Suchergebnisse

Food systems, from the local to the global, face a complex set of challenges in the twenty-first century. As recognized in the latest round of the United National Framework Convention on Climate Change talks, it is clear that global targets for mitigating greenhouse gas emissions cannot be met without major alterations to agriculture and supply chains. At the same time, these systems must adapt to changing and uncertain climatic conditions. Across national and international agendas, agriculture plays a further central role in achieving food security, driving economic growth, alleviating poverty, and sustaining ecological functions and services. In reality, food and agriculture intersect with every one of the UN sustainable development goals (SDGs), underlining growing global concern for, sometimes highly contested debate over, sustainability in food systems. It is in food systems, perhaps more than anywhere else, that we have the clearest illustrations of the contemporary realities of climate change. If evidence were needed that the challenges of a changing climate are not just those of the future, but of today, then, recent food price shocks, crop failures, and famine crises should suffice (FSIN, 2017). These events are not, of course, determined by weather alone, but are the manifestation of complex and cross-scale social, political, economic, and ecological processes, and should serve as a warning against simple and deterministic interpretations of contemporary food systems. Grappling with these complex issues is essential, if we are to understand how climate change contributes toward risks to the food system, thereby enabling targeted coordination of policies within and across governments. In this short paper, we briefly discuss the burgeoning approach of climate-smart agriculture, which seeks to integrate complex issues and set out a direction for change in contemporary systems. Only broad systemic perspectives, as advocated and advanced in this journal section, positions us (as a broad and diverse academic community) to engage with the grand challenges of providing healthy diets for a growing population, avoiding unsustainable land use change, and adapting to and mitigating climate change. The primary aim of this piece is, therefore, to set out our call for journal contributions from interdisciplinary, cross-scalar, and systemic approaches to the goal of designing climate-smart food systems. We argue here that these designs include and necessarily transcend climate-smart agriculture.

This rapid climate risk assessment for the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) uses the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2014 risk analysis framework to assess the distribution of climate hazards and social and biophysical vulnerability to those hazards in order to identify climate risk hotspots. The assessment uses regional climate models from CORDEX-Africa to map rainfall extremes and drought hazards to 2031–2059. Ten social and biophysical vulnerability indicators are identified from across the capital assets (human, physical, social, financial, natural), using data from the Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI), to develop a vulnerability index. The vulnerability index and distribution of climate hazards are mapped to identify hotspots. Hotspots of vulnerability to and risk of extreme rainfall are shown in northern Madagascar and in south west Tanzania, under both the RCP4.5 and 8.5 scenarios. These hotspots also correspond to the hotspots for drought risk under RCP4.5 and 8.5. However, it is clear that medium-high climate risk (high vulnerability, medium-high climate hazard) is widespread across Angola, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Tanzania, Mozambique, and Madagascar.

In a context of both long-term climatic changes and short-term climatic shocks, temporal dynamics profoundly influence ecosystems and societies. In low income contexts in the Tropics, where both exposure and vulnerability to climatic fluctuations is high, the frequency, duration, and trends in these fluctuations are important determinants of socio-ecological resilience. In this paper, the dynamics of six diverse socio-ecological systems (SES) across the Tropics – ranging from agricultural and horticultural systems in Africa and Oceania to managed forests in South East Asia and coastal systems in South America – are examined in relation to the 2015–16 El Niño, and the longer context of climatic variability in which this short-term 'event' occurred. In each case, details of the socio-ecological characteristics of the systems and the climate phenomena experienced during the El Niño event are described and reflections on the observed impacts of, and responses to it are presented. Drawing on these cases, we argue that SES resilience (or lack of) is, in part, a product of both long-term historical trends, as well as short-term shocks within this history. Political and economic lock-ins and dependencies, and the memory and social learning that originates from past experience, all contribute to contemporary system resilience. We propose that the experiences of climate shocks can provide a window of insight into future ecosystem responses and, when combined with historical perspectives and learning from multiple contexts and cases, can be an important foundation for efforts to build appropriate long-term resilience strategies to mediate impacts of changing and uncertain climates.

In a context of both long-term climatic changes and short-term climatic shocks, temporal dynamics profoundly influence ecosystems and societies. In low income contexts in the Tropics, where both exposure and vulnerability to climatic fluctuations is high, the frequency, duration, and trends in these fluctuations are important determinants of socio-ecological resilience. In this paper, the dynamics of six diverse socio-ecological systems (SES) across the Tropics – ranging from agricultural and horticultural systems in Africa and Oceania to managed forests in South East Asia and coastal systems in South America – are examined in relation to the 2015–16 El Niño, and the longer context of climatic variability in which this short-term 'event' occurred. In each case, details of the socio-ecological characteristics of the systems and the climate phenomena experienced during the El Niño event are described and reflections on the observed impacts of, and responses to it are presented. Drawing on these cases, we argue that SES resilience (or lack of) is, in part, a product of both long-term historical trends, as well as short-term shocks within this history. Political and economic lock-ins and dependencies, and the memory and social learning that originates from past experience, all contribute to contemporary system resilience. We propose that the experiences of climate shocks can provide a window of insight into future ecosystem responses and, when combined with historical perspectives and learning from multiple contexts and cases, can be an important foundation for efforts to build appropriate long-term resilience strategies to mediate impacts of changing and uncertain climates.