The primary aim of this tool is to offer regions a platform for self-assessment, guiding them through the process of understanding and enhancing their climate resilience. Specifically, it helps regions to:

• Gain a better understanding of the resilience-building process
• Identify their level of climate resilience maturity and recognise potential gaps.
• Prioritise suitable policies to  enhance climate resilience.
• Justify funding for specific resilience measures.

The data gathered through this self-assessment shall help regions to understand their scope of action for climate resilience-building based on their specific regional (governance) characteristics. Additionally, this assessment may also be used as reference for the development of regional resilience strategies or action plans.

This tool is designed for regional authorities, authoritative bodies or practitioners operating at regional level. These are the actors who should take the lead in conducting the assessment. However, this tool aims at capturing and assessing the capacities and features of the regional system as a polycentric system, with different types of actors steering the climate resilience-building process at various levels and scales. In fact, climate resilience-building needs to be cross-sectoral and requires collaboration across different systems. Therefore, regional practitioners conducting the assessment should take into consideration to complete it with the support of all departments working on building climate resilience. A collaborative approach to the conduction of this assessment, involving diverse regional stakeholders, is also meant to decrease the level of bias or subjectivity that could play a role if the assessment is completed by an individual. To enhance the reliability of responses, it is advisable to seek input from colleagues in relevant departments, especially when lacking sufficient information for certain questions.
 

The Climate Resilience Maturity Assessment for Regions is based on the Regional Resilience Maturity Model(RRMM), developed within the EU project “Regions4Climate” to provide a common understanding of climate resilience-building process at regional level. The RRMM consists of 50+ policy-linked indicators organised into different dimensions, emphasising the integration of climate and societal transformation within a broader climate resilience framework. This model has been translated into the Climate Resilient Assessment for Regions web-based self-assessment tool for periodic evaluations. 

The RRMM development was based on the recognition that a set of regional functions, processes and characteristics can be developed to better equip a region to face evolving and multiple (climate) risks in the short- and long-term. These characteristics can be strengthened through targeted policy and action. Therefore, the tool aims at evaluating such regional characteristics that contribute to climate resilience-building regardless of the specific sector or hazard.

This model recognizes that regions vary in competences and governance structures, aiming to assess regional characteristics that contribute to climate resilience-building across sectors and hazards. Therefore, the RRMM underscores the importance of understanding each region's specific context to evaluate its climate resilience maturity effectively.
 

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the regional scale for climate adaptation and resilience building. Regional governments, as subnational level of governance between state and local political and administrative scales, are considered a promising scale to facilitate vertical coordination among national and local levels, as well as horizontal cooperation across local authorities and mediation between local knowledge and expert adaptation knowledge (Granberg et al., 2019, p. 2; OECD, 2020, p. 3). Regions are considered suitable for strategic planning for local-scale climate resilience and adaptation, and can mobilise larger pools of resources than local governments, while carrying out decision making closer to stakeholders than the national level would (Gallaraga et al., 2011; OECD, 2020). This is recognised also by the EU Mission on Adaptation to Climate Change’s focus on the regional scale, emphasising the key role of regions to design pathways of transformation addressing regional and local needs in the face of increasing challenges, including climate change. 
 

However, there is a lack of decision-supporting tools for climate action that specifically target the regional level, distinguishing the role of regional governments from that of municipalities. But regional governments’ structure can vary drastically in terms of jurisdictions and authoritative powers and research shows how governance structures have an impact on the local capacity for resilience (Birchall et al., 2023). For example, according to Granberg et al. (2019), the role of regional governments depends on the strength of the municipalities on its territory as well. The present digital tool is an attempt to capture and clarify the role and challenges of regions in building climate resilience, in order to support regional governments in their efforts towards resilient development in a more tailored way, aligning with specific regional contexts and capacities.

References:

Birchall, S. J., Bonnett, N., & Kehler, S. (2023). The influence of governance structure on local resilience: Enabling and constraining factors for climate change adaptation in practice. Urban Climate, 47, 101348.

