Participatory Climate Action for Peace Climate-Smart Villages Case Study Community Based Participation

Partner (s): CGIAR Trust Fund

Type of Organization: Non-governmental organization

Country of Operation: West Africa, East Africa including the Horn of Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Latina America (forthcoming: South Africa)

Climate Adaptation Sector Thematic Area: Community-Based, Participatory Climate Action

Activities

The project aims to create Climate Smart Villages (CSVs) and promote the adoption of Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) approaches while encouraging national governments to participate. It also strives to set new standards for conflict-sensitive and peace-responsive climate action through innovative methods and toolkits, serving as a model for such initiatives. Climate-Smart Villages are examples of local actions that promote adaptation and resilience to climatic stresses.

Researchers, local partners, farmer groups, and policymakers work together to identify the most suitable technological and institutional interventions based on global knowledge and local conditions to increase productivity, raise incomes, achieve climate resilience, and enable climate mitigation. This approach also encourages the identification of mechanisms to support the uptake and use of such innovations so that stakeholders and partners can sustainably scale them up, using CSVs as learning grounds.

This project – particularly the addition of a peace and security component – can enhance adaptive capacity and resilience by addressing the intersection of climate adaptation and community security by emphasizing the role that climate change can play in exacerbating socio-economic vulnerabilities and competition over natural resources. The project’s CSVs approach is inclusive and promotes trust-building and social cohesion, which can lead to positive peace, shared values, and reduced structural violence. CSVs also encourage cooperation on natural resource management through joint decision-making and knowledge sharing, ultimately reducing conflicts and strengthening community resilience.

Project components include:

1. Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) Practices, Technologies and Climate Information Services: this part focuses on supporting practices and technologies that enhance climate resilience while promoting peace and social cohesion, such as agroforestry, conservation agriculture, and sustainable water management. At the same time, the project will provide climate information services, including weather forecasts and early warning systems, to encourage collaboration and community action in response to climate challenges.
2. Capacity Building and Knowledge: capacity-building, peer-to-peer learning, and gender-responsive empowerment will be offered to strengthen climate resilience and social cohesion.
3. Peace-Responsive Village Development Plans: the project aims to integrate peace-building strategies into village development plans, including conflict- sensitive assessment, community-based peace committees, and equitable access to resources, fostering social cohesion and collaborative action.

The project’s geographic focus is in West Africa, East Africa including the Horn of Africa, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Latina America (forthcoming: South Africa) and is funded by the CGIAR Trust Fund. It involves community groups, consisting of farmers, researchers, rural agro-advisory, service providers, village officials, private and public sector actors for scaling up.

The widespread acceptance of context- specific CSA practices, including the use of organic manure/compost, crop association, and intercropping/crop rotation, with adoption rates as high as 90% to 95% in various regions like Ghana, Mali, and Niger, indicates that the CSV method is a promising strategy for expanding the adoption of climate-smart agriculture across a broader range of agro-ecological zones in West Africa.

Early findings indicate a shift toward on-farm diversification, with households now adopting more than three crop innovations, significantly expanding on-farm options for resilient varieties. Sweet potatoes for food (tubers) and livestock feed (vines) are becoming increasingly popular. Because of the new livestock breeds, approximately one-third of the small ruminants in Nyando are cross- breds that can withstand heat stress, better utilize low quality forage, cope with disease burden, and recover from drought with faster compensatory growth, thus maturing to market weight in a shorter period than the local breeds. About 63% of the households diversified their crop enterprises, shifting to improved resilient crops and crop varieties. Another 37% adopted fertilizers, while 38% applied pesticides and herbicides. Conditional on the unobservable heterogeneity effects, the results show that household adoption decisions on diversification of multiple stress- tolerant crops and crop varieties, fertilizer, and pesticides and herbicides are complementary. In addition, the results confirm existence of unobserved heterogeneity effects leading to varying impact of the explanatory variables on adoption decisions among farmers with similar observable characteristics.

The study’s key findings show that smallholder farmers who implemented CSA measures earned significantly more farm income and improved their food security compared with non-adopters. The contribution of CSA measures on farmers’ income and food security can be strengthened by providing subsidies, extension services, and accurate climate services. This study suggests that promoting and scaling up a portfolio of CSA measures for farmers living in diverse landscapes should be identified and prioritized.

The project, by ensuring marginalized groups’ access to resources and decision- making processes, contributes to dismantling systemic barriers that perpetuate social inequalities and exclusion in climate action, further enhancing adaptive capacity and resilience. Results suggest that in both districts, involvement in CSA practices improved the level of participation in political, social, economic, and agricultural domains compared to households in non-CSVs. Improved participation in the four domains of empowerment may highlight the key role CSVs are playing in promoting gender empowerment.

The improved indigenous breeds that were introduced into the smallholder farming systems and their crosses with local animals exhibited improved growth rates, resulting in the farmers availing animals for sale for meat within 1.5 years, hence increasing their net returns from rearing sheep and goats.

Expanding and disseminating the interventions involves two key approaches:

1. Horizontal Scaling (Scaling Out) of CSA options: This entails using CSVs as demonstration sites where farmers can learn from one another, often facilitated by self-help groups or producer organisations. It also involves promoting climate-smart agricultural practices within local government initiatives, programmes, and policies, as well as integrating them into private-sector business models.
2. Vertical Scaling (Scaling Up): The research and knowledge accumulated in CSVs offer evidence of the effectiveness of various practices, technologies, services, processes, and institutional options. This evidence can then influence broader- scale investments in climate-smart agriculture, drive institutional changes at a larger level, and inform the development of policy instruments.

Adaptation Good Practices

• Involving stakeholders to identify the most suitable technological and institutional interventions encourages the identification of mechanisms to support the uptake and use of such innovations so that stakeholders and partners can sustainably scale them up, using CSVs as learning grounds.
• The addition of a peace and security component – can enhance adaptive capacity and resilience by addressing the intersection of climate adaptation and community security.
• The project’s CSVs approach is inclusive and promotes trust-building and social cohesion, which can lead to positive peace, shared values, and reduced structural violence.
• CSVs also encourage cooperation on natural resource management through joint decision-making and knowledge sharing, ultimately reducing conflicts and strengthening community resilience.
• Involving marginalized groups in the decision- making processes contributes to dismantling systemic barriers that perpetuate social inequalities and exclusion in climate action, further enhancing adaptive capacity and resilience.