How Do Households Cope with and Adapt to Climate Change in the MENA Region?

What are the coping mechanisms and adaptation strategies (apart from migration which is discussed in part III of the study) that households use in order to respond to changes in climate and environmental conditions? Are households forced to sell assets or take other emergency measures in cases of losses due to extreme weather events? Beyond short term emergency responses, are they taking measures to adapt to changing conditions? This paper is based on new household survey data collected in 2011 in Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Syria, and Yemen, documents the coping and adaptation strategies of households as well as government and community responses to changes in weather patterns and the environment. Overall, the results suggest that coping and adaptation strategies used by households to deal with shocks are diverse, but still limited, as are the community and government responses that could help them.