By Kelly Witkowski, Agriculture and Climate Change Officer, IICA, kelly.witkowski@iica.int
By Kelly Witkowski, Agriculture and Climate Change Officer, IICA, kelly.witkowski@iica.int
2015 was a key year for international climate negotiations, and culminated in the adoption of the Paris Climate Agreement at the COP21. Scheduled to enter force in 2020, it strengthens the resolve to meet the 2 degree Celsius temperature increase while encouraging movement towards 1.5 degrees. The Agreement also raises the profile of adaptation, underlining the need for “enhancing adaptive capacity, strengthening resilience and reducing vulnerability to climate change, with a view to contributing to sustainable development and ensuring an adequate adaptation response in the context of the temperature goal”.1
Agriculture occupied a much more prominent role in the climate negotiations in Paris than ever before. As one of the sectors most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and one that also has great potential for mitigation, the agriculture sector has increasingly been taking steps at the local, national and regional levels to address the issue. The preamble of the Paris Agreement recognizes “the fundamental priority of safeguarding food security and ending hunger, and the particular vulnerabilities of food production systems to the adverse impacts of climate change.” 2
Agriculture is also included in the majority of the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), or building blocks of the Paris Agreement, submitted by countries to the UNFCCC, including the large majority from Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC).
(I)NDCs: What are they? Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) are individual and voluntary commitments and goals for post-2020 climate action that both developed and developing countries submitted before or shortly after the COP21 in December of 2015. Based on national priorities, circumstances and capabilities, they detail each party’s goals and the actions they will take to achieve a low-carbon, climate resilient future. All of the INDC’s include a mitigation component, and the large majority also address adaptation concerns. Submissions included both unconditional goals, as well as conditional goals that are contingent on receiving financial or technical support. As the Paris Agreement was adopted during the COP21 in December of 2015, these are no longer considered intended, and are therefore referred to as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).
Through February 29, 2016, 161 submissions, reflecting 188 countries (including the 28 European Union member states) had been received by the Convention. These 188 countries represent almost 99% of global emissions in 2010 (excluding LULUCF) and 98% of the global population.3 Of these submissions, 18 included only mitigation, while 143 included both mitigation4 and adaptation.
Though not sufficient, NDCs are certainly a step in the right direction, committing all countries to report regularly on their emissions and stipulations were made in the agreement to ensure the goals are met and “ratcheted up” or increase in ambition over time. Countries will be required to submit emissions and progress reports on the implementation of their NDCs, develop revised, more ambitious plans every five years.
LAC NDCs: How was agriculture included? All of the countries in the Western Hemisphere, with the exception of Panama and Nicaragua, have submitted an INDC. Thirty one of those, from Latin America and the Caribbean, are analyzed here. All 31 of the NDCs included emissions reductions actions or targets. With the exception of Belize and Trinidad and Tobago, all also included information on adaptation. Belize, however, notes that they will be including this information at a later time.
Eighteen of the NDCs presented unconditional goals, while 29 presented goals (or additional goals) that are contingent on receiving adequate levels of support – either financial support, investment, technology development and transfer, or capacity-building.
The importance or promoting sustainable, climate resilient agricultural production and enhancing food security in the region in the face of climate change is reflected in the fact that 30 out of the 31 countries include the topic in their NDCs (Trinidad and Tobago did not). Twenty eight of the NDCs from the region reference the vulnerability of agriculture and food security to climate change and stress it as a priority for climate adaptation.
The NDCs highlighted the dependency of the countries on the agricultural sector for economic and rural development, employment, food security, and foreign exchange earnings. Sustainable management of fisheries, conservation of fisheries resources and the protection of reef ecosystems and marine habitats were mentioned as critical for many of the Caribbean countries.
While the primary focus of the region’s NDCs regarding agriculture was adaptation, many countries (24) also included agriculture as one of the sectors covered in the mitigation section of the NDC. Fewer included specific actions, projects or goals focusing on reducing emissions from the agricultural sector, as can be seen in the figure below.
Agriculture and mitigation
Due to its importance for food security, many countries do not commit to mitigation action in the sector. However in the region’s NDCs, five Caribbean countries and seven Latin American countries have included specific actions for mitigation from the sector. In the Caribbean, these were primarily linked to more efficiently using biomass to contribute to renewable energy plans or to avoiding land use change. In Latin America, there is a strong focus on mitigation as a co-benefit or in synergy with adaptation in the sector, with a focus on actions such as the implementation of agro-silvopastoral systems. Costa Rica and Uruguay make the strongest mitigation commitments for the sector, with Costa Rica focusing on coffee, livestock and biomass, and Uruguay emphasizing the reduction of emissions intensity from the livestock sector.
Agriculture and adaptation
The NDCs highlight the extreme vulnerability of the agriculture sector as well as vulnerabilities in the related sector of water resources, while emphasizing the need for policies and actions that enhance the resilience of the sector to climate change while increasing food security and promoting sustainable food production.
Several of the climate related risks and impacts featured in several of the NDCs include changes in precipitation quantity and patterns, extreme events, flooding, droughts, salinization of land and aquifers, increased land degradation, decreased productivity and increasingly scarce freshwater resources. Many highlight proactive actions being taken, such the incorporation of climate change in sectoral plans, and policies, actions to enhance food security and promote sustainable land management, and the development of agricultural sector adaptation strategies.
The governments of the region clearly acknowledge the importance and vulnerability of the agriculture sector, and prioritize building resilience in the agriculture sector to ensure food security and the achievement of other development goals. Strengthening policies, using improved varieties, diversification, reducing land degradation, improved natural resource management, rainwater harvesting and storage, desalinization, and integrated water resources management are all measures that several countries in the region have prioritized. A combination of policy, research, capacity building and technical measures at the local, national and regional levels will be required to transform the Caribbean’s agriculture into a low-emissions, climate resilient sector.
What’s Next? 2015 was a critical year for advancing the commitments made towards climate action, not only through the UNFCCC process, but also through the approval of the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction and the new Sustainable Development Goals. The coming years will define the success of these agreements, as the political commitments made are translated into action on the ground, the evolution of public policy frameworks, and the materialization of sufficient funding and other forms of support for developing countries. The agriculture sector will play a central role in the achievement in the goals laid out and must be more engaged and proactive to capitalize on the opportunities these agreements provide and to channel financing, knowledge, and technology towards the sector. Agriculture must be a leader in mainstreaming both mitigation of and adaptation to climate change within the policies, strategies and programs of the sector in order for countries to meet their food security, poverty reduction, environmental, and development goals.
Footnotes:
1 https://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2015/cop21/eng/l09.pdf pg. 23
2 https://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2015/cop21/eng/l09.pdf pg. 20.
3 http://cait.wri.org/indc
4 In the Western Hemisphere, the United States of America, Canada, Trinidad and Tobago and Belize did not include adaptation, though the latter
has plans to do so in the future.
5 Note: The data presented here is currently being finalized thus subject to change, however they do provide a solid indication of the hemispheric trends.
*The opinions expressed in this newsletter are those of the authors and they do not reflect the position of the Institute on the topics presented.
This post appears in the IICA Delegation in the USA Newsletter – January – February 2016