Galarraga, I., Gonzalez‐Eguino, M., & Markandya, A. (2011). The role of regional governments in climate change policy. Environmental Policy and Governance, 21(3), 164-182.

Granberg, M., Bosomworth, K., Moloney, S., Kristianssen, A. C., & Fünfgeld, H. (2019). Can regional-scale governance and planning support transformative adaptation? A study of two places. Sustainability, 11(24), 6978.

OECD. (2020). A territorial approach to climate action and resilience. OECD Programme. Available at: https://www.oecd.org/cfe/cities/overviewTACAR.pdf 

1. Log in or create a user profile. 
2. After you log in to your user area, you can start the assessment by clicking on “Start a resilience assessment”, or access an already existing assessment.
3. The first page (Dimension 0: "Introduction and Regional Governance Context") is where you should start. In order to answer these questions, you need to have some basic knowledge regarding the governance context and characteristics of your region.
4. The rest of the assessment consists of a series of indicators divided into 7 dimensions, covering various aspects of resilience-building. 
5. For each indicator, please read the guiding question and description, provided on the left.
6. Then, assign a score from 0 (lowest level) to 4 (highest level), based on the situation of your region at the moment of conducting the assessment.
7. If you do not have the answer, or if the indicator does not correctly apply to your regional context, please select "does not apply" and provide an explanation using the follow-up questions that will appear. Note that when selecting “does not apply”, this does not imply scoring “zero” for that indicator: rather, the indicator is not considered in the calculation of the final percentage score for that dimension.
8. If you have selected a score lower than 4, please add some information on the right, specifying what barriers your region encounters in achieving a higher score for that specific indicator.
9. If you have any additional comments, please use the space provided on the right.
10. You can save your assessment anytime, by clicking on “Save Draft”, and retrieve it later from your “User area”.
11.  Once you have completed the last dimension, click on “Submit”. A new window will open with the final score of the assessment, showing your Climate Resilience Maturity Level. Scores for each dimension will be visualised in separated boxes. 
     

The assessment is structured around 50+ indicators designed to evaluate various dimensions of regional climate resilience-building and each of them is assessed based on a scoring system, assigning a score ranging from 0 (lowest maturity level) to 4 (highest maturity level). The indicators are divided into the following dimensions:

1. Regional Governance and Institutional capacity
2. Plans and policy instruments
3. Human resources and technical skills
4. Participatory governance and stakeholder engagement
5. Behavioural change and awareness
6. Finance and resources 
7. Data and knowledge

An additional, introductory dimension opens the assessment, titled "Introduction and Regional Governance Context".
 
 

After completing the assessment, a general Climate Resilience Maturity Score is generated by summing up the scores assigned to each indicator, for each dimension. This score serves as a measure of the region's Climate Resilience maturity level for each dimension, as a percentage, and it is visualised in a radar chart. This visualisation method was chosen since it offers an intuitive and easy-to-read picture of the maturity levels for each dimension and the potential areas of improvement, in order to inform prioritisation of policy interventions from the part of the regions assessed. 

Additionally, individual Climate Resilience Maturity levels are provided for each of the dimensions assessed. 

Please note that the indicators for which "does not apply" was selected are not considered in the calculation of the final percentage score for the respective dimension.

This tool acknowledges that the concept of a region can vary widely across different contexts, encompassing various administrative structures, levels of authority and legal competences.

The term region is purposefully not defined strictly, for the tool to be used by various types of regions and tailored to their specific context. The region is understood as an administrative level between national and local. In different countries and contexts, this may pertain to autonomous regions, coalition of municipalities, and more. 

For these reasons, the first section of the assessment aims at collecting information on the governance context of the region, in order to take its specificity into account, and provide data to inform tailored policy recommendations.

As you fill in the assessment, please consider the entire regional system of your reference, including the multiple administrative units that it may contain. When you feel like the indicators or scoring levels are formulated in a way that does not capture your specific context, please write an explanation in the space provided.

Regional competences refer to policy areas or sectors in which the region holds authority, legislative competences/ownership or competences for implementation.