that climate risks rarely occur alone. The latter point being captured in the term multi-hazards and illustrated through how the unprovoked war by Russia in Ukraine and the corona pandemic interact with various forms of climate risk.
Develop appropriate indicators for measuring and evaluating adaptation (National authorities): In all Nordic countries, effective and transformational adaptation is limited by a lack of appropriate indicators for measuring vulnerabilities and adaptation efforts, as well as evaluating adaptation outcomes. The Nordic countries also lack appropriate indicators and measures to account for compounding, cascading and transboundary risks, including that of assigning responsibilities among stakeholders and government levels for addressing these risks. Evaluation work must move beyond current indicators of describing climate hazards and immediate natural hazard risks (e.g., flooding and avalanche risks). More emphasis should be placed on developing indicators or proxies for evaluating qualitative aspects of sustainability, such as wellbeing, empowerment, and dignity.

Develop holistic and integrated systems

In the Nordic countries, there is a growing awareness of the benefits and necessities of integrated approaches to social-ecological change. Yet persistent silo structures within both policy and business stand in the way for this awareness to lead to action. More systemic adaptation is about developing holistic and inclusive approaches to adaptation. It draws on the latest science to develop systems for MRE and enhance policy coherence. This can help support adaptation through mainstreaming adaptation, avoiding maladaptation and malmitigation, and ensuring alignment between risk ownership and responsibility.

Break down the silo structure between sectors (National governments; National authorities; Local and county-level authorities): In all Nordic countries, public administration is marked by a silo structure, which prevents effective cooperation and synergy across sectors and authorities. Specifically, in most Nordic countries, there is a lack of coordination and collaboration between adaptation and mitigation, missing opportunities for synergies and enhancing the risk of goal-conflicts. Breaking down silos can be aided by a coordinating body with the political mandate to follow up non-compliance. Breaking down silos can also make room for more integrative approaches such as Nature-Based Solutions (NbS) that can consider the interlinkages between climate change, biodiversity, and social justice.

Develop a clearly articulated adaptation policy cycle (National authorities): Most of the Nordic countries lack a clearly articulated policy cycle where planning documents, knowledge generation, and monitoring, reporting and evaluation (MRE) procedures are situated in relation to one another and support the continuous development of adaptation work nationally and sub-nationally.

Support adaptation in practice

The Nordic countries have highly sophisticated communications and knowledge exchange networks, which supports the development and accessibility of knowledge and tools. Yet, thus far, there has been little to no development and use of policy tools that directly incentivise adaptation at the local level and in the private sector. Faster adaptation is about developing effective and accessible tools for adaptation. It focuses on enabling swift and effective responses through enhancing financing of adaptation and access to actionable solutions, including through support systems and technical advice.

Enhance adaptation financing and economic incentive mechanisms (National governments): All Nordic countries lack sufficient financial incentives for adaptation, resulting in a growing gap between identified adaptation needs and available finances, most notably and concretely related to protecting, maintaining, and upgrading physical infrastructure. The lack of financial incentives reflects a general lack of adaptation funding across the Nordic countries. There is a clear need to increase the use of “positive” economic policy measures, such as financing, and the Nordic countries are applying these to some extent. However, there is an equally clear need to assess how and to what extent “negative” measures such as taxes and fees can be used for adaptation in the same way that such measures are used within the emissions part of climate policy. The same applies to developing and applying approximations of the cost-benefit method that can work within adaptation. For individuals, insurance schemes can be enhanced to incentivise proactive measures. The recently adopted law in Norway, which requires insurance companies to make publicly available data on payments for natural perils, can be a source of inspiration to develop a common Nordic model for natural perils insurance that better facilitates prevention against future natural perils caused by climate change. In addition, there is a need for innovative financial mechanisms that allow municipalities and private actors to capitalize on linkages between adaptation, biodiversity, and the SDGs, e.g., through nature-based solutions. There is also a significant potential in co-funding mechanisms, like public-private partnerships, that can create incentives for private property owners to implement adaptations.

Enhance efforts to translate knowledge on risks and vulnerabilities to local adaptation measures (National authorities; Local and county-level authorities): Despite the existence of knowledge platforms, most of the Nordic countries struggle with translating knowledge on risks and vulnerabilities to local adaptation measures. There is a need for “scaling down” climate predictions and operationalizing adaptation measures to fit local contexts, which in turn will require assigning more resources to local and country-level authorities for both planning and implementation. Knowledge translation could be done through expanding the role of existing knowledge-generating bodies and platforms to include a wider set of climate risks (not merely the local physical climate risks), and to bridge the gap between climate and other types of risk that can contribute to intensifying the negative effects of climate change and should therefore be seen in context.

Take responsibility

The Nordic countries have an international outlook and understand the need for collaboration and commitment beyond the national borders. Yet, when it comes to adaptation, the outlook is largely national, undermining both cross-border learning and ethical commitments. More internationally oriented adaptation is about taking responsibility for loss and damages and enabling the scaling of solutions outside the national and Nordic contexts. It calls for adaptation efforts to match mitigation efforts in priority and scale through increased support for international climate resilience and preparedness to avoid climate related conflict, account for transboundary climate risks and take responsibility for historic emissions.

Enhance the political mandate for adaptation (National governments): Leading government bodies and cross-ministerial working groups in most Nordic countries lack the mandate to put adaptation high on their national political agendas within all relevant sectors as well as to be a leader internationally. Increased political mandate will make it easier for the Nordic countries to embrace their responsibility and be accountable to local-level actors involved in adaptation nationally as well as international actors. It can further enable public bodies to accept risk ownership and ensure that all risks are accounted for in both the planning and implementation of adaptation measures. Finally, enhanced political mandate will increase the likelihood of developing cross-Nordic strategies and collaborations in areas such as transboundary climate risks.
Strengthen international commitments (National governments): For the Nordic region to continue to be a trustworthy and visionary leader for social justice and equality, national leaders must actively take upon themselves to speak up on behalf of nations and groups with less political and economic power and follow up with courageous action. No country is safe from climate change impacts until all countries are safe from climate change impacts. Therefore, Nordic governments and the Nordic region most take responsibility for climate change risks and impacts manifesting in other countries (many of which are in the Global South) that result from Nordic patterns of production and consumption.