Climate Risk-Informed Decision Analysis (CRIDA) Framework Approved as UNESCO IHP Flagship Initiative

At the 26th Intergovernmental Council meeting of UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Hydrological Programme, on 5-7 Jun 2024, member states approved a draft resolution to upgrade the Climate Risk-Informed Decision Analysis (CRIDA) Framework to Flagship Initiative status. 

CRIDA is a framework for integrating climate change considerations in water resources planning and management. It does so by identifying vulnerabilities associated with wide range of plausible future climate, and formulating flexible and robust adaptation strategies that mitigate directly against those vulnerabilities. The methodology has been applied in at least 25 studies in 22 countries around the world. Up until the Council meeting, CRIDA events had been organized primarily through IHP’s drylands water resources program, G-WADI, but many basins and watersheds that would benefit from a CRIDA approach are in temperate or even humid zones. Thus, various member states and the IHP Secretariat felt that this would be an appropriate time to create a CRIDA Flagship Initiative.

On Thursday, 6 Jun 2024, the United States of America, with co-sponsorship by the Netherlands, Uganda, and Republic of Korea, presented a draft resolution to create such a flagship initiative to the Council. Following a short debate with mostly supporting statements, the 29 members of the Council unanimously adopted the draft resolution with minor changes. Following adoption of the resolution, the delegations of Ghana, Nigeria, Sudan, and Morocco asked to be added to the list of co-sponsors of the resolution, alongside the original co-sponsors.

The strong support for the CRIDA resolution reflected CRIDA’s demonstrated potential to provide robust frameworks for water management under climate uncertainty.  The supporting countries highlighted CRIDA’s importance in integrating scientific data and understanding with decision-making processes to enhance resilience against climate impacts.  

As part of the final adopted version, language was added asking the IHP Secretariat to “seek synergies” between CRIDA and the Egypt-led Action on Water Adaptation and Resilience (AWARe) initiative.  

CRIDA’s adoption as an IHP Flagship Initiative increases its visibility and marks a significant step in advancing global water security through adaptive management strategies. More information on CRIDA can be found at https://www.unesco.org/CRIDA.