Scientific reports, political directives and national plans follow one after another, urging regions to adapt to new climate realities. Yet, one question remains: how do adaptation initiatives among local communities and businesses actually unfold on the ground. While announcements of public or government-backed projects or regulatory frameworks often take centre stage, other, far more discreet grassroots forms of action or reorganisation are at work, which can be grouped under the term “silent adaptation”.

Behind this term lie numerous individual, corporate or collective initiatives, which, while not specifically designated or labelled as “adaptation”, are nevertheless gradually transforming organisations and regions. Taking these dynamics into account and gaining a better understanding of their nature could prove crucial in ensuring that public policies do not overlook aspects of the reality experienced on the ground by local communities and businesses.

Adaptation: a concept still seeking meaning in its practical application

Faced with a steady decline in his harvests, which are suffering from persistent mildew caused by erratic weather patterns, a winegrower based in France’s Aude department has been benefiting since 2021 from data collected by local weather stations. This, thanks to a technician working for the departmental Chamber of Agriculture. This valuable data enables him to anticipate adverse weather conditions as effectively as possible while awaiting INRAE’s (the National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and the Environment, a public scientific agency) approval of new grape varieties that are more disease-resistant, which are being tested as part of a collaborative project.

Yet at no point does this winegrower refer to these measures as ‘actions for adapting to climate change’, even though they are helping his vineyard cope and keep up with the accelerating pace of new climate realities.

Long regarded as the “poor relation” of international and national climate policy agendas, adaptation to climate change is now........

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