date: Tue, 16 Dec 1997 12:05:50 +0000
from: Mike Hulme <m.hulme@uea.ac.uk>
subject: January meeting
to: acacia_conf <acacia_conf@ucl.ac.uk>

To Acacia colleagues,

1. Who are the users?  The key target group should really be those people
at EU, national, regional or local level who are charged with long-term 
planning decisions or environmental legislation.  Richard mentions coastal
and water
managers - these functions in most countries are usually split between many
different agencies which causes problems.  Local authorities, especially those
in metropolitan areas, should also be seen as a key target group.  As far as
influencing Framework V is concerned, we have missed the boat, so additional 
research managers will need to be targeted.

By the way, I'm not convinced by Jan Goudrian's notion of targeting science
journalists. There are some really dumb journalists around and although the
idea is
good to influence and improve the quality of public debate in this area, in
the end
journalists are about getting or creating a good story and not about the
critical
process of scientific exploration and reflection.

2. How do we canvass them?  This is potentially a huge task and we need to
devise
some strategy to make it manageable.  Inviting voluntary involvement runs
into the
same problem we faced here in the UK in that only those already convinced
of the
importance of the issue will get involved.  For many other potantial users,
they need
convincing that there is a real policy issue here, and one that demands
their immediate
attention.  And convincing people of the priority of this issue is not easy
- after
all, I don't think we really know where climate change impacts should fit
in the
hierarchy of policy issues, or even in the subset of environmental policy
issues.

In the proposal we talk about a Workshop for practitioners and users.  I
suspect
we need some form of short questionnaire we can send out to a range of
potential
European users asking what sort of information about climate change impacts
and
adaptation options would alter their perception of decisions they take.  If
this
is done sooner rather than later we could use the publicity surrounding the
Kyoto
process as a way to engage attention.  For example,

'The Kyoto outcome reduces estimated global warming by 2100 by 2-3 tenths
of a degC
(2.38 down to 2.11 under a standard scenario).  Does this reduction in
global warming
have any significance for you and your business or for decisions you are
charged with
making?  What information would you ideally need to have in order for you
to make
this judgement? (and give some examples)'

Workshop I should then follow on from this survey by inviting a small number
of key users to discuss with scientists what can be done to improve knowledge.

Mike


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Dr Mike Hulme				tel: +44 1603 593162
Climatic Research Unit			fax: +44 1603 507784
School of Environmental Sciences	email:  m.hulme@uea.ac.uk
University of East Anglia		web site: http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/~mikeh/
Norwich  NR4  7TJ                      
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*********
For the new CRU 1961-90 mean monthly climatology look at:
     http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/~markn/carbon/nerc.htm
                       ****************************
Mean temp. in C.England during 1997 has been about 1.0deg C above the
1961-90 average.
December needs an anomaly of about +3degC for 1997 to break the 1990
'warmest year' record
                       ****************************
The global-mean surface air temperature anomaly estimate for 1997 is
+0.43deg C 
above the 1961-90 average, the warmest year yet on record (beating 1995)
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*********
