Digital tools for climate change adaptation and mitigation

KEY MESSAGES ◼ Digital tool functions for agricultural technical advice and performance assessment related to climate change adaptation and mitigation are limited. ◼ Tools for technical advice provided functions related to climate change adaptation more often than mitigation. Yet most tools (92%) addressed three or fewer climate change adaptation indicators. ◼ Technical advice with access to weather information or early warning systems for hazardous weather was the most common function of the tools analyzed. ◼ Performance assessment tools were predominantly GHG emission calculators. ◼ Features for inclusive communication with tool users (e.g., iconography, video or audio messages) included messaging (31% of tools) and voice and video (28%). ◼ Exemplary tool features for climate change adaptation and mitigation should inform future digital tool development for agriculture and food systems. ◼ Tools that provide coaching functions and support farmer input enable farmers to weigh the trade-offs of their decisions and add context on how to achieve and sustain change. ◼ Achieving scale for climate-informed digital tools does not just mean increasing farmers’ access to tools, but also supporting action recommendations in tools and identifying priority, large-scale impacts in terms of the level of climate risk mitigated and resilience built, or climate change mitigation achieved

Exemplary features of digital tools for agroecology: A global review

KEY MESSAGES ◼ Few digital tools support agroecology comprehensively, but many have agroecological components. ◼ Features that improved two-way farmer communication, targeting of farmer subgroups, farmer-driven content and use of human intermediaries were exemplary features for social inclusion. ◼ Exemplary features for technical advisory tools included context-specific technical options, use of videos, integration with coaching and hotlines for questions, and two-way communication. ◼ Exemplary features for performance assessment included collaborative definition of indicators with farmers, easy to use spreadsheets (for researchers) and easily digestible quick view reporting such as pie charts

Evaluating ambition for soil organic carbon sequestration and protection in nationally determined contributions

Increased international attention on agricultural soil organic carbon (SOC) has raised expectations of its potential contribution to both climate change mitigation and adaptation. Yet, debate on what is achievable and how to monitor or verify improvement in SOC has challenged progress. Since SOC is the primary terrestrial carbon pool, specification of SOC targets, policies and measures in agriculture may be pivotal to achieving global climate change targets, and thus appropriate to include in the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) to the 2015 Paris Agreement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Global digital tool review for agroecological transitions

This report summarizes a global review of digital resources relevant to climate change-informed agroecological transitions. The goal of the review was to identify exemplary features of digital tools for socially inclusive and climate-informed agroecological transitions. We cataloged digital resources available globally that provided either technical advisory services or performance assessment, as functions that directly support scaling up new practices. We reviewed the tools’ functions (i.e., the purpose of using a tool) against indicators for exemplary features (i.e., the channels through which a user can engage with the tool). To address social inclusion, we gave special attention to farmers’ co-creation of knowledge for on-the-ground practices

Critiques of digital tools in agriculture: Challenges & opportunities for using digital tools to scale agroecology by smallholders

KEY MESSAGES ◼ Two themes manifest in the challenges outlined, unequal power relations and a disconnect from farmers’ needs and input. ◼ Agricultural digitization should strive to follow ethical principles specific to the sector, agroecology offers an existing framework. ◼ Digital technical assistance that advances the interests of smallholders and is relevant to their farms can facilitate a shift towards agroecology through farmer-to-farmer networks and knowledge exchange. ◼ Recommendations include: ▪ Govern for an inclusive digital ecosystem & economy ▪ Leverage and expand food, data & social justice movements ▪ Code ethics into digital developmen

Ambition for soil organic carbon sequestration in the new and updated nationally determined contributions 2020- 2021: Analysis of agricultural sub-sectors in national climate change strategies

Key messages - The share of countries that referenced soil organic carbon (SOC) in new and updated NDCs has increased since the previous round of NDCs. - Among the top 10 countries with the highest mitigation potential for SOC in croplands and grasslands, 6 referred to SOC in mitigation measures. - Among the top 10 countries with the highest mitigation potential in wetlands, 5 referred to wetlands in mitigation measures. - SOC commitments that demonstrated high standards, which may indicate options for other countries, included quantified outcomes, information on reference levels of indicators, mitigation potentials, and policies. - Specification of sub-sector actions in NDCs can improve eligibility for climate finance, but this level of detail can reduce countries’ flexibility for meeting their NDC targets and countries often lack affordable, robust monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) systems

Climate change impacts of the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) commercial agriculture portfolio

This report provides an initial, rapid assessment of a selection of programmes in the commercial agricultural portfolio of the Department for International Development of the United Kingdom (DfID) (now the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Offices or FCDO) to demonstrate a range of interventions and their likely net greenhouse gas (GHG) emission impacts. Analysis of crop and livestock value chains in seven countries, representing over four million hectares, shows that the changes in farmers’ practices supported by DfID’s bilateral investments in commercial agriculture significantly enhance crop and livestock production, while likely reducing net GHG emissions in the near term. The programme value chains increased average crop productivity by 1.0 ton per hectare per year (t ha-1 y-1), and reduced net GHG emissions by as much as 5.5 tCO2e ha-1 y-1 (cocoa agroforestry) compared to the start of the programme. Cereals demonstrated smaller annual changes, averaging a reduction of 0.80 tCO2e ha-1 y-1. Livestock productivity only increased slightly on average from 1.0 (goats) to 3.0 kg head-1 y-1 (beef cattle), with corresponding slight reductions in net GHG emissions from 0.001 (goats) to 0.01 (beef cattle) tCO2e head-1 y-1. Increases in emissions across the programmes are commonly due to increased use of nitrogen fertiliser and mechanisation. Reductions are commonly due to carbon sequestration in the soil as a result of manure addition, minimum tillage, crop rotation or reduced burning. These results are consistent with the increased use of inputs expected from market-driven agricultural intensification

