Climate Change

Strengthening the provision of climate services for farmers

Building resilience in farming communities implies protecting livelihoods and strengthening capacities to reduce or absorb the impact of, and quickly recover from, disruptive events. Climate services provide climate information to help individuals and organizations make proactive and climate-informed decisions that support the transformation towards more productive, resilient and anticipatory agricultural systems. 

It is estimated that improved climate services and forecasting could lead to up to USD 30 billion per year in increased global productivity and up to USD 2 billion per year in reduced asset losses. The benefit-cost ratios are estimated to be in the order of 10 to 1 and in some cases even higher (WMO, WBG, GFDRR, USAID, 2015; GCA, 2019).

Climate services relevant to the agriculture sector

Climate services relevant to the agriculture sector

  • Weather forecasting
  • Seasonal climate forecasting linked to local crop calendars
  • Agrometeorological crop monitoring and forecasting
  • Pest and disease forecasting and advisories
  • Extreme event warnings tailored to relevant sector (pastoral, fisheries, etc).
  • Services relevant at various stages of the value chain (transportation, storage, etc).

 

Climate services support adaptation planning in the agriculture sector. Developing effective climate services for agricultural users is an interdisciplinary process that involves many steps and actors. The general process should be tailored to the local context and to the needs and preferences of the intended users. Another major challenge is the communication and uptake of climate-informed advisories and early warnings. A series of feedback mechanisms should systematically integrate the producers and users of information in the co-design and co-production of climate services. Some of the fundamental steps for reaching the last mile in the climate services framework include: 

1. Data collection and monitoring
2. Co-production and co-design of tailored services
3. Communication of services to the last mile
4. Participatory engagement for climate-informed actions

FAO projects on climate services:

Agricultural climate resilience enhancement initiative (ACREI)

Agricultural climate resilience enhancement initiative (ACREI)

 

ACREI is a WMO-FAO-ICPAC joint three-year project that seeks to strengthen climate services and the participatory engagement of local communities. With activities in Kenya, Uganda and Ethiopia, the project is an example of effective cooperation between international and regional agencies. Increasing access to climate information tailored to the user is a primary focus of ACREI. The project places emphasis on participatory mechanisms to sustainably enhance production and diversify livelihoods for increased incomes. Sixty farmer field school groups have been formed and are being supported to undertake learning with focus on adaptation: there are 18 in Uganda, 20 in Ethiopia and 22 in Kenya, with an average of 30 members each. 

Participatory Scenario Planning (PSP) exercise with a Farmer Field School as part of the Agricultural Climate Resilience Enhance Initiative. PSP strengthens the collective interpretation, ownership and practical application of seasonal advisories and climate forecasts, which are translated into local languages.

Strengthening Agro-climatic Monitoring and Information System (SAMIS)

Strengthening Agro-climatic Monitoring and Information System (SAMIS)


SAMIS is enabling farmers in LAO PDR to make informed judgements about the most appropriate technologies and approaches to adopt in the face of climate variability by building infrastructure for agro-climatic monitoring and a web tool called LaCSA (Laos Climate Services for Agriculture) that provides weekly, monthly and seasonal recommendations by crop. At the policy level, new decision makers are being provided with IT hardware, software and capacity development to assess how climate change may shift suitability of key crops and the socio-economical acceptability of different future potential farming and cropping systems.

Scaling-up Tajikistan’s agrometeorological programme

Scaling-up Tajikistan’s agrometeorological programme

With support from the European Union and in close collaboration with the Agency for Hydrometeorology of Tajikistan’s Committee for Environmental Protection, FAO established a pilot agrometeorological network to introduce weather data collection and analysis methods to provide early warning to farmers on climate, plant diseases and yield forecasting.