Download Mainstreaming Climate Smart Agriculture into African National and

CSA-NAIPS Concept for ALS-729mc
Mainstreaming Climate Smart Agriculture into African National and
Regional Agriculture and Food Security Investment Plans
Feed the Future, the U.S. Government’s global hunger and food security initiative, has promoted
a model for inclusive agriculture-led economic growth called “sustainable intensification” (SI)
integrating advanced technologies and management practices for genetic-, ecological-, and socioeconomic intensification with local agro-ecological systems to produce more and better food for
growing populations, stimulate economic growth, and build resilience - all while using land,
water, chemicals, and other natural resources more efficiently.
Building on sustainable intensification, “climate-smart agriculture” (CSA) in the context of
African nations aims to achieve triple wins by simultaneously:
a) boosting productivity, sustainable yields, and incomes of small farmers by SI;
b) improving vulnerable populations’ adaptation and capacity for resilience to the effects of
climate change and other stresses that cannot be avoided; and
c) reducing net greenhouse gas emissions and capturing carbon, where conditions allow and
compatible with (a) and (b) [so less adaptation will be needed down the road].
Alternatively, the new African CSA Alliance expresses this as:
a) enhanced food security by sustainably increasing the reliability and productivity of
agricultural livelihood activities;
b) increased smallholder resilience and adaptation to the likely effects of climate change;
and,
c) where appropriate, and in the interest of smallholder farmers, reduced greenhouse gas
emissions from agriculture and improved carbon sequestration.
We agree with the African perception of these goals, in their context, as a hierarchy of needs, in
the above order. But none of them can be pursued in isolation from the other. Climate-blind
agricultural investments are doomed to be inefficient if not disastrous for food security and
nutrition, Feed the Future’s top-line objectives.
To achieve these joint goals, Feed the Future works with smallholder farmers and global,
regional and national research partners to identify and adapt promising strategies and
technologies for local farming systems, in order to efficiently intensify and diversify major
production systems where the poor and undernourished are concentrated. These include, but are
not limited to, approaches such as:
1. improved crop, livestock, and aquaculture varieties for tolerance of heat, drought, flood,
salt, pest, disease, and/or acidity [including conservation of historical diversity for use in
generating varieties that are both more resilient and productive]
2. conservation agriculture [or its components of low-till, soil cover, and crop rotation],
especially with legumes
3. agro-forestry, especially with legumes
4. fertilizer efficiency technologies and integrated soil fertility management [see #s 2-3]
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CSA-NAIPS Concept for ALS-729mc
5. irrigation efficiency technologies, water capture and storage, integrated water resources
and watershed management
6. alternate wet-and-dry rice production, combined with fertilizer efficiency technologies
7. farmer- and herder-managed natural regeneration of dryland ecosystems’ productivity
[trees, grass, soils]
8. accelerated offtake of livestock from drought-prone drylands
9. integrated agro-silvi-pastoral farming systems
10. integrated pest management
11. weather prediction and information services for farmers (in combination with market
information via cellphone technology)
12. weather-indexed crop and livestock insurance
13. improved connectivity to markets, food processing, and enhanced storage facilities to
reduce post-harvest losses
14. commodity-based trade standards for processing-based approaches to meat safety rather
than geographic, fence-based approaches, to better enable diversified economic strategies
for sustainable economic development in increasingly arid areas under climate change, by
allowing co-existence of livestock and wildlife for tourism.
Feed the Future is already supporting CSA technologies and practices in Africa
As suggested above, integrated packages combining two or more of these approaches can often
optimize synergies and trade-offs. Feed the Future is working in concert with the U.S. Global
Climate Change Initiative to develop strategies, practices and to help actors throughout the food
system both reduce unnecessary emissions and adapt to climate change so that food security can
be increased despite changing climate patterns. The USG’s FY2014 Budget Request included
$105 million for resilience activities which are targeted to rural communities in areas with high
concentrations of chronic hunger, and which face serious climate change impacts. Additionally,
approximately $96 million of the total $160 million in agricultural research and development
requested in the FY 2014 budget for FTF will be spent in sub-Saharan Africa to improve climate
resilience and productivity, and to integrate adaptive technologies and practices in the production
of various crops. Examples of how these resources translate to country assistance programs
include:

Since 2006, U.S.-supported programs have contributed to the release of 140 droughttolerant maize varieties in 13 African countries. Building on this work, Feed the
Future strengthens public and private sector seed systems to ensure that new varieties can
reach smallholders at scale.

In Senegal, Feed the Future’s Yaajeende program promotes rain-indexed insurance, use
of short-cycle seeds, and other technologies helping farmers adapt to changing rainfall
patterns. Improved maize seed helped double yields over three years to a national
average of 2.8 tons per hectare. Women farmers are also now practicing conservation
agriculture and water harvesting techniques to restore degraded lands to productivity.
Feed the Future is also working with coastal communities to improve fisheries and
mangrove ecosystem management, increasing productivity and resilience while
reducing emissions.
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CSA-NAIPS Concept for ALS-729mc

Feed the Future has also trained West African hydrological and agro-meteorological
service staffs to develop seasonal forecasts to help farmers anticipate and prepare for
wet or dry years.

In southern Ethiopia and northern Kenya, Feed the Future’s Pastoralist Areas Resilience
program increases livestock productivity and access to markets, enhancing
communities’ ability to adapt to more frequent drought and market shocks. Some
pastoralists now have access to weather-indexed livestock insurance. Some leading
pastoral communities in Kenya, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe are also restoring
degraded rangeland productivity through improved grazing and land management
practices.

