13 November 2014: The CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS), the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA) and CARE Denmark have released an issue brief on six issues to address in a changing climate to prevent additional loss and damage and promote the long-term viability of smallholder farmers. The brief emphasizes the importance of advancing food security and nutrition through major agreements expected in 2015 on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), climate change and disaster risk reduction (DRR).

Titled ‘Stepping up to the Challenge: Six Issues Facing Global Climate Change and Food Security,’ the paper considers how to scale up farmer-led adaptation and ensure the world’s poorest producers drive the adaptation agenda, highlighting the importance of South-South cooperation and joint research and development (R&D) over one-directional technology transfer.

It addresses the following issues: scaling up proven action and practice; ensuring equitable outcomes for women; giving decision-making power to farmers; enhancing nutrition security, not just food security; making mitigation an opportunity for food security; and supporting markets and value chains for low-income producers an consumers.

On ensuring equitable outcomes for women, the authors observe that there are proven actions for increasing women’s access to natural resources and decreasing inequality and recommend mainstreaming actions to address gender gaps in policy formulation. On farmers’ decision-making power, the brief recommends extending such power beyond the farm to agricultural policy making. On agricultural value chains, the brief underscores the role of productive and efficient value chains to increase returns to small-scale producers and rural communities.

The organizations will present the publication at a seminar at the UN Climate Change Conference in Lima, Peru on 7 December 2014. [Publication: Stepping up to the Challenge: Six Issues Facing Global Climate Change and Food Security] [CCAFS Publication Webpage] [CCAFS Blog] [CTA Press Release] [IISD RS Coverage of Lima Climate Change Conference]