Co-Evaluation as a step in the Co-Generation of Climate Services. An analysis of the CLARA experience

Due to the pervasive nature of climate change impacts, and their relevance for human welfare, climate services delivering advanced knowledge of climate change and variation are crucial. They aid informed decision-making at relevant spatial and timescale and to improve prevention, preparation, adaptation, and minimize residual damages. It is also imperative to evaluate the climate services with a view to quantify the economic value added of these services. Particularly crucial is to assess how the decision-making process of the service end users would unfold with and without the service to identify its differential impact on properly selected indicators of performance.

The co-generation (also called co-creation) in products and services was made popular by the business literature in the early 2000s and represents a conceptual shift from an emphasis on output to an emphasis on a mutually satisfying relational process between developers and users in service creation. It mainly consists of four stages, namely co-design, co-development, co-delivery, and co-evaluation. The stage of co-evaluation refers to the development and application of agreed upon criteria for the measurement of results. The criteria will touch upon both substantial and procedural issues. From a user perspective, it will be important to evaluate relevance, impact/benefits, utility, credibility, and costs (financial and human resources) in using climate services. These elements are important to assess the effectiveness and uptake of the service and possibly refine it towards these goals. From a developer perspective, important aspects to evaluate will include, for instance, the scientific quality of the service or its skill.

This presentation introduces the lessons learnt in the context of the H2020 project CLARA (Climate forecast enabled knowledge services) on how to effectively implement the interactions among researchers, end users and service developers to unveil the economic value added of climate services.