Assessment of vulnerability and adaptation to climate change for the coastal lagoons of Egypt

Description

Climate change is a “normal” climatic phenomenon; the climate has always been changing throughout the history of the Earth. Natural changes in climatic conditions have resulted in Ice Ages and relatively warm periods in temperate regions while wet periods have intermitted with dry periods in Africa (Van der Geest, 2002). Climate change, since the last century, however has been accelerated due to the increase in greenhouse gases related to human activities (CECC, 2008). The impacts of climate change on freshwater systems and their management are mainly due to the observed and the projected increases in temperature, sea level and precipitation variability (very high confidence), semi‐arid and arid areas are particularly exposed to the impacts of climate change on freshwater (high confidence) (Kundzewicz et al., 2007). Observations indicate that lakes and rivers around the world are warming, with effects on thermal structure and lake chemistry that in turn affect abundance and productivity, community composition, phenology, distribution and migration (Rosenzweig et al., 2007). Climate change, for instance, is one of the water-related environmental issues and, together with urbanization, is a major, long-term and human-induced factor that affects natural and human systems in all regions of the world (IPCC, 2007 and UN-HABITAT, 2011).