Highlights and images for 10 December 2023

Moving from Planning to Implementation: Solutions on How to Accelerate Transformative Adaptation Action in the Agriculture and Land-use Sectors

Persistent gaps between planning climate action and achieving transformative change in agrifood systems must be closed in order to fully implement adaptation solutions and achieve the targets of developing countries’ Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and National Adaptation Plans (NAPs). Offering opportunities to learn from those engaged in transformative, synergistic agrifood systems change, this event launched the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN’s (FAO) new collection of success stories from around the world, Catalyzing Climate Solutions.

Zitouni Ould-Dada, Deputy Director of the Office of Climate Change, Biodiversity and Environment, FAO, opened the event by highlighting the increasing attention to climate adaptation, where capacity must be synergistically built alongside mitigation efforts. Ould-Dada announced the launch of the Catalyzing Climate Solutions report and urged others to learn lessons from the cases included in the report.

In opening remarks, Maria Helena Semedo, Deputy Director-General, FAO, urged multi-sector responses on adaptation in agrifood systems, as food and water systems are most frequently reported as at risk from climate change and 94% of NDC’s prioritize agrifood systems. She noted increasing political will to take action, as demonstrated at COP 28 by: the Agriculture, Food, and Climate National Action Toolkit; 150 countries signing the Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture, Resilient Food Systems, and Climate Action; and the first inception meeting of the Food and Agriculture Sustainable Transformation (FAST) Partnership. However, she stressed investment gaps, with less than 20% of climate related developing financing going to agrifood systems in 2021.

Ould-Dada moderated a panel discussion where stakeholders shared their experiences addressing climate adaptation in agrifood systems at the country level.

Maribel Pinto, Ministry of Environment, Panama, highlighted efforts to work with local food producers to understand how future scenarios will affect them. She noted that Panama has started NAP-related work in agriculture and aquaculture sectors to implement the commitments demonstrated by NDCs.

Tserendulam Shagdarsuren, Ministry of Environment and Tourism, Mongolia, stressed her President’s new comprehensive policies on agrifood systems, as well as links between different ministries and institutions that facilitate collaboration at the policy and implementation levels. She stressed that local partners are essential for implementation and that the comprehensive policies will be re-evaluated in 2026.

Lamine Diatta, Directorate for Environment and Classified Establishments, Senegal, also emphasized connections between planning at the national level and implementation at the local level. Diatta noted the need for tools that help subnational leaders mainstream climate adaptation, and he cited work with FAO to assess vulnerabilities in different ecologies, where solutions must take consider local contexts.

Linda Ogallo, Climate Prediction and Applications Center (ICPAC), shared experiences working with FAO in Kenya, Uganda, and Ethiopia to identify gaps in data and improve information provision in local communities to support agricultural development. On achieving gender equity in such projects, Ogallo emphasized the need to be intentional to ensure women are equally included and also to be aware of gender-specific preferences for different information sources.

Joe Robertson, EAT Forum, stressed many gaps exist in the value chains of agrifood systems that financing does not presently reach, and urged creating multidimensional performance metrics to reveal these gaps and to make them accessible to private investors. Demonstrating where value is present will reveal the best places to put money that synergistically delivers urgently needed benefits to climate resilience, human health, access to nutrition, and sustainable food production.

During a question and answer period, audience members asked about the different types of information local communities need in the short-, medium-, and long-term, as well as barriers to scaling up adaptation action. Pinto noted certification programs involving the private sector to bolster exports, and Diatta stressed the challenge of achieving scale across geographic regions with such specific ecological conditions. Ogallo noted tools for farmers, such as participatory scenario planning, and Shagdarsuren stressed the challenge of meeting the adaptation needs of livestock herders. Robertson underscored the need to get actionable data to private investors that links multiple dimensions of adaptation, such as the appropriate value of ecologies and regenerative farming practices and materials.

Closing the event, panelists offered brief reflections on the biggest barriers to scaling up adaptation: Robertson noted vulnerable places that are considered risky investments, and thus left out of finance flows; Ogallo stressed siloed approaches that emphasize agricultural productivity rather than vulnerability as a whole; Diatta highlighted access to climate finance; and Pinto and Shagdarsuren urged better access to information to build adaptive capacity.

Organizer: FAO
Contact: Julia Wolf | julia.wolf@fao.org
For more information: www.fao.org/climate-change