About
International Meeting and Workshop on “Building
Perspectives and Capacity to Measure Climate Change Impacts due to Changes in
Agricultural Practices”
Climate Change and India
India is known for its huge diversity in climate and in
agricultural crop production systems. Most of agriculture in India is highly
dependent on monsoon rains, and 60% of agricultural lands are rain dependent. Changes
in climate, including large scale shifts in rainfall patterns, are likely to
lead to more extensive soil degradation and to adversely impact soil microbes,
soil water holding capacity, soil nutrient availability, fertility and
productivity. Climate change impacts, including a warmer climate, are already
visible in India, where the production of major crops like rice, wheat and
maize are likely to be increasingly impacted over time.
Recent estimates indicate that soil degradation levels in
India are already high, and that India is losing 5,334 million tons of soil
every year due to soil erosion, or approximately 16.75t/ha/year. In Andhra
Pradesh about 27% of agricultural lands suffer from severe soil loss (15-20
t/ha/yr). Major districts affected by soil erosion in Andhra Pradesh are Anantapuramu,
Chittoor, Kadapa, Visakhapatnam, and Vizianagaram.
Climate change impacts, including a warmer climate, are
already visible in India. While a decline in monsoon rainfalls has been
observed, the frequency of higher rainfall events is also evident, which is
contributing to soil erosion. Greater attention to natural resources and
technological needs will be required to sustain crop productivity and to ensure
continued food and environmental security to India in the face of these changes.
To assist small and marginal farmers to adapt to the adversities of climate
change, an increased focus on soil health, irrigation and water use, nutrient
utilisation and retention, and crop management practices is necessary at both the
farmers’ level and the policy level, supported by strong agricultural research
and application oriented outputs.
In addition to the impacts of climate change, farmers in
India are experiencing ever increasing costs for crop cultivation. Coupled with
lost soil fertility due to erosion, the farming community is experiencing extreme
levels of distress. Indiscriminate
and excess use of fertilisers and plant protection chemicals over the past 6
decades are believed to have contributed to soil degradation and increased
cultivation costs as well as environmental pollution with human and animal
health impacts. The impacts to soil health and fertility have reduced the
resilience of these soils and crops to climate change.
Andhra Pradesh
Many public and private initiatives in India, led by
governments and external donor agencies, are already working to tackle the
adverse effects of climate change. The Government of Andhra Pradesh through
Rythu Sadhikara Samstha (RySS) has initiated an ambitious project entitled “Climate Resilient Zero Budget Natural
Farming” (CRZBNF). The project aims to promote low-input organic agriculture by changing current agricultural
practices that will help to improve the livelihoods, food security, and
environmental outcomes for farmers, their families, communities and the country
at large. By enhancing the use of indigenous farm resources in place of
chemical fertilizers and pesticides, the project will improve agricultural
production systems and soil health, confer greater resilience, adaptation to
and mitigation of climate change. The Azim Premji Philanthropic Initiatives
(APPI) has joined hands with this ambitious initiative that is working with
500,000 farmers to enable their conversion to CRZBNF in the next 5
years.
Agricultural practices recommended in
CRZBNF, including soil fertility management, plant protection practices and
crop diversity, are improving agricultural sustainability and enhancing agricultural
sector resilience to climate change. Though significant impacts to crop
resilience are visible on farms practicing ZBNF, there is a need to quantify
the changes in GHG emissions, resilience to climate change, and soil fertility,
biology and physical structure by developing scientific methods and criteria that
will enable the further spread of CRZBNF. To address this gap, an international
meeting and workshop is planned by the Government of Andhra Pradesh through
RySS in collaboration with APPI and C-AGG.
Background Information
Agriculture is both a source and a sink of greenhouse gases
(GHG). As a source of GHG, agriculture is a major contributor globally of
anthropogenic emissions that contribute to climate change, accounting for 24%
of global GHG emissions in 2010 (IPCC, 2014). Terrestrial carbon stocks play an
important role in the global carbon cycle, and soil carbon sequestration can
reduce agriculture’s contribution to climate change and improve the soil
resource. The agricultural sector
has significant potential to mitigate climate change, since soils are an ideal
natural and beneficial reservoir for storing organic carbon. Increased soil carbon stocks
improve soil quality, productivity, water holding capacity, resilience, and
environmental function.
