During the webinar, the speakers promoted a set of training materials that is freely available for those interested in learning more about the implementation of NDCs in the agriculture sector in Africa. More info about the webinar: https://ccafs.cgiar.org/implementing-ndcs-agriculture-sector-across-africa-what-directions-capacity-building#.XxaxH_gzbfZ

1. Module 2:
Climate actions in agriculture and
priority setting for investments
Organized by
With support from

2. Introduce the premise of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) and other
climate-resilient agriculture approaches
Describe different CSA technology options
Provide case-study examples of successful CSA technology options
in Africa
Discuss technical tools for ex-ante analysis of CSA options in agriculture
Learning Objectives

3. Part 1:
Climate-smart agriculture and other climate-resilient
agriculture approaches

4. Climate-smart agriculture definition
• Most common is from FAO:
“agriculture that sustainably increases productivity, enhances
resilience (adaptation), reduces/removes GHGs (mitigation) where
possible, and enhances achievement of national food security and
development goals”

5. Why CSA?
• CSA addresses the
relationship
between climate
change and agriculture
• CSA addresses food
security, misdistribution
and malnutrition
• Relationship between
agriculture and climate
change is a two-way street Source: Vermeulen 2014.

6. • CSA addresses the relationship between agriculture and poverty
• 75% of the world’s poor live in rural areas
• Agriculture is their most important income source
 Agriculture is uniquely placed to propel people out of poverty
Why CSA?

7. Source: Papusoi and Faraby 2013
What is CSA?
Key characteristics:
• Addresses climate change
• Integrates multiple goals
• Manages trade-offs

8. • Maintains ecosystem services: CSA adopts a landscape approach to ensure
coordinated approaches to land use, planning and management
• Multiple entry points at different levels
• Not ‘just’ a set of practices and technologies
• Also involves information technologies, insurance schemes, value chains,
and institution and political enabling environments
Additional characteristics of CSA

9. • CSA is context specific
Source: Rosenstock and Lamanna 2015
Additional characteristics of CSA

10. • Does a practice need to achieve all three pillars, productivity, adaptation
& mitigation?
Not necessarily. In developing countries, mitigation is seen as a co-benefit rather
than a requirement. Also, in a portfolio or landscape approach, some practices
could focus on productivity and resilience while others focus on mitigation, as long
as all objectives are being met in the entire area.
• Isn’t this just the same as {sustainable agriculture, agroecology}?
CSA’s “equal” focus on productivity, resilience, and mitigation differentiates it from
other approaches, but it shares many characteristics with other approaches to
sustainable food security. CSA is also not prescriptive, but must be tailored to the
local context.
• Other Questions?
Source: ICRAF and CIAT 2020
CSA Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

11. Actions to
achieve CSA
Source: FAO (2017),
Infographic on Climate-
Smart Agriculture. Food
and Agriculture
Organization of the United
Nations, Rome, Italy.

12. 1. Agro-ecology
2. Sustainable intensification
3. Nature-based solutions
4. Ecosystem-based adaptation
5. Conservation agriculture
Other approaches related to building climate resilience in agriculture

13. Discussion:
1. What other approaches are being used in your country?
2. How do these approaches relate to the pillars of CSA?
 There is not one correct solution. Here we will continue focusing on CSA, but other
approaches can lead to similar outcomes.
Other approaches related to building climate resilience in agriculture

14. 1. Weather-smart practices
2. Water-smart practices
3. Seed/breed-smart practices
4. Carbon/nutrient-smart practices
5. Institutional/market-smart activities
Types of CSA options

15. Climate information
services:
• Help to build
resilience by enabling
farmers to better
manage negative
impacts of weather-
related risks in poor
seasons while taking
greater advantage of
average and better
than average seasons
1. Weather smart practices
Examples:
PICSA use in 14 countries in Africa
Climate info services in Senegal