CCAFS’s Low- Emissions Development (LED) research and engagement impact on innovation and scaling-up mitigation options in agriculture

The objective of CCAFS’s Flagship 3 on Low-emission Development (LED) is to reduce agricultural greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions while ensuring food security at large scales. Research focused on estimating GHG emissions, developing LED technical options, and identifying mechanisms for scaling up options. Results informed the feasibility of an LED framework in agriculture and built a community of practice for implementation of LED at scale. This report provides a synthesis of the Flagship’s outputs, outcomes, and impacts. LED research outputs The Flagship reported 1,001 outputs from 2011 to 2020. CCAFS’s other flagships and regional programs contributed an additional 866 outputs related to the LED program. Most outputs (42%) were reports and journal articles (Figure 1). LED research outcomes The CCAFS LED Flagship generated 60 outcomes from 2011-2020 (Table 1). The Flagship informed 16 LED policies and plans, 8 improved MRV systems, and contributed to developing 8 LED finance and investment plans. This review of the CCAFS LED Flagship found that the Flagship: - Produced significant new knowledge about greenhouse gas emissions for smallholder farmers, low-cost emissions estimation methods and tools, a database of emission factors representing agricultural systems in low and middle-income countries, a web- based knowledge platform for Measurement, Reporting, and Verification (MRV), and a web-based guidance to low-emission development resources; Emission factors were generated for paddy-rice (99), rice-wheat system (56), livestock (34), and maize-wheat systems (25). - Provided evidence for climate action by providing decision-makers with ex-ante analysis and tools to identify targets, LED options, and the suitability of options for different production systems; - Developed and tested approaches for integrating mitigation into national and sub- national agricultural development programs, sustainability initiatives, and private sector investment to support large-scale adoption of LED options; - Contributed to 60 significant outcomes, i.e., use of research outputs at scale, from 2011- 2020. The majority of outcomes informed LED policies and plans, improved MRV systems, or enhanced LED finance and investment at global, regional, and national levels; and - Generated impacts over 10 years with the potential to reduce emissions by 196 M tons of CO2e, including the adoption of mitigation options by 36 M farmers in 69 M hectares of land with more than US$4 billion investment committed from national and sub-national governments, global climate finance, the private sector, and bilateral/multilateral funding organizations. Lessons from the CCAFS LED experience - Partnerships with research users across the public and private sectors can lead to innovation in mitigation research and scaling. Partnering with entities who conveyed their research needs to us and wanted to use results to design their programs generated the most impact. This happened with USAID, DfID/FCDO, IFAD, ADB, World Bank, Climate Bonds Initiative, responsAbility, Impossible Foods, the GRA and others. It required an entrepreneurial approach to approaching partners to offer services rather than pre-determined research projects. Partnership with the GRA was especially productive, gave us government legitimacy and helped us develop access to a wider base of contacts. Regular UNFCCC COP presence helped us to build visibility and expand our partnerships. - Research focused on countries with existing leadership in LED in agriculture where demonstrable progress was possible: Vietnam, Indonesia, Colombia, Brazil, Mexico, China, Kenya, and Ethiopia. - Investing in communities of practice through initial workshops and science-policy forums helped rapidly develop the LED framework for agriculture and built CCAFS’ networks for collaboration and impact. - Rapid analysis of NDC data, e.g., after the 2015 Paris COP, providing infographics that can be used in a wide range of presentation contexts (e.g., maps of NDCs), and making databases widely available, such as the NDC analysis in 2015 generated a lot of interest and ongoing use. - A focus on high-impact mitigation actions that contribute meaningfully to global targets is a priority, rather than on practices promising insignificant (i.e., low) mitigation co- benefits. - Prioritize geographic emissions hotspots, countries, and value chains to generate large - A huge appetite exists in the finance community for technical information and developing pipeline of mitigation projects in the supply chain and landscape. - Support the transition to a policy, finance and market environment, for example, conditional finance, regulations, and company accountability; to mainstream GHG mitigation in the agriculture sector

Agroecology and climate change rapid evidence review: Performance of agroecological approaches in low- and middle- income countries

Agroecology is increasingly seen as being able, or even necessary, to transform food systems (HLPE 2019). The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) and the CGIAR Research Programme on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) commissioned this rapid evidence-based review to assess the quality and strength of evidence regarding (i) the impact of agroecological approaches on climate change mitigation and adaptation in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) and (ii) the programming approaches and conditions supporting large-scale transitions to agroecology and transitions. The review also aims to identify knowledge gaps critical to understand and inform future public and private investment in research, development, and deployment of agroecological approaches. The focus here is on the science of agroecology at the field and landscape level, not on social movement, value chain or business aspects. We use the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) 10 elements of agroecology with the Gliessman (2016) framework to identify agroecology practices (transition level 2) and agroecology systems (transition level 3). To assess evidence related to agroecology‘s climate change outcomes we conducted a systematic literature review of i) synthesis papers and ii) primary empirical studies related to nutrient and pest and disease management. For the latter we documented the presence of evidence for climate change outcome indicators, but not the magnitude or direction of the change. We also conducted semi-structured interviews with representatives from 12 organizations supporting or implementing on-the-ground agricultural development programmes to better understand the feasibility of scaling out agroecology