IHCantabria attended in Panama the closing ceremony of a project that has analyzed the risk of climate change in the Gulf of Montijo

Researchers of the Environmental Hydraulics Institute of Cantabria (IHCantabria) attended on October 2 and 3 the closing event of the project “Technical assistance for the development of a climate risk vulnerability study in the Gulf of Montijo”, funded by the European Union through the EUROCLIMA Program, implemented by the French Public Agency for Technical Cooperation: Expertise France, and whose beneficiary is the Ministry of Environment, through its Directorate of Climate Change.

Within this project, which began in February 2024 and has lasted 7 months, IHCantabria has conducted a climate change risk analysis of the Gulf of Montijo, located in the Province of Veraguas, on the Pacific coast of Panama, which is included in the National System of Protected Areas (SINAP) of the Ministry of Environment of Panama, and is identified as a RAMSAR wetland of high international importance.

The closing event of this project, held on October 2 and 3 of 2024 in Panama City and Santiago de Veraguas respectively, was attended by representatives of all the entities that are part of the project. On behalf of IHCantabria, the Director of the project, Javier López Lara, professor at the University of Cantabria and head of the Climate Risk, Adaptation and Resilience Group of IHCantabria, and María Fuentes Álvarez de Eulate, IHCantabria researcher of the same group, participated in this event. Also, on behalf of the Panama-based company Ítaca, its CEO Laura Canevari attended this event. Ítaca has formed a consortium with IHCantabria for the execution of the project, covering the elaboration of social, economic and social participation studies.

Within the framework of this closing meeting, on the first day the official closing event took place in Panama City, attended by representatives of the Ministry of Environment of Panama, the Delegation of the European Union in Panama and Expertise France, where the results of the project and its most relevant conclusions were presented, as well as the analysis of potential future strategies in this area at the national level. On the second day, a closing meeting was held in Santiago de Veraguas with the communities and key local agents who participated in the project, where the results of the project were also presented and the experiences, lessons learned and local strategies for the future were discussed.

The main objective of the project was to analyze the climate risks associated with marine dynamics through the analysis of the impacts derived from sea level rise in the Gulf of Montijo, in addition to the proposal of restoration measures for mangrove forests in the area based on this risk analysis. In order to formulate these restoration measures and ensure their effectiveness in order to ensure that they last over time, we have worked closely with the local communities of the Gulf of Montijo throughout the project. This collaboration has been carried out through a total of 8 workshops led by the company Ítaca whose objective was, on the one hand, to determine the perceived and tolerable risk of these communities to the effect of river and coastal flooding in the area, as well as to have a better knowledge of the study area through their testimonies and experiences. On the other hand, the second objective of these workshops was to create capacities in the community in order to ensure the continuity of the restoration actions identified during the project, making a concrete, consensual and planned definition of the actions to be carried out in the future once the project is completed.

Of the tasks planned within the framework of this project, specifically IHCantabria has carried out: (1) historical analysis of the evolution of the coastline in the last 40 years, including both the evolution of beaches and mangrove forests; (2) determination of flood maps of the study area and erosion rates in the future, for different climate change scenarios in both areas; and (3) analysis of vulnerability and risk in the study area due to climate change, considering potential impacts (such as flooding, lack of fluvial sediment supply, erosion/recession of the coastline and anthropic actions) not only on the mangrove forests and their associated ecosystems, but also on the population, housing, critical infrastructure and economic activities carried out in the Gulf of Montijo.

The Ministry of Environment of Panama has shared the progress of the project through its Climate Risk and Vulnerability Module, which can be accessed through the following link: https: //transparencia-climatica.miambiente.gob.pa/modulo-vrc/

Finally, IHCantabria has participated in multiple studies in Panama in recent years, financed by international organizations such as the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and, in this case, by the EUROCLIMA Program, through the French public technical cooperation agency Expertise France.