16. • Index-based insurance
• Uses a weather index, such as rainfall, to
determine payouts for clearly defined
hazards
• Contribution to CSA:
• Productivity: allows farmers to take
additional risks and invest in improved
practices
• Adaptation through short-term climate risk
management
• Adaptation through longer-term risk
management
• Mitigation
1. Weather smart practices
Photo: ILRI/Susan Macmillan
Example: Kenya Livestock Insurance Program, see info here and
here

17. • Different scales: farm level, irrigation
systems or catchment level, and
national or river basin level
• Under rainfed agriculture:
• Water harvesting
• Soil management practices for
capture and retention
• Soil fertility and crop management
innovations (Water use efficiency)
2. Water smart practices
• Under irrigation:
• From the source
• Through conveyance and application systems
• Through better scheduling and availability of water in the root
zone
Photo: ICRISAT (link to original)

18. • CSA contribution:
• Productivity: improved growth (in absence of other limitations)
• Adaptation through short-term risk management: reduction in the risk
of crop water stress and yield loss
• Adaptation through longer-term risk management: increase in water
availability and greater water use efficiency
• Mitigation: opportunities in rice alternate wetting and drying; possible
reduced energy consumption for pumping
• Decrease women’s and girls’ workload in fetching water and manual
irrigation of fields
2. Water smart practices

19. • Forestry and agroforestry
• Productivity: improved production of
ecosystem services (food, fibre, fuel,
soil quality)
• Adaptation: healthy and diverse
ecosystems are more resilient to natural
hazards
• Mitigation: increase in tree cover
increases carbon sequestration and
biomass above and below ground
• Example: the Great Green Wall re-
greening work in Burkina Faso and
Niger (see pg. 9-10 here)
3. Nutrient/carbon-smart practices

20. Soil management practices
• Productivity: improvements in
fertility and soil water availability
and reduction of losses through
erosion will improve productivity
• Adaptation: specific interventions
can help reduce risk of run-off
during intense rainfall events
• Mitigation: improvements in
carbon storage, reduction in
emissions from excess fertilizer
applications
3. Nutrient/carbon-smart practices
Example: landscape-based adaptation in Doyogena,
Ethiopia
Climate-smart landscape in Doyogena, Ethiopia, fostering landscape
rehabilitation and increased livelihood resilience. Photo: D. Solomon
(CCAFS)

21. • Involves strategies to account for the
different socio-economic, climatic and soil
conditions of an area
• Productivity: higher yielding varieties,
better crop nutrient management, faster
growing livestock
• Short-term adaptation: breeding for
drought tolerance, shorter duration
varieties; breeding for resistance to pests
and diseases
• Longer-term adaptation: heat and salinity
tolerance traits
• Mitigation: reductions in emissions from
soil and water management and more
productive livestock breeds
4. Seed/breed-smart practices

22. • Policy engagement: appropriate policies and an enabling environment
• Institutional arrangements: at all levels and between scales
5. Institutional/market-smart activities
• Value chains: bring together
relevant stakeholders from
different parts of the chain to
make decisions in a coordinated
way
 All activities affect productivity,
adaptation and mitigation

23. • Example: policy frameworks that support climate actions, such as Ethiopia’s
Climate Resilient Green Economy strategy
• Example: community seed banks across East Africa, with policy support (info
here)
• Climate-smart input subsidy programs? Evidence is thin that these have
been successful (see here)
• Other macro level examples from your countries?
5. Institutional/market-smart activities

24. • What are your examples?
• Please share successful CSA stories from your own countries
Case studies of successful CSA

25. Part 2:
Priority setting for CSA options using data
Based on material from World Agroforestry (Hannah Kamau) and the
Evidence for Resilient Agriculture (ERA) team

26. Climate hazards and risks
• Any exercise on prioritization
must first start with an
understanding of the climate
signals/hazards and risks
Source: Girvetz et al. 2019

27. • Many countries already have National
Agriculture Investment Plans (NAIPs)
as part of their CAADP commitment—
these have already prioritized
interventions
• Other publications that offer
prioritizations:
• NDCs, NAPs and NAMAs
• CSA Profiles
• CSA Investment Plans
• Economic analyses from universities or
policy think tanks
Priority setting for CSA options
Source: Nwafor 2018

