A recent Nature article highlights a significant moment for evidence-based policymaking, as major funders invest $70 million in creating “evidence banks“ that will enable policymakers to quickly access and synthesize the world’s scientific knowledge. The need for mainstreaming rigorous evidence synthesis has been increasingly recognized in recent years, but this marks the first major investment by funders to tackle the critical challenge of supplying governments with high-quality, actionable evidence. The goal is to build systems that allow for rapid synthesis of research, empowering policymakers to make informed decisions on complex global issues such as climate change.
For the climate community, this investment is a call to action to create comprehensive, living databases that answer the essential question: “What works?” While thousands of studies have been produced on climate-related policies, the synthesis of these studies into clear, reliable insights has lagged behind. Policymakers often struggle to navigate this vast body of research, and traditional evidence synthesis is slow, costly, and often outdated. By building these evidence banks, with studies pre-selected, tagged, and ready to be synthesized, this initiative aims to provide real-time, evidence-backed answers. This first wave of funding signals a crucial shift towards more efficient, evidence-driven climate policy, marking the beginning of a new era in the way we tackle climate change with the power of evidence synthesis.
Read the article here: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-03100-2