Global Climate Change is one of the dire challenges facing the international community today. Coastal zones are vulnerable to its impacts. An effective approach with long-term prospects in addressing climate change impacts is it's mainstreaming into development agenda of sectoral policies. A comprehensive risk and vulnerability assessment is a pre-requisite to ensure that the right adaptive response is taken for effective integration into developmental plans. The objective of this study is to evaluate and prioritize risks, vulnerability and adaptation issues of current and anticipated impacts of climate change on the coastal zone of The Gambia. The study will also give a methodological contribution for assessing risks, vulnerability and adaptation from the sub-national to local levels. The relevance of this study will be to create a link between the sub-national and local levels in order to facilitate the integration and mainstreaming of climate change into sectoral and local policies for more climate-resilient communities. This will aid in the promotion of strategic investment of constrained developmental resources to actualize successfully dynamic coping strategies, elude 'maladaptation' and less compelling responsive measures. A purposive expert sampling technique was used in selecting respondents for the study. The findings of the study reveal that by the end of the 21st century, the climatic variables likely to have the highest impact on the coastal zone of The Gambia are 'increased flood severity' and 'increased temperature'. The coastal zone of The Gambia showed a high vulnerability to these climate change variables. The suggested adaptive response in addressing the impacts of increased flood intensity in the study area includes; improving regulations for restricting agriculture and livestock grazing activities to improve land cover; strengthening of early-warning systems, among others. The suggested adaptive response in addressing the increase in temperature includes: increase crop diversification and rotation to reduce total crop failure; switching to drought-tolerant crop and animal species, among others.

The aerial videotape-assisted vulnerability analysis (AVVA) technique was combined with various data sets to assess the vulnerability of the coastal zone of The Gambia to sea level rise. Land loss due to inundation, flooding, and erosion was estimated. Costs of damage and population at risk were also evaluated. Only historical data and maps were used to assess the vulnerability of the coastal zone of the Abidjan region of Côte d'Ivoire to sea level rise. Results show that with a 1 m sea level rise the whole of the capital city of Banjul will be under mean sea level in the next 50 to 60 yr as a greater part of the city is below 1 m. The mangrove systems on St. Mary's Island, Kombo St. Mary, and the strand plains in the north bank will be inundated. About 1950 billion Dalasis (US $ 217 million) worth of land will be lost. The most appropriate response would be to protect the whole of the coastline of Banjul, the shoreline area from the Banjul cemeteries to Laguna Beach Hotel, the infrastructure at Sarro, and the hotel complex at Cape Point. Innovative sand management, repair of the damaged groins, and construction of dikes, breakwater structures, revetments, and low-cost seawall are some of the shoreline stabilization and hardening techniques suggested for the protection of this area. For the Abidjan region, the same response strategies should be used. Adaptation responses identified for both regions include public awareness, increase in height of coastal infrastructure, urban growth planning, wetland preservation and mitigation, and development of a coastal zone management plan.

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