/library/oar/handle/123456789/130245 2025-12-24T11:24:37Z 2025-12-24T11:24:37Z /library/oar/handle/123456789/141261 2025-11-13T11:16:10Z 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Blue carbon markets in small island developing states : community participation in the case of Seychelles Abstract: Climate change and its forecasted impacts on Small Island Developing States (SIDS) have been documented in the literature extensively, and climate change adaptation has been identified by mainstream scholars as a key policy response. However, relatively little is known about how SIDS implement climate change adaptation initiatives on the ground, and much less is known about how local communities are integrated in the decision-making policy processes around these initiatives. The challenges in this space are many, and revolve around a lack of research capacity, a lack of inclusion of all stakeholders, a dearth of robust data as well as a vague policy directive on how to operationalise adaptive capacity knowledge at the community level. Given these challenges, SIDS have increasingly looked towards their territorial ocean space as a way of re-framing their future development pathways in recent years. Termed as the Blue Economy (BE) model, some SIDS have started to re-consider the true value of their marine ecosystems via this more formalised framework, especially given the importance of preserving and conserving their blue carbon stock (mangroves, salt water marshes and seagrass meadows) to prevent further climate change. Within this context, the Republic of Seychelles hosts some of the largest seagrass meadows in the Western Indian Ocean. Therefore, blue carbon markets, and specifically the participation of local communities within such mechanisms, requires much further attention as a potential mitigative measure for climate change adaptation to succeed. This research traces the role of climate change adaptation within SIDS’ development agendas, the rise of the Blue Economy model, and the potential for blue carbon offset markets therein as a potential for further adaptative measure in the SIDS, through the lens of the Republic of Seychelles’ Blue Economy model. The role of community participation in blue carbon markets, notably, seagrass habitats and meadows, is considered in depth. The study involved the conducting of a systematic literature review to identify research gaps. The use of a discrete choice model was also proposed as a means to assess the community’s willingness to participate in a blue carbon offset project in Seychelles. It is believed that this is the first time the multinomial logit model (MNL) in assessing adaptive capacity through seagrass carbon offset markets in Seychelles has ever been applied. This research study collected primary data via an exploratory research design as there was very little data in existence as discovered by the researcher. The three main data collection methods employed the use of the CRisTAL participatory approach for community mapping focus groups, elite interviews among key stakeholders in government, academia and civil society, and a household questionnaire that was randomly disseminated within the coastal communities on the three main islands of Seychelles. Further, the study also sought to test the hypothesis of whether climate conscious individuals in Seychelles would participate in a seagrass offset market due to societal expectations, altruism and economic benefits. The researchers’ choice of methods was intended as an integration, one which would sequentially structure and build a comprehensive understanding of the research context. The elite interviews were conducted to glean high-level insights and these interviews informed the development of the household surveys and community focus groups by highlighting priority areas within the communities. The focus groups, in turn, which saw the use of the CRiSTAL mapping technique, allowed for a participatory exploration of ground roots issues, identifying lived experiences and broader themes that were especially relevant to the Seychelles context. Methodologically, this progression enabled the refinement of key concepts and the methods built on one another to generate a layered understanding of both the institutional and community-level dynamics that affected the Seychelles in the case of blue carbon offset markets. This integrated process ensured that each method contributed unique data while also serving to shape the subsequent data collection stages, thus reinforcing the coherence of the overall research design. In all, the researcher conducted four (4) community mapping focus groups, six (6) elite stakeholder interviews and completed the collection of two hundred and twenty-five (225) household surveys. While the sample size is acknowledged to be indicative. the data set was deemed robust enough for analysis and discussion by the researcher. This integrative approach enabled the study to advance a central argument: that the long-term feasibility of seagrass conservation in the Seychelles towards a blue carbon market is contingent not only on ecological priorities or top-down governance arrangements, but also very much dependent on a grounded, real-world understanding of how local communities perceive and interact with coastal ecosystems under conditions of climactic changes and institutional pressures. The objectives of the research revolved around identifying and assessing the advantages, disadvantages and barriers to community participation in blue carbon market measures that support climate change adaptation, in the context of the SIDS of Seychelles. In doing so, it helped to extend our theoretical understanding of climate change adaptation in the context of coastal communities of SIDS, and explored the role of community involvement in the uptake of local economic development mechanisms linked to the concept of the blue economy. The study contributed to the small but growing field of research focusing on the development of effective blue carbon markets in Small Island States, but will more importantly assess the importance of community participation in determining the success of these markets. The findings from this study shows that in general, it supported the majority of the findings in the mainstream literature but also revealed key new insights for the consideration of scholars in this field. It was found, for instance, that while most climate-conscious respondents would be willing to participate in a seagrass blue carbon offset market for social and economic reasons, many were not willing to participate financially for altruistic reasons on a voluntary basis presently. Furthermore, and perhaps more pertinently, many felt the introduction of blue carbon offset markets in Seychelles would not alleviate the climate crisis. Relevantly, the study also lent weight to the ‘people-policy’ gap that most scholars argue exists in climate adaptation literature. In doing so, the findings also emphasised the need to engage with coastal communities and stakeholders in a more meaningful manner. At the time of writing, it is also believed that such a study is rare in other SIDS and it is the first ever study conducted in Seychelles that sought to understand households’ willingness to pay for carbon offsetting in a seagrass blue carbon market. As Seychelles begins to work on the development of the country’s first Blue Carbon Policy, this research study makes a valuable first pass contribution for policy makers in Seychelles to understand the true perceptions of the community around the offset market concept and seek to implement the necessary policy levers in order to generate meaningful interactions with these stakeholders. Description: Ph.D.(Melit.)

2024-01-01T00:00:00Z /library/oar/handle/123456789/130829 2025-01-20T09:41:06Z 2024-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Climate change adaptation and the role of civil society organisations in the Mediterranean region : a case of Malta Abstract: One of the major issues facing many nations worldwide is climate change, which is defined as a shift in the composition of the atmosphere and the unpredictability of ambient conditions across similar time periods caused either actively or passively by human activity. The most recent sixth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in their dedicated chapter on small islands indicates that more needs to be learned about how climate change is affecting small islands, particularly what are the most effective adaptation measures. The overarching aim of this research is to investigate the role of civil society organisations in Malta in climate change adaptation. This shall be done by answering three research questions: (i) What are the trends and impacts of climate change in the Mediterranean region, and specifically on the Maltese island (RQ1); (ii) How are civil society organisations in Maltese islands addressing the challenges posed by climate change adaptation in their strategies and campaigns (RQ2); and (iii) To what extent are civil society organisations collaborating with key stakeholders such as private sector and government to foster climate change adaptation, and vice versa (RQ3) This qualitative study adopted a narrative literature review to answer research question one (RQ1) while an expert interview was conducted to answer research questions two and three (RQ2 & RQ3). Thematic and document analyses were conducted to analyse the responses of the interviewees. The research was divided into 4 stages of literature review, expert interviews, reflective thematic analysis, and document analysis. The main themes that emerged from this study are co-designing of adaptation policies, stakeholders’ engagement and the extent of involvement in policy process. This research found that CSOs participation in climate change adaptation is at the level of policy because Malta needs to improve on so many legislations concerning climate for anything meaningful to happen. Secondly, even though CSO are always willing to hold conversations, the government is reluctant. This is evident in the manner at which they involve CSO in decision-making processes. It is not just enough to invite the CSO, but invitation must be early at the formulation stage. Evidence shows that most of the invitations initiated by the government are just mere procedural exercises without real impacts on the final policy documents. Description: M.A.(Melit.)

2024-01-01T00:00:00Z