The Global Center on Adaptation (GCA) in collaboration with DanChurchAid (DCA) convened a regional workshop to advance Locally Led Adaptation (LLA) across South Asia. The workshop, held from 12-14 February 2025 at the Everest Hotel in Kathmandu, was hosted by the Ministry of Forests and Environment of Nepal and funded by UK International Development. It brought together 119 leading practitioners, experts, policymakers, and funders from six countries in the region to explore the challenges, opportunities, and best practices for institutionalizing and scaling up LLA. The workshop was also live streamed. (Please scroll down to watch the recordings.)
A Regional Approach to Climate Resilience
South Asia is among the most climate-vulnerable regions globally, due to its heavy dependence on a monsoon weather system that is being disrupted by climate change, a large coastline, fragile mountain and riverine systems, and hot and cold temperature extremes that are already challenging for human well-being. With 29% of the world's extreme poor residing in the region, and 70% of the population living on less than US$ 5.5 a day and vulnerable to climate impacts, the need for urgent, locally driven solutions has never been more critical. This workshop deepened understanding of policy frameworks, financial mechanisms, and institutional responses necessary to institutionalize and scale LLA in the region.
Key Focus Areas
The workshop addressed LLA in critical sectors, including food security, water resource management, urban resilience, infrastructure, and climate finance. Through interactive sessions and discussions, participants examined best practices, innovative financing mechanisms, and strategies to integrate adaptation into national and local governance structures.
“South Asian countries have led the way in demonstrating government-led locally led adaptation approaches, including the Local Adaptation Plans of Action, Local Climate Adaptive Living Facility, the LDC Initiative for Effective Adaptation and Resilience, and the integration of adaptation in local development planning in Kerala, India,” said Anju Sharma, Global Lead, Locally Led Adaptation, GCA. “While these approaches now need to be institutionalized in governance systems in the region, they also offer immense learning for effective local adaptation for the rest of the world – learning that GCA will aim to facilitate through the Global Hub on LLA.”
Strengthening Collaboration for Impact
The event featured keynote addresses, panel discussions, and working groups, fostering collaboration between government representatives, civil society organizations, the private sector, and international financial institutions. A significant outcome was the development of actionable recommendations to enhance LLA implementation at scale.
“Countries in the region have a common goal of accessing adaptation finance. Through this workshop, we again realized the vital importance of partnerships across sectors, borders and disciplines,” stated Suman Subedi, Climate Change Management Division, Ministry of Forest and Environment, Nepal.
“We have learned a lot from the invaluable experiences and diverse perspectives shared over the last three days. It was a pleasure to witness the enthusiasm and commitment from a wide range of actors in the region to work together towards this global issue,” said Samjhana Bista, Country Director of DCA Nepal.
Institutionalizing Locally Led Adaptation
The workshop was part of GCA’s activities under the Global Hub on Locally Led Adaptation, which promotes LLA through knowledge sharing, peer-to-peer learning, capacity-building, and the development of People’s Adaptation Plans that guide investment by international financial institutions. The initiative supports countries across the globe to integrate LLA into national planning and financing mechanisms.
Key Outcomes
Workshop participants agreed on the importance of embedding LLA approaches into government institutions and systems to avoid fragmentation and duplication, and to achieve scale. Quantified commitments by governments to devolve climate finance and performance based measures to ensure effectiveness were discussed. Participants highlighted the need to address the social, political and cultural causes of climate vulnerability, beyond technical solutions, and to strengthen youth leadership, local cooperatives, and peer-to-peer learning mechanisms, while respecting traditional knowledge. The need for constantly generating evidence to make the economic and business case for scaling up locally led initiatives was emphasized in multiple sessions.
The workshop also discussed the importance of addressing existing power imbalances between funders and recipients, and ensuring mutual accountability, also of providers to climate-affected communities. Participants highlighted the need for better coordination between fund providers, to support easier access by those who need support most, and reduce the burdens of reporting. Monitoring and evaluation frameworks that answer to the needs of communities were highlighted, to enable iterative learning. The role of the private sector in supporting the scale up of small enterprises that support climate resilience was highlighted, along with collaborations with communities to sustain nature based solutions.
The rich examples and outcomes from the workshop will be captured in the 2025 edition of GCA’s annual publication, Stories of Resilience.