This report provides an overview of a project that aims to help Indian smallholders to join the global carbon market in Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan. The project is based on the SMART-CDM approach, which introduces specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and tangible practices that smallholders can take to improve their access to carbon markets. The approach helps smallholders to work together and is based on 40 possible activities designed to reduce emissions or sequester carbon through activities related to tree-planting, agriculture activities and energy consumption reduction activities. Implementation of the project has been facilitated through cooperation with livelihood programmes.

This paper presents Open Data Kit (ODK), an extensible, open-source suite of tools designed to build information services for developing regions. ODK currently provides four tools to this end: Collect, Aggregate, Voice, and Build. Collect is a mobile platform that renders application logic and supports the manipulation of data. Aggregate provides a “click-to-deploy” server that supports data storage and transfer in the “cloud” or on local servers. Voice renders application logic using phone prompts that users respond to with keypad presses.

The Durban Climate Conference in December 2011 represented a significant step forward for the United Nations climate change process. Although its outcomes continue to be debated, the Durban Conference could prove to be a game-changing conference for the climate negotiations. Governments adopted a comprehensive package of decisions—including an agreement to initiate a second commitment period for the Kyoto Protocol and the 'Durban Platform' to negotiate a long-term, all inclusive future mitigation regime that includes a process to address the 'ambition gap' for stabilizing average global temperature increases at 2 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels. They also adopted a range of decisions designed to implement the 2010 Cancun Agreements, including launching a new Green Climate Fund and developing stronger requirements for the reporting and review of countries' mitigation efforts.

The second volume of 'Microinsurance Compendium, Protecting the Poor' highlights that the number of microinsured people has reached almost 500 million. The report emphasises the role of microinsurance in poverty alleviation when combined with social protection, risk prevention, mitigation, and vulnerability reduction. The report features 26 chapters addressing innovations in microinsurance, covering emerging issues such as: current trends in microinsurance, health insurance, life insurance and general insurance, and low-income market. Other parts examine: insurers and microinsurance; delivery channels and intermediaries; and the infrastructure and environment for microinsurance. The Compendium underscores increasing climate change risk, stressing its impact on the poor, due in part to weak infrastructure. It provides an overview of emerging climate change risks, the role of microinsurance in addressing weather-related risk and the operational challenges.

This report by the Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN) is the first of a three-part series of reports which highlight the scientific findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) 'Special Report on Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation (known as 'SREX') for each region, and discuss the implications for society. The SREX report itself was compiled over two and a half years, involving 220 expert authors, 19 review editors and a four-day approval process by government representatives from around the world. The final 594 page report and its 20 page summary present a rich but sobering account of how different forms of extreme weather events – ranging from high temperatures to heavy rainfall – are likely to become more common by the end of the 21st century, and are more likely to be caused by climate change.

This report is the result of research conducted in 2010 by the Information Society Unit of IPTS as part of the CROSSROAD Project – A Participative Roadmap for ICT research on Electronic Governance and Policy Modelling. Overall, the research aims to push the boundaries of traditional eGovernment research and help resolve the complex societal challenges Europe is facing by the application of ICT-enabled innovations and collaborative policy modelling approaches, which include the harnessing of collective intelligence, agent-based modelling, visual analytics and simulation, just to mention a few.

The document begins with a review of the evidence of climate change in Colombia, citing the Institute of Meteorology and Environmental Studies of Colombia (IDEAM). This institution said that Colombian glaciers lost 50cm per year. Other change have ocurred on Cartagena and Tumaco coasts because there have been increases in sea level between 3-5mm in the last 50 years. The IDEAM also mentions that in future forecasting a redistribution of rainfall patterns by changes in atmospheric circulation. Adapting to climate change requires creativity and a willingness to break paradigms. Academia, professionals, decision makers and civil society should consider climate trends for their planning processes, and also to implement practices and efficient use of resources that result in reducing Greenhouse Gas emissions, contributing positively to the global problem.

A key reason for pessimism with respect to greenhouse gas emissions reduction relates to the ‘motivation problem’, whereby those who could make the biggest difference prima facie have the least incentive to act because they are most able to adapt: how can we motivate such people (and thereby everyone else) to accept, indeed to initiate, the changes to their lifestyles that are required for effective emissions reductions? This paper offers an account inspired by Rawls of the good of membership of ‘intergenerational cooperative union’ to achieve justice that provides a solution to the motivation problem.