About this Publication
AgriCord Building Resilience Toolkit PART I, FO Members Assessing Climate Risks and Designing Adaptation, provides a tool for a Farmers’ Organisation (FO) to conduct a climate risk assessment amongst their member farmers/producers, and to facilitate the planning of efficient and feasible adaptation responses in support of resilient livelihoods of FO members. The tool is the first in the series of tools in the AgriCord Resilience Toolkit that aims to analyse climate risks and build resilience at the level of FO members, value-chains and organisations’ internal and external operations.
Farmer Organisations (FO) have many reasons for assessing and understanding their member farmers’ vulnerabilities to climate change as well as for screening their own activities through a climate lens. Firstly, smallholder farmers are those who are hit hardest by climate change. Extreme weather events and climate variability already threaten smallholders’ livelihoods in many parts of the world, and more climate risks are likely to materialise in the coming years and decades. More action is needed to strengthen the resilience and adaptive capacity of farmers’ livelihoods in response to climate variability and extremes.
Secondly, FOs play a key role in creating adaptive capacity and thus reducing vulnerability of their members in ever-changing climatic conditions. For farmers to be able to adapt swiftly and adequately to climate change, they need access to knowledge, assets, good governance (decision making), institutions and innovation. Together, as a system, these elements determine the adaptive capacity of smallholder farmers. Farmers’ Organisations play a pivotal role in strengthening and sustaining this adaptive capacity (or resilience) for their members, from the extremely vulnerable to the wealthier farmers. To fulfil this role, FOs need to understand how climate change is likely to affect their members, and what are the characteristics that make members, their production and related value chains vulnerable to the changes. On the other hand, the changing climate may in some cases open new opportunities for FO members which need to be explored, and related structural barriers in their value chains to be addressed.
Thirdly, the FOs also need to assess their own capacity to take necessary actions to better meet their members’ needs in the face of climate change. This may require developing new services or adjusting the existing ones. Furthermore, the FOs may need to climate proof their own infrastructure and facilities to better withstand extreme weather events, such as floods, high temperatures and storms.
Author(s)
Food and Forestry Development (FFD)
Year
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Organisation
Food and Forestry Development (FFD)