28. CSA Country Profiles in Africa
These give an overview of agricultural challenges and how CSA can help specific
countries adapt to and mitigation climate change
• 14 Profiles available in
Africa (click here for access)
• Under preparation for
Niger, Ghana and Mali
• Developed using
participatory
approaches by CIAT and
CCAFS with in
partnership with the
World Bank, Costa
Rica’s CATIE, and USAID

29. CSA Investment Plans (CSAIPs)
• World Bank initiative
building on the CSA
Profiles
• Identify concrete
actions governments
can take to boost CSA
• Used for driving
investments and
policies
CSAIP investment outcome example:
In Lesotho, the CSAIP informed the design of the
$50 million second phase of the Smallholder
Agricultural Development Project (SADP 2), by
highlighting the sector’s major climate change
challenges and possible solution pathways, in
particular related to the likely impacts of climate
change on agricultural trade and comparative
advantage across key commodities as well as key
climate-resilient practices.

30. Make use of national universities and policy think tanks to assess the costs and
benefits of policies that contribute to climate adaptation, such as:
• Research and extension (e.g., climate forecasts)
• Input quality and availability (e.g., improved seeds and fertilizers)
• Water availability (e.g., irrigation and water-saving technologies)
• Market access and infrastructure (e.g., roads, transport)
• Improving value chains (e.g., on-farm storage, value addition)
Economic evaluation tools: economics of different policies

31. • NAIPs and other existing policy documents should be used first
to make sure other CSA plans are in alignment
• But what if you need more details for your country or specific
area?
• Trying to decide what are the best-bet options can be challenging
• The online database Evidence for Resilient Agriculture (ERA) can help
• Here we provide an overview; the group exercise will provide hands-on
exploration of the website
Priority setting for CSA options

32. Priority setting for CSA options using data
The challenge for decision makers
Many Practices Many Goals Many Contexts
MitigationResilience
Productivity
Of what?
Most common crops?
Most vulnerable crops?
For whom?
Most farmers?
Most vulnerable farmers?
Module 5 discusses
social inclusion concerns

33. Priority setting for CSA options using data
The importance of context
Source: Bayala et al. 2012,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaridenv.2011.10.011
In a given farming system…
Some practices improve outcomes
Others do not…

34. Priority setting for CSA options
Source: Pittelkow et al. 2014
Effect on Maize Yield (%)
Conservation AgricultureFor a given option…
It can improve outcomes in
some places
But not in others

35. How to determine the best-bet options to scale up?
1. Identify the context
2. Identify the options
3. Identify the outcomes
CSA Options
Yield
Income
Soil Health
Gender Equity
Adoption Potential
etc..
Best-Best
Options
4. Generate evidence
5. Evaluate the evidence
6. Choose the best-bet
options

36. Trade-offs and synergies
You may notice that some options have positive impacts for one outcomes,
but neutral or negative impacts on other outcomes
Increased Yield Inorganic Fertilizer GHG Emissions, Costs
Less erosion,
Improved soil quality,
mitigation
Agroforestry Lower yields
Increased resilience to
droughts
Irrigation High cost, high labor
demand
Option

37. Determining best-bet options using scientific evidence
How can we sift through the 1000s of studies on potential CSA options in
Africa to decide what to recommend?
70
Practices
x 20
Indicators Abstract/title review
Full text review
Key word search
Data extraction
+50,000
studies
1700 studies

38. Determining best-bet options using scientific evidence
When compiled, all this evidence becomes stronger. Examining many
different CSA experiments on different farms in different places – META-
ANALYSIS
70
Practices
x 20
Indicators
The group exercise will now give you hands-on experience using ERA to
examine outcomes, assess climate-smartness and identify interactions.

39. Key messages
Climate-smart agriculture can help countries meet several of their development
goals and NDC commitments
Many CSA practices are context-specific and need to be evaluated for each
agro-ecosystem where they will be applied.
Models and prioritization tools can help evaluate CSA options to know which
will provide the best return on investment.

40. Thank you
Questions?