Global
land clearing and cultivation for agriculture are estimated to have released
136 Gt of carbon from soils over the last 150 years – or 50 to 70% of the soil
carbon stock (Lal, 2004). Carbon restoration to soils is possible and highly
desirable. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) of the United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) indicates there are
virtually no scenarios to prevent more than a 1.5°C or 2°C rise in mean global
temperature increases unless we deploy carbon-negative technologies and
strategies, including biological sequestration (IPCC, 2014).
Opportunity
·
A
large number of farmers (>50,000) have been practicing CRZBNF for the past 4
to 6 cropping seasons.
·
The Government
of Andhra Pradesh through RySS is currently working to assist 500,000 farmers
in Andhra Pradesh to convert from resource-intensive to CRZBNF in collaboration
with APPI.
·
C-AGG has
expertise in agricultural GHG emissions and emissions reductions, including the
principles, tools, and methods to measure, estimate, and account for changes in
agricultural GHG emissions reductions using cost-effective, scalable,
verifiable approaches; and the relevant policies and programs that have shaped
and continue to inform these opportunities.
·
A dedicated workshop
in Andhra Pradesh will bring together experts from C-AGG, CCAFS, ICRISAT, IISc,
ICAR (CRIDA, NAARM, NBSSLUP), ANGRAU, other relevant institutions and civil
society organisations in India to transfer knowledge and build capacity to
fulfill the objectives of the workshop.
·
The resulting
outcome will be building perspectives and knowledge transfer. The aim will be
to:
o develop a scalable, cost-effective system to measure or
estimate changes in agricultural GHG emissions;
o other parameters associated with agricultural adaptation to
climate change;
o increased resilience to the impacts of climate change as a
means of improving farmer livelihoods, agricultural productivity, and food
security.
Objectives of the Meeting and Workshop
·
Leadership Meeting on Days 1
and 2:
The meeting will:
·
establish
the need to build capacity for climate change adaptation and climate change resilience
amongst farmers in Andhra Pradesh, and review initiatives already under way to
assist farmers in this transition;
·
develop
knowledge on resilient agricultural production systems in India, soil quality
indicators, practices to build soil carbon sequestration and soil health
properties, including by sharing case studies from other regions; and
·
discuss
opportunities to track and assess progress in Andhra Pradesh by sharing
information on approaches to estimate and/or measure agricultural GHG emissions,
emissions reductions, soil health properties, and measures of resilience in
identified agricultural production systems practicing CRZBNF compared to
control systems.
·
Intensive Capacity-Building
Workshop on Days 3 and 4:
The workshop will:
·
build
and enhance the capacity of stakeholders and project partners to assess and
track progress on the adoption of practices in Andhra Pradesh to achieve
agricultural adaptation, mitigation, and resilience to climate change;
·
assess
commonly accepted international approaches to measure and/or estimate changes
in GHG emissions and sequestration due to adoption of climate friendly
agricultural practices that also convey increased resilience and adaptation to
climate change;
o
the
assessment will include a review of key metrics, methodologies, processes and
available resources and their roles in tracking change indicators due to shifts
in agricultural practices; and
·
transfer
knowledge to assess necessary steps to develop a scalable, cost-effective
system to measure or estimate changes in agricultural GHG emissions and other
parameters as identified.
Expectations
Climate Resilient Zero Budget Natural Farming Practices (CRZBNF)
are integrated approaches that consider care of soil, environmental, and
peoples’ health through integrated systems-based agricultural approaches from
seed to seed. Impact assessment models to measure these alternative pathways are
uncertain, with no standardised methodologies in place to assess the impacts.
The expectations of the
workshop will be to establish and determine how to measure or estimate the
positive impacts of CRZBNF practices for farmers in Andhra Pradesh. Desired positive
impacts include improved farmer productivity and income generation, GHG
mitigation, adaptation to and resilience to climate change impacts (e.g.
resistance to drought, high precipitation, changes in monsoon characteristics,
soil erosion, and reduced environmental impacts of farming). The workshop will
assess and identify key indicators to measure the effectiveness of CRZBNF
practices, identify a suite of common policy indicators, technology indicators
and result or impact indicators.
Target Group:
Representatives of
government, national and international academic and research institutions, civil
society organisations, farmers and CRZBNF project teams
