3 December 2012: Lamenting the lack of progress on agriculture in the UNFCCC negotiations, participants at the Agriculture, Landscapes and Rural Development Day explored options for climate-smart agriculture to address mitigation, adaptation and smallholder farmer challenges.

This fifth annual meeting was held on 3 December 2012, alongside the 18th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 18) to the UNFCCC in Doha, Qatar. The event focused on: existing scalable solutions to mitigation and adaptation challenges that can benefit farmers; gaps where knowledge is not available or solutions are limited; and potential trade-offs in implementing known solutions.

The event featured plenary sessions, roundtable discussions and an ideas marketplace. Roundtable discussions addressed: national and sub-national information gaps for adaptation decision making; the development of landscape approaches for adaptation; issues in greenhouse gas (GHG) measurements in agriculture; the scaling up of risk management approaches; climate finance for the rural poor; resilience in dryland ecosystems; and tools for achieving emission reductions. The ideas marketplace focused on: sustainable palm oil; evidence-based adaptation policies; the improvement of livelihoods through forest carbon activities in Indonesia; outlooks on food, fuel, fiber and forests; climate-smart agriculture; climate services; bamboo household energy; and a small-holder organic research platform.

The event was hosted and sponsored by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), the World Bank, and other international partners, as well as being co-organized by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO), the World Food Programme (WFP) and other international organizations engaged in agriculture and food security. [Website of the Agriculture, Landscapes and Rural Development Day]