The threat of global climate change has caused concern among scientists as crop growth could be severely affected by changes in key climatic variables and agricultural production and food security could be affected both globally and locally. However, farmers living in harsh environments in the regions of Africa, Asia and Latin America are constantly coping with extreme weather events and climatic variability. This has led them to develop and/or inherit complex farming systems that have the potential to bring solutions to many uncertainties facing humanity in an era of climate change. These systems have been managed in ingenious ways, allowing small farming families to meet their subsistence needs in the midst of environmental variability, and without depending much on modern agricultural technologies.

In light of global concerns over the impacts of climate change and climate variability, this document provides an overview of opportunities for adaptation and mitigation in dryland pastoral and agropastoral systems. It makes a case for a concerted global effort to promote mitigation practices that also have benefits for adaptation and livelihoods of pastoralists and agropastoralists in drylands. The review also highlights the vast untapped potential for climate change mitigation and adaptation associated with improved carbon sequestration in pastoral systems and rangelands. Much of this potential lies in soil carbon sequestration.