Regional priorities for strengthening climate services for farmers in Africa and South Asia

This report captures a process of shared South-South learning and planning towards defining priorities for strengthening and scaling-up climate information and advisory services for agriculture and food security in West Africa, Eastern and Southern Africa, and South Asia. The process began at the international workshop on “Scaling up Climate Services for Farmers in Africa and South Asia” (Saly, Senegal, December 2012), where participants collectively identified critical gaps in the design, delivery and effective use of climate services for smallholder agriculture; and self-organized into working groups to develop a set of priority actions for strengthening climate services for smallholder farming communities within and across regions in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. Following up on a commitment made at the workshop, USAID and CCAFS partnered to develop a small grants program and sponsor a set of guided planning workshops to enable the working groups that emerged from the Saly workshop to further develop their visions, and obtain resources to begin to implement them. Expert working groups from all regions prioritized improving the scientific capacity of National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHSs) to develop location specific seasonal climate forecasts at the subnational scale, and enhancing institutional frameworks for collaboration between the different agencies involved in the production and communication of climate services. The Eastern and Southern Africa working group also emphasized the co-production with farmers of location-specific climate services, and the importance of assessing the added value of climate services for enhancing agricultural production and managing risk. The West Africa working group prioritized communications mechanisms for reaching marginalized groups, including rural radio and Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs), and training farmers to access and use climate information. Building on the region’s existing strength in ICTs, the South Asia group emphasized efforts to identify appropriate ICT tools and build the capacity of smallholder farmers, women, poor and socially marginalized groups to access and utilize climate information services

Proposed Elements in the Compendium on National Drought Policy

Crisis management has typically characterized governmental response to drought. This approach has been ineffective, leading to untimely and poorly coordinated responses. The growing frequency and magnitude of droughts in many parts of the world call for the development of a pro-active, risk-based approach, the tenets of which are outlined in a national drought policy. Improved management of drought requires completion of a vulnerability assessment at the outset to determine those sectors, regions, and population groups most at risk to severe drought. Each country is unique in its vulnerability and institutional capacity to prepare for and respond to drought. Since the national drought policy for any given country will depend very much on the local circumstances and priorities, it is imperative that the guidance provided on the development of a national drought policy not be prescriptive to any government. Instead, we propose to develop a compendium of the desirable elements in a national drought policy from which countries could adopt those elements that will be appropriate to their local circumstances and national priorities. This paper describes some of those elements that could be included in the compendium on national drought policy under three main categories: Drought Monitoring and Early Warning Systems; Vulnerability Assessment and Impacts and Emergency Relief and Response

Managing drought risk in a changing climate:The role of national drought policy

There is increasing concern worldwide about the ineffectiveness of current drought management practices that are largely based on crisis management. These practices are reactive and, therefore, only treat the symptoms (impacts) of drought rather than the underlying causes for the vulnerabilities associated with impacts. Through the adoption of national drought policies that are focused on risk reduction and complemented by drought mitigation or preparedness plans at various levels of government, the coping capacity of nations to manage droughts can be improved. The time for adopting an approach that emphasizes drought risk reduction is now, given the spiraling impacts of droughts in an ever-increasing number of sectors and the current and projected trends for the increased frequency, severity and duration of drought events in association with a changing climate. This paper discusses the underlying concepts of drought, the principles and objectives of national drought policies and a drought planning process that has been effective in the preparation of drought mitigation plans

Coalition-building for participatory irrigation management under changing water resource trends: reflections on the reforms in Andhra Pradesh, India.

In Shivakoti, G. P.; Vermillion, D. L.; Lam, W. F.; Ostrom, E.; Pradhan, U.; Yoder, R. ( Eds.). Asian irrigation in transition: responding to challenges. New Delhi, India: Sag

Moving towards the concept of "partnership" in irrigation management in India

In Sivamohan, M. V. K.; Scott, C. A. (Eds.), India: Irrigation management partnerships. Hyderabad, India: Booklinks Corporatio