USA Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the entity for evaluating the science associated with climate change. Its recent report, plus the Ukraine crisis, indicates the urgency of closing down fossil fuels by investing in developing sustainable agriculture and renewables.
What must be done?
Immediate and rapid emissions reductions crosswise sectors – The opportunity to stop ever-intensifying climate change has been weakening or nearly shut for some years. The expanding emissions must end before 2025 to maintain temperatures below 1.5C because the outcomes will escalate further, affecting billions of people. The horizon looks like a new fossil fuel extractive wealth that would soon make our Paris Agreement goals unviable; instead, grab the chance to disentangle from historical extractive dependencies.
Investment in renewable energy
We must phase out fossil fuel use and increase investments in renewable energy. Accelerating the replacement of coal and oil is becoming more effective with each investment. The cost curves for this technology are declining while fuel prices keep rising.
But it is not only the energy sector we must urgently transform, but also how we process our food. Even though fossil fuel reduction must be our focus, we must maintain an eye on the large-scale emission reductions and land expropriation from the potential of Agriculture, Forestry, and many other sectors.
Without delay, we must make a Food and Energy profound transformation in production and focus on local, regenerative, and natural agricultural attempts to reduce carbon usage while boosting biodiversity. This modification will also determine the Food security of millions. We must also work hand in hand with Indigenous inhabitants, considered the best custodians of wild sites.
Before the current geopolitical crisis, energy and food prices had been pressing to historical levels. But when the trouble began, prices skyrocketed, particularly concerning Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, which count heavily on wheat imports.
One in three Africans lives under the poverty line, despite Africa having the most uncultivated arable land portions than any other on the planet. Thankfully, investment, innovation, and technology can set up well-defined solutions. Leaders, farmers, and smallholders must support this transition towards more regenerative and productive Agriculture.
Transforming food systems could free the trillions of money the globe spends on the hidden cost of food, from fertilizers to transportation. We could also get rid of almost all the 8.5% of emissions that come from Agriculture. We must support the numerous associations and pilot projects, including those in Africa, quickly renewing how we exploit our lands.
Leading African organizations generated a report showing business and Nature’s benefits when applying more nature-friendly farming practices. They expect that 2023 will be a crucial moment for the Food and Agriculture agenda that enhances and supports future innovation for climate-resilient and sustainable Agriculture performance.
A real test for leadership – For millions of people – particularly in Africa – suffering and exposure to natural disasters are already part of their daily life. Only immediate action that draws us out from the extraction and destruction processes will reinforce our safety and self-reliance from the climate borderline in which we are.
It is required for all stakeholders to make more visible an integrated world that tackles climate change through a transformative agenda. It is time to transform responsibilities and projects into action. We urge leaders to bring institutional, social, and innovation discussions to the table to discuss priorities and opportunities around climate change, including enthusiastic young individuals working on these topics.
Key takeaways
Implementation demands finance – The forthcoming summits must be known as the “implementation period”, as it is the time to change over prior promises into climate action. However, execution requires to be financed, as there can be no significant dialogue about climate change if finance is not regarded.
Communication – Food and Agriculture are considered top priorities for climate change action. Other high-level factors besides finance, energy, and water, such as Food Systems, nature-positive and nutritious Agriculture, advancing climate-smart adaption, and policy coherence, are central dilemmas in tackling Food System challenges and are reinforced even more.
Technological innovations and their politics – Technological creations include drone-based information systems, vertical farming, and cultured meat. They come with trade-offs, restrictions, and specific requirements according to context, an example of how technological innovation could help solve the challenges of climate change.
High-tech agriculture might cause unwanted consequences for value chains and smallholder farmers: when it increases dependency on technologies or data providers, as it does on social and institutional innovation management strategies or partnerships linked to local and indigenous knowledge on the way Food Systems are organized and carried on.
Further considerations: the different stakeholders and criteria represented in the Pavilion agenda will help to pinpoint another challenging solution for social land industrial matters and talk about technological solutions rather than challenging social and institutional ways of doing things. Institutions need to shift tools or change their thinking and enhance conversations about finance and policy. But any transformation includes discomfort, so we all must be ready to work through it together.
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