German technical development cooperation agency on behalf of the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety
(BMUB) as well as the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Recently the topics of ecosystem-based adaptation and private sector
adaptation have been added to the site. The website has so far reached the highest
amount of users during the UNFCCC Conferences of the Parties and currently
peaks at more than 2,000 accesses per day. Hosting the Adaptation M&E Navigator
on AdaptationCommunity.net not only ensures high accessibility and a relevant
audience, but also enables updates of the tool as new experiences and publications
become available.
18.6 Limitations
As a decision support tool, the Adaptation M&E Navigator must be concise, easy to
navigate, understandable to non-experts and applicable to a broad variety of
contexts. It is therefore facing a number of tradeoffs. First, it has to strike a careful
balance between being concise and providing sufficient degree of detail. As shown
in Fig. 18.1, the scope of the Adaptation M&E Navigator is limited to providing an
overview of relevant approaches in form of a brief description. Additional guidance
may be needed to design and implement a particular approach. Second, in order to
keep the approaches to a manageable number they have to be applicable to a
relatively broad context and cannot account for every possible variation. As a
result, the ratings provided for the three criteria of complexity, subjectivity and
available experience are indicative only and could deviate in practice depending on
the details of implementation. Third, some of the specific M&E purposes are more
suited to standardized M&E approaches than others. Practice has shown that
national adaptation M&E systems developed to date are diverse and very context
dependent (EEA 2015; Hammil et al. 2014a; Leiter 2013). Thus, whilst the Adaptation M&E Navigator can point to a direction in regard to a suitable M&E
approach, the development of the actual M&E system may require a more complex
process (considerations for developing national adaptation M&E systems are
outlined in Leiter (2013) and Price-Kelly et al. (2015)).
Furthermore, whilst there was general agreement on the common M&E purposes
featured in the Adaptation M&E Navigator, feedback by colleagues who
commented on a draft version suggests that the purposes could be arranged in
slightly different ways. For instance, if monitoring the implementation of projects
(purpose #2) was broadened to include monitoring of adaptation plans, then monitoring the National Adaptation Plan process (purpose #3) could be grouped as a
special case under it. Nevertheless, it was maintained as a separate item due to its
importance for countries under the UNFCCC negotiations. Finally, as pointed out
by Fisher et al. (2015, p. 30): “What makes a method most appropriate to climate
change adaptation is not necessarily its intrinsic qualities, (. . .), but instead how the
method is applied.” Thus, the decision support provided by the Adaptation M&E
Navigator is only part of the total process that leads to an effective application of
M&E for adaptation to climate change (compare Fig. 18.1).
338
T. Leiter
(BMUB) as well as the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Recently the topics of ecosystem-based adaptation and private sector
adaptation have been added to the site. The website has so far reached the highest
amount of users during the UNFCCC Conferences of the Parties and currently
peaks at more than 2,000 accesses per day. Hosting the Adaptation M&E Navigator
on AdaptationCommunity.net not only ensures high accessibility and a relevant
audience, but also enables updates of the tool as new experiences and publications
become available.
18.6 Limitations
As a decision support tool, the Adaptation M&E Navigator must be concise, easy to
navigate, understandable to non-experts and applicable to a broad variety of
contexts. It is therefore facing a number of tradeoffs. First, it has to strike a careful
balance between being concise and providing sufficient degree of detail. As shown
in Fig. 18.1, the scope of the Adaptation M&E Navigator is limited to providing an
overview of relevant approaches in form of a brief description. Additional guidance
may be needed to design and implement a particular approach. Second, in order to
keep the approaches to a manageable number they have to be applicable to a
relatively broad context and cannot account for every possible variation. As a
result, the ratings provided for the three criteria of complexity, subjectivity and
available experience are indicative only and could deviate in practice depending on
the details of implementation. Third, some of the specific M&E purposes are more
suited to standardized M&E approaches than others. Practice has shown that
national adaptation M&E systems developed to date are diverse and very context
dependent (EEA 2015; Hammil et al. 2014a; Leiter 2013). Thus, whilst the Adaptation M&E Navigator can point to a direction in regard to a suitable M&E
approach, the development of the actual M&E system may require a more complex
process (considerations for developing national adaptation M&E systems are
outlined in Leiter (2013) and Price-Kelly et al. (2015)).
Furthermore, whilst there was general agreement on the common M&E purposes
featured in the Adaptation M&E Navigator, feedback by colleagues who
commented on a draft version suggests that the purposes could be arranged in
slightly different ways. For instance, if monitoring the implementation of projects
(purpose #2) was broadened to include monitoring of adaptation plans, then monitoring the National Adaptation Plan process (purpose #3) could be grouped as a
special case under it. Nevertheless, it was maintained as a separate item due to its
importance for countries under the UNFCCC negotiations. Finally, as pointed out
by Fisher et al. (2015, p. 30): “What makes a method most appropriate to climate
change adaptation is not necessarily its intrinsic qualities, (. . .), but instead how the
method is applied.” Thus, the decision support provided by the Adaptation M&E
Navigator is only part of the total process that leads to an effective application of
M&E for adaptation to climate change (compare Fig. 18.1).
338
T. Leiter