Assessments and appraisals for climate-smart agriculture
There are a number of practices with the potential to improve productivity of local agricultural systems, enhance food security and support livelihoods. Implementing climate-smart agriculture is a very context- and location-specific process. There is no single set of practices that is applicable to all situations. A careful strategic assessment needs to be made within a policy or programme to evaluate the benefits and trade-offs in various social, economic and environmental conditions (see module C3 on policies).
Assessments can identify the impacts local climate conditions have on agriculture, food security and livelihoods, and how these impacts are changing and are projected to change in the future. Assessments can also be used to assess whether certain measures are climate-smart or not in a particular context. Effective climate-smart agriculture interventions may differ from more traditional agricultural development and natural resources management interventions. Proper assessments are necessary to justify a transition to climate-smart agriculture and determine which climate-smart agriculture activities can achieve desired outcomes (e.g. increased incomes despite high vulnerability to an increasing number of droughts). Knowing which crops or livelihood activities may be more sensitive to changing climate, for example, will help practitioners choose more resilient crops and adopt more diversified livelihoods. Informing stakeholders of the changing amounts of rainfall and the spatial distribution of precipitation will help them improve their management of water resources. (See Box C8.1).
Climate impact assessments
Climate impact assessments specify the past, present and expected future changes in climate, and establish evidence-based relationships between climate and productivity in crop, livestock, forestry and fishery sectors. (The impacts of climate change in agriculture are described in modules B1 on crop production, module B2 on livestock production, module B3 on forestry and module B4 on fisheries and aquaculture). Climate impact assessments identify the vulnerability of different stakeholders to a changing climate (Figure C8.1). Stakeholders targeted by vulnerability assessments include male and female smallholder farmers, landless labourers, commercial farmers and people working in the value chain.
The rest of this chapter provides an overview of the possible approaches and frameworks for climate impact assessment. These different approaches can be described as 'top-down', 'bottom-up', 'vulnerability' and 'resilience'. Definitions of key concepts important to understand climate impact assessments are provided in module A2 Climate impact assessments are typically conducted at the project’s conceptualization stage, but they are also used to inform policy directly (Figure C8.2).
Effective adaptation options can be explored based on historical, current and projected climatic impacts on agriculture and the vulnerability of livelihoods and food security. It is also possible to simulate the adaptation activities that are more suitable for adapting to a changing climate. Mitigating climate change can be achieved in two main ways: reducing emissions of greenhouse gases and sequestering carbon in the biomass and the soil. Assessing the mitigation potential of project interventions is important for ensuring that there are no trade-offs with adaptation actions. On a national scale, it is also important to monitor and quantify the impact of carbon sequestration in contributing to international agreements on climate change mitigation. Climate-smart agriculture activities should also meet broader food security and development goals (for further information see module A1 on the rationale of climate-smart agriculture).
The best climate-smart agriculture interventions are those that promote synergies between adaptation and mitigation without compromising food security and development goals. Ideally, priority should be given to options that address as many climate-smart agriculture objectives as possible. Stakeholders should be invited to review the findings of the appraisal.
Vulnerability and resilience approaches
Traditionally, vulnerability and resilience approaches are different in some key aspects.
Table C8.1.
Vulnerability approach | Resilience approach |
|---|---|
Oriented towards hazard and risk research | Oriented towards ecological and environmental science |
Focused on people | Focused on complex interactions, feedbacks and processes of social-ecological systems |
Translatable to application and policy outcomes | Conceptual and not easily translatable into practice |
Conduct assessments for single spatial scale and ‘snapshots’ in time | Conduct dynamic assessment (but present methodological difficulties in measuring and characterizing) |
Less focused on ecological and environmental aspects | Less focused on the social aspects of social-ecological systems |
Assess present and future vulnerability from past information | Assess more positively future needs by building on present assets |
Source: adapted from Engle, 2011.
These concepts have evolved over time. Recently, they have begun to converge, with vulnerability frameworks starting to include more environmental factors, and the resilience frameworks starting to put more emphasis on the social systems (i.e. livelihood resilience). Despite their remaining differences, the two frameworks can be connected through the concept of adaptive capacity (Engle, 2011; see also chapter A2-2). Adaptive capacity assessments from both the vulnerability and resilience perspectives are recommended. An important common element will always be the specific identification of target groups and areas in relation to livelihoods and food security systems.
Quantitative scaling-down approaches focusing on outcome vulnerability
The top-down assessment approach starts from global atmospheric greenhouse gas concentration scenarios and climate projections, and moves down the spatial scale to regional, national and subnational levels for local climate projections, climate change impact assessments, and ultimately the identification of adaptation options (Figure C8.1). The local impacts of climate change on different sectors and the vulnerability of these sectors are derived using a sequence of different methods and tools across disciplines and scales. In this multicomponent approach, uncertainties in the analyses may be inflated as they are propagated throughout the sequence.
Figure C8.1. Outcome vulnerability
- Source: adapted from O’Brien et al., 2007
Local participatory qualitative assessments of vulnerability
The bottom-up assessment approach takes observed local trends, both past and present, as the point of departure, and focuses on the socio-economic dimensions of vulnerability as a basis for considering future vulnerability. The emphasis is on community-based participatory assessment, rather than on the numerical models often used in top-down approaches. The vulnerability and adaptation needs of communities are put into context with reference to local non-climatic factors. Vulnerability is influenced by changing biophysical, social, economic, political, institutional and technological structures and processes.
In the participatory qualitative approach, many factors and processes determine the vulnerability of social and ecological systems. The concept of contextual vulnerability provides a more holistic view in which the climate projections are only one part of the assessment of threats.
Figure C8.2. Contextual vulnerability
The top-down assessment approach may be best suited for informing climate-smart agriculture policies at the national and subnational levels. However, it may not be able to suggest the best climate-smart agriculture practices at a given project site. The bottom-up approach is appropriate for detailed assessments at a small scale to support the design of climate-smart agriculture projects.
Climate impact assessments provide an important interface between science, policy and the public. Better communication should be encouraged among three distinct communities: the climate science community, the impact and vulnerability assessment community and the climate-smart agriculture community. An effective climate impact assessment must incorporate a wide variety of stakeholders to validate the process, interpret the results and translate them into adaptation and mitigation options that support climate-smart agriculture outcomes.
Appraisals of climate-smart agriculture options in terms of productivity, climate change adaptation and mitigation benefits
Following climate impact assessments, climate-smart agriculture appraisals examine the extent to which different climate-smart agriculture measures may achieve the objectives of increasing productivity, decreasing vulnerability by enhancing climate change adaptation and mitigation, and improving food security, given the expected impacts of climate change. This helps practitioners identify effective climate-smart agriculture options and creates synergies for reaching multiple objectives. Climate-smart agriculture projects can then be formulated to implement the identified measures. Climate-smart agriculture strategies should ideally be reviewed and updated periodically as new information becomes available.