AgMIP joins the Global Alliance for Climate-Smart Agriculture
Apr 23, 2015
By: Jenna Famular
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) agricultural systems must increase production 60 percent by 2050 to meet the nutritional needs of a world population of 9 billion. However, agriculture systems will also be impacted by climate change and decision-makers will need to incorporate both mitigation and adaptation strategies into their planning to insure a food secure future for their people. In order to address these interrelated challenges of food security, FAO initiated the concept of Climate-Smart agriculture in 2010.
Climate-Smart agriculture promotes production systems that sustainably increase productivity, improve resilience via adaptation, reduce or eliminate greenhouse gas emissions via mitigation, and enhance achievements of national food security and development goals.
In September 2014 The Global Alliance for Climate Smart Agriculture (GACSA) was launched to work with stakeholders from farmers to governments to withstand the effects of climate change in agriculture, forestry, fisheries, food systems and social policies, and promote sustainability in natural resource use.
Photo: C. Rosenzweig and C. Porter at Climate-Smart Agriculture meeting in Montpellier, France, March 2015.
The Alliance’s overall aim is to enhance the resilience of 500 million people in agriculture by 2030 through their use of climate smart agriculture approaches. As of January 2015 the Alliance had 74 members working towards these goals. The Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP) is pleased to announce it has recently joined GACSA and an AgMIP PI, Cynthia Rosenzweig, will also be serving on the Strategic Committee. This committee, along with a Facilitation Unit hosted by FAO, will work to guide GACSA initiatives and interactions.
AgMIP will also serve as a facilitator for the Knowledge Action Group on Environment and Decision Support Tools. The objectives of the Knowledge Action Group are to promote knowledge, research and development, and sharing of technologies, practices, and policy approaches for Climate-Smart agriculture, as well as to improve communication among participants via outreach, extension, and technical assistance.
AgMIP’s mission to provide effective science-based agricultural decision-making models and assessments of climate variability and change compliments the goals of climate-smart agriculture. These models and assessments work towards creating sustainable farming systems to achieve local-to-global food security. The tools and protocols AgMIP scientists are developing can be used anywhere in the world to help local stakeholders in their ongoing climate-smart decisions.
By linking climate, crop and economic models with emerging technology trends and adaptations of interest to stakeholders, assessments of current – and future – investments in climate-smart adaptations can be advanced. A scientific process that includes envisioning of a range of possible stakeholder decisions under plausible future conditions allows stakeholders to investigate pathways more appropriate to the impacts of climate change on farming systems.
AgMIP is looking forward to working with the other members of GACSA to further the efforts of climate-smart agriculture and to facilitate the use of climate-smart decision-making in agricultural planning.
From more information on the Global Alliance for Climate Smart Agriculture please click here.