The Local Adaptation Champions Awards spotlight and reward inspiring, innovative and scalable locally led efforts to address climate change and build resilience among vulnerable communities.
The 2023 Award Categories:
Capacity Building:This category includes innovations and initiatives that support a continuous and iterative process of learning for local communities, governments, and organizations. These innovations and initiatives should be based on established need from the participants and enable inclusive local decision-making that is sustained beyond project cycles, for instance by leaving an institutional legacy; facilitating skills for technical and soft institutional attributes (like collaborative leadership, trust, and network governance); and/or allowing local actors to autonomously increase their capacity and share skills over time. ?Examples include institutionalizing adaptation capacity in local organizations; support for peer-to-peer learning; and support for local experts and champions.
Business Adaptation Solution: This category is for small and large businesses that have supported leadership by local communities and governments in adaptation efforts; helped address structural inequalities faced by women, youth, children, disabled, displaced, indigenous peoples and marginalized ethnic groups that make them more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change; and/or developed and made easily available adaptation solutions or technologies that address local climate-related vulnerabilities.
Women in Leadership: This category is for local, national, or global woman leaders who design, champion, and/or lead adaptation and climate resilience efforts in and for local communities. Applications are invited from, or on behalf of, women leaders at the local, national, or global level who have led in the design or implementation of efforts that demonstrably build climate resilience – particularly of the most vulnerable – within communities.
Innovation in Delvolving Finance: This category is for organizations, projects, initiatives or programs using innovative models that provide flexible, long-term, patient and/or predictable funding for adaptation at the local level. The funding should be made available in ways that enable and support local determination of climate challenges, priorities, and solutions.