The Climate Change Strategy for the Western Indian Ocean region is an operational framework to foster regional cooperation in addressing the impacts of climate change by assessing the degree of preparedness and the vulnerability and adaptive options of communities within the Nairobi Convention area. It takes into account the existence of national climate change strategies and complements national actions by encouraging collaborative e orts by States with the aim of sustainably managing marine and coastal ecosystems by enhancing the resilience and adaptive capacities of socio-ecological systems, individually or collectively, in order to maximize resource use, and by avoiding duplication of effort.