Matching farmers to innovation in Africa makes communities resilient to climate change

6 January 2022. EurActiv. Climate action for communities across Africa will be front and center of debate in next year’s COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, with greater emphasis than usual on the role of agriculture, farming and food systems, which are central to so many African economies.

It’s critical that we better understand how farmers actually adopt climate-smart agricultural technologies and practices on the massive scale needed to address the climate crisis.

Projects like ‘Building Livelihoods and Resilience to Climate Change in East and West Africa’ – funded by the European Union and supported by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) – deploy Agricultural Research for Development (AR4D) to answer how.

What this EU-IFAD supported project in Africa shows is how – on the frontlines of climate change – there is ample opportunity to connect and capitalise on all the innovation that’s already happening in communities vulnerable to climate change.

The goal of this project is to build livelihoods and improve resilience to climate change of smallholder farmers of East Africa (Tanzania, Kenya and Ethiopia) and West Africa (Mali, Senegal, Niger and Ghana) through the large-scale adoption of CSA technologies and practices.

This project tackles many of the issues central to IFAD's strategy - driving transformation in agriculture and tackling the root causes of climate change, youth unemployment, gender inequality and shortfalls in nutrition around the world. 

This EU-IFAD project looks at value chains and how we can enhance market access for women and young people through innovative methods (such as digital agriculture) and the examination of CSA technology and practices through a gender lens. 

Led by CCAFS' Climate-Smart Technologies and Practices Flagship, the project has two main objectives:

• Gain new knowledge on scalable CSA technologies and the options available for institutions. This new knowledge must show demonstrable benefits to farmers (including women farmers) and young people, with positive impact on employment, climate resilience and low emissions development. 
• Engage ongoing initiatives to help prioritize the 'best bet' policy options 

The innovations and partnerships were delivered under the ‘Building Livelihoods and Resilience to Climate Change in East and West Africa’ project. The project is kindly supported with a grant from the European Union, delivered via the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), under grant number 2000002575, implemented by Alliance Bioversity-CIAT with AR4D support from the European Commission.