Options for Climate-Smart Agriculture at Kaptumo Site in Kenya

This report identifies and assesses climate-smart agricultural practices through participatory appraisal tools with experts and farmers, as part of the MICCA pilot project in Kaptumo, Kenya. The aim is to highlight and add climate-smart practices within the ongoing development programme which aims to integrate climate change adaptation and mitigation with improving livelihoods and productivity of the dairy farming system

Rare and low-frequency coding variants alter human adult height

Height is a highly heritable, classic polygenic trait with ~700 common associated variants identified so far through genome - wide association studies . Here , we report 83 height - associated coding variants with lower minor allele frequenc ies ( range of 0.1 - 4.8% ) and effects of up to 2 16 cm /allele ( e.g. in IHH , STC2 , AR and CRISPLD2 ) , >10 times the average effect of common variants . In functional follow - up studies, rare height - increasing alleles of STC2 (+1 - 2 cm/allele) compromise d proteolytic inhibition of PAPP - A and increased cleavage of IGFBP - 4 in vitro , resulting in higher bioavailability of insulin - like growth factors . The se 83 height - associated variants overlap genes mutated in monogenic growth disorders and highlight new biological candidates ( e.g. ADAMTS3, IL11RA, NOX4 ) and pathways ( e.g . proteoglycan/ glycosaminoglycan synthesis ) involved in growth . Our results demonstrate that sufficiently large sample sizes can uncover rare and low - frequency variants of moderate to large effect associated with polygenic human phenotypes , and that these variants implicate relevant genes and pathways

REVIEW OF CLIMATE CHANGE MITIGATION IN AGRICULTURE IN TANZANIA

This report assesses and identified policies, strategies and initiatives led by the Tanzanian government towards addressing the impact of climate change in agriculture. Supporting 80% of the population, agriculture is still the main stay of the economy, and hence any negative impact originating from climate change to this sector has significant effect to the country economy and community livelihoods. The commitments of the Tanzanian government towards combating climate change at national, international and local level have been exemplary. Furthermore, due to less mechanized form of agriculture which also a rainfed, less input in terms of inorganic fertilizer and chemical pesticides, the country is still contributing less to the emission of the greenhouse gases (GHG). GHGs emission in Tanzania is reported mainly to be from land use change and forestry by 87.33%, energy and agriculture ranking second and third by contribution 6.39% and 5.68% respectively. This information gives an impression that despite less emission of GHGs in agriculture compared to other sectors, special attention needs to be paid on soil and livestock in order to reduce the emission from agriculture. The expected growth in agricultural sector may trigger acceleration of GHGs emission which might surpass other sectors, currently the conversion of natural forests and woodlands into agricultural fields is at alarming rate, the current rate of deforestation that have been reported by the government stands at 400,000 ha/year, agricultural sector is said to be the key contributor of deforestation. The REDD+ readiness phase is the most significant mitigation program, the readiness phase has been implemented through the UN-REDD and the NICFI programme with a total budget of over 100mil USD. The readiness phase has laid down a foundation to most ground work to support accounting on GHGs emission. Moreover, the readiness phase gave set up of the MRV system together with a road map for RL/REL. currently the ability of the nation to collect emission data (NFI) is much enhanced than before. Institutional arrangement and coordination for Carbon monitoring is well underway through the NCMC. However the development of MRV system in Tanzania is still at infancy stage as many of the key issues are not in place viz. NFMS, RL/REL and the definition of forest. Tanzania has a good foundation of policy framework to address adaptation and mitigation of climate change in agriculture. It needs very complex and accommodating methods and tools that will capture differences in agro-ecologies farming systems, agricultural input levels and other land management.The document is also available ttp://www.fao.org/climatechange/micca/en/) .Government of Finland

Urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts (SDG 13): transforming agriculture and food systems

Actions on climate change (SDG 13), including in the food system, are crucial. SDG 13 needs to align with the Paris Agreement, given that UNFCCC negotiations set the framework for climate change actions. Food system actions can have synergies and trade-offs, as illustrated by the case for nitrogen fertiliser. SDG 13 actions that reduce emissions can have positive impacts on other SDGs (e.g. 3, 6, 12, 14, 15); but such actions should not undermine the adaptation goals of SDG 13 and SDGs 1, 2, 5 and 10. Balancing trade-offs is thus crucial, with SDG 12 central: responsible consumption and production. Transformative actions in food systems are needed to achieve SDG 13 (and other SDGs), involving technical, policy, capacity enhancement and finance elements. But transformative actions come with risks, for farmers, investors, development agencies and politicians. Likely short and long term impacts need to be understood

Resolving the UNFCCC divide on climate-smart agriculture

Agriculture has featured prominently in the UNFCCC technical discussions but is largely absent from the formal negotiation processes. There is also a growing divide between how developed and developing countries frame solutions to the impacts of climate change on agriculture, which is limiting recognition of solutions that integrate mitigation and adaptation opportunities, such as climate-smart agriculture

Associations of autozygosity with a broad range of human phenotypes

Abstract: In many species, the offspring of related parents suffer reduced reproductive success, a phenomenon known as inbreeding depression. In humans, the importance of this effect has remained unclear, partly because reproduction between close relatives is both rare and frequently associated with confounding social factors. Here, using genomic inbreeding coefficients (FROH) for >1.4 million individuals, we show that FROH is significantly associated (p < 0.0005) with apparently deleterious changes in 32 out of 100 traits analysed. These changes are associated with runs of homozygosity (ROH), but not with common variant homozygosity, suggesting that genetic variants associated with inbreeding depression are predominantly rare. The effect on fertility is striking: FROH equivalent to the offspring of first cousins is associated with a 55% decrease [95% CI 44–66%] in the odds of having children. Finally, the effects of FROH are confirmed within full-sibling pairs, where the variation in FROH is independent of all environmental confounding