Speech given to Opening Session of the Third International Conference on Community Based Adaptation to Climate Change held at the Sheraton Hotel, Dhaka , Bangladesh on 18 February 2009.First of all I would like to thank all the participants at this conference for attending, particularly those of you who have come from abroad. I hope you will find the conference interesting and useful. As you are aware, this is the third such international conference on CBA that has been held in Bangladesh . The last one being held in February 2007 and I am pleased to see quite a few participants who were at that conference here again today.I will, very briefly, try to give you an update on the current status of adaptation touching upon both the science as well as global policy and then also locate the issue of CBA within the broader topic of adaptation to climate change.  ScienceFirst let me say a few words about the science of adaptation. As many of you will be aware the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) brought out its fourth assessment report in 2007 (for which the IPCC received the Nobel Prize for Peace together with US former Vice President Al Gore). The fourth assessment made some important findings regarding the latest science on climate change. I will highlight just a few key findings: (i) Firstly it reported, for the first time, that the impacts of climate change are already occurring and no longer something to be expected only in the future, due to the rise in global temperatures that has occurred already. Hence, we need to prepare ourselves to cope with these unavoidable impacts(ii) Secondly, that we can still avoid the global catastrophic potential impacts over the longer term (i.e. the next 50 to 100 years) if we take very strong and swift action to reduce emissions (or mitigate) at the global level very soon (iii) Thirdly, that we now need to act boldly and jointly on both mitigation (globally) and adaptation (locally) in all countries(iv) Fourth, and finally we need to reinforce the global agreements on climate change, namely the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its Kyoto Protocol no later then the fifteenth Conference of Parties (COP15) of the UNFCCC to be held in Copenhagen , Denmark in December 2009.  PolicyThe policy implications of the IPCC's fourth assessment report were, thus, very clear and has led to significant agreements at the thirteenth Conference of Parties (COP13) that was held in Bali , Indonesia in December 2007. The most important agreements reached under this Bali Action Plan were as follows: (i) Firstly, we agreed to set a time limit to agree the next phase of the UNFCCC and Kyoto Protocol (sometimes referred to as the "Post 2012" agreement or "Post Kyoto" agreement) no later than COP15 in Copenhagen, in December 2009(ii) Secondly, we also agreed the broad framework of such a new agreement, namely its four "Pillars" as follows: (a) Mitigation action to be geared up by all countries, but specially by the rich countries(b) Adaptation by all countries, but specially in the most vulnerable countries (which includes the small island developing states and least developed countires, including Bangladesh ) with separate international funding for adaptation (c) Technology Transfer and Innovative Financing for both mitigation as well as adaptation. COP14 At the last conference of parties (COP14) held in Poznan, Poland in December 2009 we had a number of proposals submitted by different countries and groups on all the above issues; some proposals were specially on adaptation, specially on how to raise the many tens of Billions of Dollars needed annually for adaptation in the developing countries, specially the most vulnerable countries. I am pleased to report that the LDC Group, with a major role played within it by Bangladesh , made a very important and substantive proposal to raise adaptation funding for developing countries from an International Air Passenger Adaptation Levy (IAPAC) which would raise 10 to 15 Billion Dollars a year for adaptation in the most vulnerable countries. This proposal was very well received in Poznan .  Thus from now, until Copenhagen in December there will be a series of three or even possibly four international negotiating sessions under the UNFCCC to hammer out the Copenhagen Agreement by December. The first such meeting will start in March in Bonn , Germany . It is very important that the most vulnerable countries, including the LDCs play an important role in these negotiations in order to push the issue of adaptation with special emphasis on funding for adaptation. So the good news is that adaptation has now been very clearly accepted in both the science as well as global policy levels in the upcoming Copenhagen negotiation and the IPCC.  I am also pleased to note that we have amongst us representative from both the UNFCCC Secretariat as well as the IPCC who will be giving presentations and updates during the conference.  CBAFinally, let me discuss where we stand on the issue of community based adaptation (CBA). As most of you here are well aware most (if not all) the adverse impacts of climate change are likely (at least initially) to fall on the most vulnerable (usually the poorest) communities, in the poorest countries (including Bangladesh ). The challenge for the global community is therefore to assist such vulnerable countries to deal with such impacts (which they are not responsible for causing). This realm of adaptation is now recognized and has a name - Community Based Adaptation or CBA and this series of conferences has played a major role in advancing this field. The challenge before us in the CBA community are many and I will list a few:   (i) Firstly, we need to advance the Sciences of CBA, which requires that the research community work closely with the practitioners who work with the most vulnerable communities. This calls for Action-Research in close partnerships between researchers and practioners.(ii) Secondly, the organizations, NGOs, governments and others who currently work with these mostly poor and vulnerable communities need to understand the implications of both current climate variability and future climate change and the latest findings on adaptation science, policy and practice (iii) Thirdly, the policy makers, specially funders including national (such as Ministries of Finance and Planning) as well as international (including the various adaptation funds created under the UNFCCC, multilateral funders such as the World Bank and Regional Development Banks as well as bilateral donors such as DFID and Danida, etc.) all need to find ways to both "Climate Proof" their development investments as well as ensure that any new climate change adaptation funds reach and benefit the most vulnerable and poor communities (a daunting challenge for all development funding)(iv) Fourthly and finally, the vulnerable communities themselves need to be informed and capacitated to deal with these impacts. This is a far from trivial challenge as it involves communicating a global phenomenon in locally relevant terms and language as well as providing assistance, capacity building and empowerment. (v) Finally, the challenge is to go from pilot scale to mass replication around the world.I am pleased that the series of CBA conferences, of which this is the third, is providing a platform to enable sharing of knowledge and experience amongst policy measures (both global as well as national), researchers and practitioners on CBA. After the second conference in 2007 we prepared and launched the CBA website (CBA-Exchange) which is now up and running. During this, third conference we will be discussing the possibility of launching a major CBA Initiative involving Civil Society and others and you will find the Draft Proposal in your packs. We will discuss this amongst ourselves during the field trips and conference and then we will have a special session on the last day to hopefully agree on an announcement. So, I am personally looking forward to spending the next few days both in the field and here in Dhaka getting to know many of you and discussing ways in which we can all continue to work together to promote CBA.I thank you for your patience and wish everyone has a successful conference experience.