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Climate-Smart Landscapes: Opportunities and challenges for integrating adaptation and mitigation in tropical agriculture

Editors

David Lindenmayer

Authors

Celia A. Harvey, Conservation International
Seth Shames, EcoAgriculture Partners
Mario Chacon, Yale University
Camila I. Donatti, Conservation International
Eva Garen, Conservation International , Yale University
Eva Wollenberg, CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) , University of Vermont
Lee Hannah, Conservation International
Angela Andrade, Conservation International
Lucio Bede, Conservation International
Alicia Calle, Yale University

Date

October 22, 2013

Challenge

No Related Challenges

Research Theme

Short Summary

Tropical agricultural systems can provide both mitigation and adaptation benefits if they are designed and managed appropriately.

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Summary

Getting Adaptation and Mitigation Together

Addressing the global challenges of climate change, food security, and poverty alleviation requires enhancing the adaptive capacity and mitigation potential of agricultural landscapes across the tropics. However, adaptation and mitigation activities tend to be approached separately due to a variety of technical, political, financial, and socioeconomic constraints. Here, we demonstrate that many tropical agricultural systems can provide both mitigation and adaptation benefits if they are designed and managed appropriately and if the larger landscape context is considered.

Achieving More than Climate Benefits

Many of the activities needed for adaptation and mitigation in tropical agricultural landscapes are the same needed for sustainable agriculture more generally, but thinking at the landscape scale opens a new dimension for achieving synergies. Intentional integration of adaptation and mitigation activities in agricultural landscapes offers significant benefits that go beyond the scope of climate change to food security, biodiversity conservation, and poverty alleviation.

Transformative Change is Needed

However, achieving these objectives will require transformative changes in current policies, institutional arrangements, and funding mechanisms to foster broad-scale adoption of climate-smart approaches in agricultural landscapes.

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Related Publication

August 2012

From Climate-Smart Agriculture to Climate-Smart Landscapes

This article explains the concept of climate-smart landscapes, enumerates the benefits, identifies key components, and recommends concrete actions to scale them up around the world.

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