Climate-Smart Landscapes: Opportunities and Challenges for Integrating Adaptation and Mitigation in Tropical Agriculture

Celia A. Harvey, Betty and Gordon Moore Center for Science and Oceans
Mario Chacón, Betty and Gordon Moore Center for Science and Oceans
Camila I. Donatti, Betty and Gordon Moore Center for Science and Oceans
Eva Garen, Betty and Gordon Moore Center for Science and Oceans
Lee Hannah, Betty and Gordon Moore Center for Science and Oceans
Angela Andrade, Conservation International Colombia
Lucio Bede, Conservation International-Brazil
Douglas Brown, World Vision International
Alicia Calle, Yale University
Julian Chará, Centre for Research on Sustainable Agricultural Production Systems (CIPAV)
Christopher Clement, University of Vermont
Elizabeth Gray, Nature Conservancy
Minh Ha Hoang, World Agroforestry Centre
Peter Minang, World Agroforestry Centre
Ana María Rodríguez, Betty and Gordon Moore Center for Science and Oceans
Christina Seeberg-Elverfeldt, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Bambi Semroc, ENVIRON Holdings, Inc.
Seth Shames, EcoAgriculture Partners
Sean Smukler, The University of British Columbia
Eduardo Somarriba, CATIE - Centro Agronómico Tropical de Investigación y Enseñanza
Emmanuel Torquebiau, CIRAD Centre de Recherche de Montpellier
Jacob van Etten, Bioversity International
Eva Wollenberg, University of Vermont

Abstract

Addressing the global challenges of climate change, food security, and poverty alleviation requires enhancing the adaptive capacity and mitigation potential of agricultural landscapes across the tropics. However, adaptation and mitigation activities tend to be approached separately due to a variety of technical, political, financial, and socioeconomic constraints. Here, we demonstrate that many tropical agricultural systems can provide both mitigation and adaptation benefits if they are designed and managed appropriately and if the larger landscape context is considered. Many of the activities needed for adaptation and mitigation in tropical agricultural landscapes are the same needed for sustainable agriculture more generally, but thinking at the landscape scale opens a new dimension for achieving synergies. Intentional integration of adaptation and mitigation activities in agricultural landscapes offers significant benefits that go beyond the scope of climate change to food security, biodiversity conservation, and poverty alleviation. However, achieving these objectives will require transformative changes in current policies, institutional arrangements, and funding mechanisms to foster broad-scale adoption of climate-smart approaches in agricultural landscapes. ©2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.