ICTSD-IPC Platform on Climate Change, Agriculture and Trade


Press Release

IPC Alert Climate Change and Food Security (PDF 342KB)

Forbes - More Food On Less Carbon (PDF 54KB)

Contents

Introduction

The global agricultural sector faces three major challenges in the 21st century:

  • it must make good on its promise of poverty alleviation since some 70 percent of the world’s poorest people live in rural sectors and rely on agriculture;
  • it must provide global food security and sustainably meet increased demands from a growing population, changing dietary preferences and a growing reliance on agricultural feedstocks for energy production;
  • it must adapt to climate change and, where possible, play a role in climate change mitigation.

There is a risk that these three challenges will be addressed separately, which would reduce their chances of success.  Focusing on the climate change challenge alone, for example, could have negative impacts for food security and poverty alleviation, which in turn would weaken efforts to curb climate change.  The world’s population will neither be able to contribute nor benefit from climate change mitigation unless it enjoys food security.   Food security, particularly for the world’s poorest populations, and poverty alleviation requires greater investment in the agricultural sectors of developing countries.  Such investment is hindered in part due to a distorted agricultural trade regime, which is still subject to high levels of subsidies, tariff and non-tariff barriers, and care must be taken not to create disproportionate or unjustified trade barriers under the guise of addressing climate change.

Recognizing the need to combat these major challenges in a coordinated manner, ICTSD and IPC have launched a unique interdisciplinary and international platform of climate change, agricultural and trade experts to promote increased policy coherence, to ensure food security, a more open and equitable global food system, and effective climate change mitigation and adaptation.  For a full illustrative brochure of the ICTSD-IPC Platform on Climate Change, Agriculture and Trade, please click here. The platform is undertaking research, analysis and dialogues on issues at the interface between climate change, agricultural policy and trade.

We believe that these sets of issues constitute the most important elements, which the climate change, agricultural and trade policy communities must wrestle with for the foreseeable future, and to be effective, must do so jointly.  This interdisciplinary experts’ group - given the international community’s attempt to reach consensus on a new climate change agreement by the end of 2009 – will focus in particular on the implications of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiations on agriculture and trade, with a view to providing policy-relevant insights from the perspective of the climate change and trade regimes.  The group’s combined expertise and output will serve to assist the UNFCCC negotiators understand the linkages to agriculture and trade, and likewise, inform agricultural policy, trade policy experts and stakeholders about the policy inter-linkages between these three fields.

Composition of the Platform

Steering Committee

  • John Anthony Allan, Kings College (UK)
  • Jason Clay, Senior Vice President Market Transformation, WWF US  (US)
  • Franz Fischler, Former Commissioner for Agriculture, European Union (Austria)
  • Adrian Macey, Ambassador of Climate Change Negotiations (New Zealand)
  • Daniel Martino, Carbosur, Coordinating Lead Author of Agriculture Chapter for IPPC AR4 (Uruguay)
  • Raul Montemayor, Vice-President, Federation of Free Farmers Cooperatives/International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP), IPC Member (Phillippines)
  • Michel Petit, Professor, Institut Agronomique Méditerranéen, IPC Member, (France)
  • Peter Smith, Aberdeen University, Coordinating Lead Author of Agriculture Chapter for IPPC AR4 (UK)

Expert Group

  • Christian Friis Bach, International Director, DanChurchAid (Denmark)
  • Bruce E. Dale, Michigan State University (US)
  • Jane Earley, consultant, Earley and White Consulting Group LLC (US)
  • Lin Erda, Professor and Ex-Director General, Agro-Environment and Sustainable Development Institute Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (China)
  • Marcos Jank, President, UNICA (Brazil)
  • Willem-Jan Laan, Director, Global External Affairs, Unilever, IPC Member (NL)
  • Gerald Nelson, Senior Research Fellow, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) (US)
  • Ni Hongxing, Deputy Director-General, Ministry of Agriculture (China)
  • Tim Searchinger, Research Scholar, Princeton University, former co-Director of Center for Conservation Incentives at Environmental Defense (US)
  • Hasit Shah, Managing Director, Sunripe Kenya Ltd. ; Chairman, Fresh Produce Exporters Association of Kenya (FPEAK) ; Chairman, Kenya Horticultural Council (KHC) ; Director, COLEACP (Kenya)
  • Youba Sokona, Executive Director, The Sahel and Sahara Observatory (Tunisia)
  • Vanessa Stiffler-Claus, Manager, Federal Affairs, John Deere (US)
  • Ancha Srinivasan, Senior Climate Change Specialist, Asian Development Bank (India)

For a full illustrative brochure of the ICTSD-IPC Platform on Climate Change, Agriculture and Trade, please click here. For more information on agriculture and trade issues, visit ICTSD’s Programme on Agriculture.