We are pleased to invite you to the exciting, new FARMD & CGIAR’s Climate Change, Agriculture, and Food Security (CCAFS) Spring Webinar Series:
Prioritizing climate-smart agricultural interventions at different spatial and temporal scales
If global food security and poverty reduction targets are to be achieved in sustainable ways agricultural systems will need to be transformed. One approach to reorienting agricultural systems to support food security under the new realities of climate change is climate-smart agriculture (CSA).
CSA is about promoting coordinated action towards climate-resilient pathways through building evidence, increasing local institutional effectiveness, fostering coherence between climate and agricultural policies, and linking climate and agricultural financing. It emphasizes implementing flexible, context-specific solutions, using approaches that evaluate the trade-offs and synergies, between the three pillars: 1) sustainably increasing agricultural productivity to support equitable increases in incomes, food security & development; 2) managing risks in the short term and building resilience to climate change in the longer term, from the farm to national levels; and 3) developing opportunities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture.
Information is needed that can help decision-makers at all levels prioritize climate-smart investment. CGIAR and partners are developing a growing body of work on tools and methods that can be used to prioritize CSA interventions and investments at different scales. Some of this work was highlighted in a recent special issue of the journal Agricultural Systems. A series of four webinars by distinguished scientists is proposed to present some of CGIAR’s work in this arena. Each webinar is a live event, lasts one hour (15 minutes presentation, 45 minutes facilitated discussion), and will be recorded and uploaded on this page (see below for past presentations in the series).
Webinar Schedule:
April 12: Dr Pramod Aggarwal, CCAFS Regional Program Leader, South Asia
Tools and approaches to prioritizing CSA interventions in South Asia
3 May: Dr Ana Maria Loboguerrero, CCAFS Regional Program Leader, Latin America Reducing Climate Risks in Latin American Agricultural Sector: A Tool to Prioritize Climate Smart Agriculture Interventions
24 May: Dr Todd Rosenstock, ICRAF & Dr Evan Girvetz, CIAT
“CSA-Plan”: Strategies to put CSA into practice
21 June: Dr Mark van Wijk, ILRI
Farm household characterization to inform climate-smart agricultural interventions
Pramod holds a Ph.D. from the University of Indore and also from Wageningen University, Netherlands. His research contributions include developing the concept of climate-smart villages, crop growth models for the tropical environments, impact assessment of climatic variability and climate change on crops, characterizing risks of yield loss for developing weather derivatives, and crop yield monitoring systems.
Ana María Loboguerrero is the Latin American Leader of the CGIAR Research Program for Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS), based in Cali, Colombia. In this position, she plays a major role in partnership development aimed to build impact pathways so that knowledge in climate change leads to implementation. Ana María has contributed to strengthening the agricultural sector in Latin America so that it is not totally dependent on climate variability, but on the contrary, it manages climate to its advantage, or at least to avoid the bulk of negative consequences. Ana María Loboguerrero has used her experience working in the public sector to become a key partner of policymakers and planners in the region so that they truly use climate information and tools to design and implement plans and strategies and find ways to make climate information useful and applicable for end-users.
Ana María holds a Master and a PhD in Economics from University of California, Los Angeles, USA (UCLA). She has 7 years’ experience of working on climate change challenges. Dr. Loboguerrero has also worked at the Research Department and Monetary and Reserves Department of the Central Bank of Colombia, the Research Department of the Inter-American Development Bank and the Sustainable Environmental Development Deputy Directorate of the National Planning Department of Colombia as Coordinator of Climate Change. While at the deputy directorate, Dr. Loboguerrero led the formulation of the Colombian Climate Change Policy, the National Adaptation Plan, the National Development Plan and the research agenda on climate change as well as coordinated technical support for the Colombian Low Carbon Growth Strategy.
Todd Rosenstock is an Environmental Scientist with the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) where he investigates how smallholder agriculture affects the environment and society and vice versa. Dr. Rosenstock’s research applies observational and manipulative experiments, data synthesis and modeling techniques to understand the synergies and trade-offs among food production, soil health, and climate at the farm- and landscape scales and optimize local and global benefits from agricultural systems in developing countries. Methods development for monitoring social and environmental change and CSA are the integral theme of his current work. He is particularly interested in integrative, multidisciplinary science that can be applied to emerging environmental and development issues and thus is always keen to find ways to link science with public policy and programming. Dr. Rosenstock currently works in smallholder farming systems in East Africa and Latin America.
Evan Girvetz is a Senior Scientist at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), leading projects for the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS). His research spans climate-smart agriculture (CSA), sustainable agricultural intensification, ecosystem services, environmental decision support, water resources management, and nature conservation planning. Dr. Girvetz works on these issues agricultural development programs and projects globally through innovative partnerships with the African Union New Partnership for African Development, the World Bank, USAID, government agencies, NGOs, the private sector, among others. Dr. Girvetz currently also holds an affiliate assistant professor position at the University of Washington School of Environmental and Forest Sciences.
Mark van Wijk is a Senior Scientist at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), based in Quito, Ecuador. His research focuses on analyzing the drivers of food security in smallholder farming systems in developing countries, trying to harvest from the added value of combining modeling, experimental, participatory and statistical approaches. Previously he worked almost 10 years as Assistant Professor at Wageningen University in the Plant Production Systems group.