Climate Change and Development Links

Until recently, climate change was viewed largely as an environmental concern, of little relevance to development policy-makers or practitioners. Likewise, development approaches have been given less attention within the climate change community, who instead favour natural science approaches focusing on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This paper describes the independent evolution of climate change and development discourses, and provides some explanation as to why the two fields have operated largely independently from one another. The recent initiatives to strengthen links between the climate change and development communities are also described. These are of particular importance as climate change impacts will significantly affect national development.