Implementation of a Strategic Framework for Scaling Up Ecosystem-Based Adaptation

In the last few decades, governments, civil society organizations, local communities, and scientific institutions have made significant progress in implementing EbA measures. However, scaling up EbA—meaning the ability to consolidate, replicate, and institutionalize these experiences at the territorial and sectoral levels and within public policy and investment frameworks—remains the primary challenge. 

Scaling up EbA, under the umbrella of nature-based solutions, requires not only technical interventions but also robust enabling environments, including political leadership, adaptive governance, capacity building, sustainable financing, and the integration of scientific information with local and Indigenous knowledge, among other key factors. 

Against this backdrop, the Scaling Up Ecosystem-Based Adaptation Measures in Rural Latin America initiative, implemented in Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Guatemala, offered valuable insights into how EbA measures are scaled up in practice. Based on the documented evidence from 18 cases, it is demonstrated that scaling up does not follow a single path, but rather manifests itself through multiple trajectories that combine vertical processes—associated with public policies, management tools, and institutional frameworks—as well as horizontal processes linked to replicating community, sub-national/territorial, and sectoral successful practices. 

This publication shares lessons learned regarding the success factors that enabled the scaling up of EbA in the three countries, using a strategic framework that integrates the dimensions of governance, capacity building, and enabling conditions throughout the EbA mainstreaming cycle.