AGRICULTURE AND ENVIRONMENT - Science for Agriculture and Rural Development in Low-income Countries - page 68

Box 4. Climate change
Climate change has evolved from a complex environmental issue to a even more complex
development issue. Climate change is not a peripheral issue for development. This is
especially true for the arid and semi-arid regions of the world. Today already, the natural
variability in rainfall and temperature are among the main factors underlying variability in
agricultural production, which in turn is one of the main factors behind food insecurity.
Availability and quality of water are closely related to amount and frequency of rainfall. The
dryland areas of the world are among the most vulnerable regions to climate change. At the
same time, the resilience of human and natural systems in the dryland areas and in the
West African Sahel in particular, has been remarkable over the last three decades.
Climate change is an additional stress to the Sahelian region which is already under
stress from other pressures. A timely signaling of impacts of climate change, including
changes in climate variability, and identification of adaptation strategies in this complex
environment are important for its development. Clearly, adaptation to environmental
change is not new, as changes and variations in climate and other environmental factors
have occurred naturally. Both, human and natural systems have had to adapt to these
changing conditions. The Impacts of Climate Change on Dryland (ICCD) project has tried to
draw lessons from the past with the objectives to understand the current situation and
define successful adaptation strategies to future changes in climate. Climate change will
increase the probability of extreme weather conditions, leading to catastrophic income
shortfalls. National governments need to review past interventions and develop innovative
ways to assist rural communities in coping with, and recovering from, massive and large
economic and environmental shocks. That is required to increase understanding of climate
change and its effects and for the development of technologies adapted to location- and
sector-specific conditions.
In a workshop, experts gave the highest priority to developing an adequate early
warning system with an efficient strategy to communicate with households and institutions.
In addition, high priority was given to maintaining social security mechanisms,
understanding migration strategies and regulating land and water entitlements. Adequate
attention is needed for potential conflicts when resources become scarce. Local
government and non-governmental organizations need support to monitor economic
changes and to implement local policies. Agricultural research plays an important role in
developing technologies that perform well under drought conditions. International
agreements on climate change implications may be exploited for example by redefining
subsidy policies. Finally there is plenty of scope for improving scientific research on climate
change by extending research networks, by fine-tuning existing models, and by expanding
the geographic area of research. (After Dietz et al . 2004).
consistently embedded within broader strategies designed to make national and regional
development paths more sustainable. Such policies deal with issues such as land re-
source management, and energy and water access and affordability (Smith et al. 2003;
Easterling et al. 2004; Halsnæs and Verhagen 2007; www.developmentfirst.org).