State-Wide Strategic Framework to Support Place-Based Regional Adaptation

Aim: Provide independent expert advice to DELWP to co-design a long-term and state-wide strategic framework to support place-based regional adaptation planning.

‍Outcome: The Climate Change Exchange collaborated with DELWP and the regions to co-develop a Theory of Change for their ‘Supporting Our Regions to Adapt’ (SORAd) program; guidance materials to support the development of region specific Adaptation Plans in Victoria; and the monitoring, evaluation, reporting and improvement (MERI) framework for that program. 

An iterative co-design approach – that involved the RMIT research team, the Australian Resilience Centre, the DELWP Adaptation Policy Team and DELWP Regional Community and Partnerships Teams – was used.

The guidance materials aim to help users understand the complex drivers (ecological, social, cultural, political, ethical, economic, etc.) of risks and vulnerabilities, in order to build adaptive capacities and address key leverage points within a region or sub-region.   

Approaching adaptation as a multi-stakeholder, learning-based practice, the project used concepts and methods from adaptive pathways planning, transitions management, sustainability science, and systems and resilience thinking. The multi-agency, multi-disciplinary group also recognised that we create adaptation through our practices and relationships. We, therefore, actively worked to acknowledge how our own frames, narratives and positions shaped the guidance materials and will shape decisions and actions made through using the materials.  

The DELWP regions went on using the guidance materials to develop their regional adaptation strategies and annual adaptation action plans.