Through the Resilience In the Sahel Enhanced (RISE) Initiative in Niger and Burkina
Faso, the Resilience and Economic Growth in the Arid Lands (REGAL) programs in
Kenya, and a new program in Mali, the USG is working to increase the resiliency of local
populations and national governments to climate change by improving local governance
and natural resource management structures to avoid conflicts over declining natural
resources, increase the provision of accurate climate, weather, and early warning
information to improve decision making in the face of growing uncertainty, and promote
climate smart agriculture practices.

In Zambia, FTF is working on improving farming systems to increase resilience to
climate change. Activities targets improvements in agricultural productivity and
diversification with conservation farming, drought-tolerant maize varieties, improved
groundnut varieties, sustainably intensify maize-legume production systems, and
innovations to control climate-induced expansion of aflatoxin.

In Mali, Feed the Future is supporting an aggressive agroforestry program in Sikasso,
Mopti, and Timbuktu. The approach increases fruit, fodder, and fuelwood production for
both household use and income generation, using the “Farmer-Managed Natural
Regeneration” method already proven on 5 million hectares in Niger and 500,000
hectares in Burkina Faso. Because trees can tap deeper sources of moisture and nutrients
than annual crops, together with integrated soil and water conservation practices, this also
improves resilience (adaptation), and reverses land degradation, while sequestering more
carbon in trees and soils.

Also, in Mali, Feed the Future is introducing fertilizer deep placement [FDP, and other
micro-dosing/fertilizer efficiency practices?], which maintain or increase production
while reducing nitrous oxide emissions by about 30% and also reducing water pollution
impacts on fisheries productivity.

In Tanzania and Mali, the “alternate wet and dry” (AWD) rice irrigation method reduces
methane emissions from rice.
National Agriculture and Food Security Investment Plans
Currently about 32 African countries have National Agriculture and Food Security Investment
Plans (NAFSIPs, aka NAIPs), and the Regional Economic Commissions have regional versions
of these (RAFSIPs). An evaluation of their consistency with CSA was done by FAO (2012).
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CSA-NAIPS Concept for ALS-729mc
USAID supported a technical workshop on CSA for COMESA to work on NAFSIPS in 2011,
and has been supporting 15 ECOWAS countries in a consultative process of integrating CSA
into their NAFSIPs in the past year. Some of the existing investment plans will also need to be
renewed in the next year, so there is a general desire to upgrade the approach taken for the next
phase of investment plans, covering 2015-25, as per the Malabo Declaration. There is a need to
bring increased attention and quality control to mainstreaming CSA into that process, to then
trigger financing and support, including countries’ own domestic resources, to ensure ownership
and sustainability. We see five key components that are necessary for success, which need to be
integrated into country CADDP processes:
1. Climate Change vulnerability assessments to support priority setting.
2. Country stocktaking and profiling of what’s currently taking place.
3. Assessments of technical options & technologies for CSA; tools and instruments for their
promotion.
4. Training to expose people to analytical approaches and planning tools, to reach 30
countries.
5. Coordination efforts with other ministries and technical players.
1. Climate change vulnerability assessments – The U.S. Government is using the best
available science to help identify climate-related risks in both the short-term and the longterm. This includes modeling of regional climate trends and analysis of the impacts on and
risks they pose to food security. African nations need access to these models and analyses.
Agro-ecosystem vulnerability mapping may also be a useful analytic approach. The
approach should also emphasize identifying climate stresses along the entire food value chain
– including not only production, but also post-harvest storage, transportation, processing, and
marketing. This will help countries identify priorities for investments to build the resilience
of the agricultural sector and ensure that the response addresses the most pressing climate
challenges.
2. Country stocktaking and profiling includes dialog with national focal points for climate
adaptation and mitigation, water resources management, infrastructure, and/or low emissions
development strategies (LEDS) to crosswalk plans for ideas and compatibility. It also means
reviewing and coordinating with the National Adaptation Plans (NAPs) and the other
analogous plans under the various UN Conventions, like those under the UNCCD plans
addressing desertification, sustainable land management and resilience of arid, semi-arid and
dry sub-humid areas, not to mention the Convention on Biological Diversity. It requires
assessment of the policy readiness and enabling conditions for CSA in each country. As
proposed by CCAFS, a CSA Readiness Assessment Tool would be useful to support NAFSIP
enhancement with critical information on institutions, policies, and finance, to identify both
opportunities and barriers to CSA implementation and scaling, so they can be addressed in
plans.
3. Assessment of technologies and practices reducing risks – CCAFS (the CGIAR Climate
Change, Agriculture and Food Security program) has already compiled a CSA Compendium
of practices and technologies. However this needs to be updated with evidence for the results
and cost-effectiveness of each when used in African contexts, preferably using data collected
from FARA, NARS, universities, and other African sources, so that technologies and
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CSA-NAIPS Concept for ALS-729mc
practices can be ranked and prioritized on cost-effectiveness for productivity,
adaptation/resilience, scalability, and carbon sequestration or GHG emissions efficiency.
Agro-ecosystem suitability mapping for different crop and land management regimes (soil
types and fertility potential, water, crop suitability under changing conditions) may also be a
useful tool (see figure).
4. Capacity building – The familiarity and facility of
country agricultural planners and stakeholders in
using the tools and techniques above are crucial not
just to their ability to understand the results of such
analyses, but also to own them and use them to test
different scenarios. A learn-by-doing approach is
essential.
5. Coordination - Considerable coordination will be
needed, across ministries (e.g. Agriculture,
Finance, Water, Environment), RECs and CAADP
(including its joint accountability review
processes), research and other organizations,
donors, etc.
Map of Faidherbia suitability in Tanzania (ICRAF).
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