A synthetic assessment of the global distribution of vulnerability to climate change from the IPCC perspective that reflects exposure and adaptive capacity
IPCC (2001) expressed “high confidence” in the conclusion that “developing countries will be more vulnerable to climate change than developed countries”. This pronouncement has framed subsequent discussions despite concern raised elsewhere in Chapter 18 of the same assessment that “current knowledge of adaptation and adaptive capacity is insufficient for reliable prediction of adaptations” because “the capacity to adapt varies considerably among regions, countries and socioeconomic groups and will vary over time”. In an attempt to reconcile this apparent contradiction, this document employs the IPCC framework that vulnerability is a function of exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity to organize a synthetic assessment of new knowledge and available tools to produce geographically explicit qualitative portraits of vulnerability designed explicitly to incorporate both exposure to climate change (across a range of futures as reflected in temperature change) and subjective judgments of national capacities to adapt.
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