From Local Knowledge to Climate-Ready Communities: Inclusive Tools for Resilience

From Local Knowledge to Climate-Ready Communities

From Local Knowledge to Climate-Ready Communities is a tested research-to-action model developed by the National Research and Innovation Agency of Indonesia (BRIN) and partners to transform community knowledge into inclusive tools, policies, and actions for climate adaptation and disaster resilience. The initiative addresses a persistent gap in climate action: communities often possess detailed knowledge of environmental change, food security, natural warning signs, adaptive architecture, and collective survival, yet this knowledge is rarely documented, validated, or translated into practical resources for governments, schools, disaster agencies, and people with different accessibility needs.

The model is grounded in research on Indonesian communities’ responses to climate uncertainty, identifying practices such as community rice storage, intergenerational tree planting, and livelihood diversification as long-established strategies for protecting food supplies, household income, ecological resources, and future generations. Through a two-year research-to-action pathway, activities in 2024 included community workshops, policy dialogues, and knowledge exchange in West Sumatra, Aceh, and an Asian regional forum. In 2025, UNESCO Headquarters fully funded a structured pilot in Padang, Parigi Moutong, and Yogyakarta, implemented with Universitas Budi Luhur and local partners.

Inclusive Climate and Disaster Resilience

The 2025 pilot involved 100 participants, including 28 persons with disabilities, alongside customary and religious leaders, educators, volunteers, researchers, civil society organizations, and government representatives. Participants identified environmental indicators, cultural practices, trusted communication channels, accessible evacuation needs, and community resources that could be translated into practical preparedness routines. Pre- and post-training assessments demonstrated improved awareness and greater ability to recognize natural indicators, adaptive architecture, and cultural media for disaster education.

The innovation provides a structured pathway for identifying, validating, translating, and reusing community-tested knowledge. It has produced a bilingual ISBN-registered handbook, a policy brief, a ten-minute animated film, and an accessible web-based scrollytelling application. A total of 150 handbook copies were distributed to participants and relevant institutions, including local governments, UNESCO, BRIN, BNPB, Bappenas, and relevant ministries. Together, these outputs strengthen climate and disaster literacy, disability inclusion, community participation, and the integration of culturally grounded knowledge into resilience planning.

Replication and Institutional Adoption

The model has reached the scaled and replicated stage, with activities implemented across multiple locations and contexts. Its approach can be replicated by identifying local knowledge, validating it through community and expert dialogue, co-designing accessible materials, linking resources to schools and public agencies, and monitoring changes in knowledge and practice.

The next stage is to expand the model to additional climate-vulnerable regions, adapt materials to local contexts, embed them in schools and district programmes, and strengthen long-term measurement of knowledge, behaviour, and policy uptake. The initiative is seeking regional co-funders, implementation partners, and policy support to facilitate replication, long-term impact measurement, and institutional adoption.