The Role of Agriculture in the UN Climate Talks

Agriculture, and consequently food security and livelihoods, is already being affected by climate change, according to latest science from the IPCC. The various strands of work already underway on agriculture within the UNFCCC process can be strengthened and made more coherent. A 2015 climate agreement should reference food production and provide the financial, technical and capacity building support for countries to devise ambitious actions for the agricultural sector. A new climate agreement should be consistent with the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) proces

Progress on agriculture in the UN climate talks: How COP21 can ensure a food-secure future

Agriculture, and consequently food security and livelihoods, is already being affected by climate change, according to latest science from the IPCC (Porter et al. 2014). The IPCC agrees that the world needs to produce at least 50% more food than we do today in order to meet the goal of feeding a projected 9 billion people by 2050. This must be achieved in the face of climatic variability and change, growing constraints on water and land for crops and livestock, and declining wild capture fishery stocks. Although the protection of food security lies within the core objective of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) (Article 2), formal arrangements for addressing agriculture within COP21 are unlikely. CGIAR would welcome the strengthening of aspirations for food security through action on mitigation and adaptation within a new agreement. We recognise that the new climate agreement is unlikely to be prescriptive about how adaptation in agriculture is supported and how agriculture might contribute to emission cuts. These issues are addressed within countries’ INDCs and determined at national level

Funerary practices or food delicatessen? Human remains with anthropic marks from the Western Mediterranean Mesolithic

The identification of unarticulated human remains with anthropic marks in archaeological contexts normally involves solving two issues: a general one associated with the analysis and description of the anthropic manipulation marks, and another with regard to the interpretation of their purpose. In this paper we present new evidence of anthropophagic behaviour amongst hunter-gatherer groups of the Mediterranean Mesolithic. A total of 30 human remains with anthropic manipulation marks have been found in the Mesolithic layers of Coves de Santa Maira (Castell de Castells, Alicante, Spain), dating from ca. 10.2-9 cal ky BP. We describe the different marks identified on both human and faunal remains at the site (lithic, tooth, percussion and fire marks on bone cortex). As well as describing these marks, and considering that both human and faunal remains at the site present similar depositional and taphonomic features, this paper also contextualizes them within the archaeological context and subsistence patterns described for Mesolithic groups in the region. We cannot entirely rule out the possibility that these practices may be the result of periodic food stress suffered by the human populations. These anthropophagic events at the site coincide with a cultural change at the regional Epipalaeolithic-Mesolithic transition

Climate change adaptation in agriculture: practices and technologies. Messages to the SBSTA 44 agriculture workshops

In 2014 the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA), as part of its mandate to consider issues related to agriculture, decided to invite submissions from parties and observers, covering four topics, in 2015 and 2016. Of the two topics for consideration in 2016, one relates to ‘identification and assessment of agricultural practices and technologies to enhance productivity in a sustainable manner, food security and resilience, considering the differences in agro-ecological zones and farming systems, such as different grassland and cropland practices and systems’. In this info note we provide a brief overview of key practices and technologies. A twinned info note considers higher-level measures of adaptation in agriculture, such as policies and institutions

The challenges of making evaluation useful

The evaluation profession has been studying ways of increasing the use of evaluations. Here are some of the things we've learned are important for evaluations to be useful: being clear about intended uses by primary intended users; creating and nurturing a results-oriented, reality-testing culture that supports evaluation use; collaboration in deciding what outcomes to commit to and hold yourselves accountable for; making measurement of outcomes and program processes thoughtful, meaningful, timely, and credible - and integrated into the program; using the results in a visible and transparent way, and modeling for others serious use of results.<br>A avaliação como profissão vem estudando meios de ampliar a utilização das avaliações. Aqui são apresentadas algumas lições aprendidas como importantes, para avaliações serem úteis: clareza sobre quais são as utilizações pretendidas pelos principais usuários pretendidos; criação e fortalecimento de uma cultura de orientação de resultados e constatação da realidade que apóie a utilização da avaliação; colaboração nas decisões sobre com quais resultados se comprometer e se responsabilizar; garantia de que a verificação dos resultados e do processo de desenvolvimento do programa seja reflexiva, significativa, oportuna, confiável e integrada ao programa; utilização dos resultados de um modo visível e transparente servindo como exemplo para outras utilizações responsáveis de resultados