Risks, vulnerabilities and resilience in a context of climate change

Agricultural activities are by nature prone to risks and uncertainties of various nature, both biophysical, abiotic, climatic, environmental, biotic (pests, diseases) and economic. Many of these risks have a climatic component and most of them will be affected by climate change, either in intensity, scope or frequency. The aim of this paper is not to review the increasing literature on risks, on vulnerability1 and on resilience.2 It is to articulate these broad notions in such a way that they can be of use to frame an approach applicable to concrete issues in the agricultural and food systems. The impact of a risk depends on the shock itself and on the system to which it is applied. Depending on its vulnerability, the system will be more or less affected by the same shock. Depending on its resilience, it will recover more or less easily. Climate change is expected to modify risks, vulnerabilities and the conditions that shape the resilience of agriculture systems. Climate change is also introducing new uncertainties. Could building resilience to known risks be a way to build resilience to changing risks and to adapt to climate change? How to build strategies and policies for resilience of agriculture and related systems in the context of climate change? To consider these questions, one has first to clarify how these notions of risk, vulnerability and resilience are connected, how they apply to systems, and to interlinked systems, and how environmental (biophysical), economic and social perspectives can interact. Therefore, this paper aims towards a better understanding of “what adaptation means” and towards strategies to build resilience in making the following points: 1. Risks operate on systems and first one must have a good understanding of the systems to be considered. 2. Climatic risks and changes operate in the middle of all other risks, superpose with them and change them. 3. Before we come to “what we mean by resilience”, we must explain the notion of vulnerability. To consider risks as they impact systems leads us to consider vulnerabilities. We will try to define what this notion covers and its dimensions. 4. Building resilience starts with reducing vulnerabilities: a system is more resilient if it is less vulnerable. But this is not enough. Resilience adds two dimensions: the