Overview: Climate Change Adaptation in the Agricultural Sector

Abstract

Agriculture is vulnerable to climate change but has considerable adaptation potential. The sector will be significantly transformed over the next few decades as it incorporates new technology and management and organization, that are in part a response to changing demands from growing population, changing incomes, other competition for land, resource and environmental protection, and the effects of environmental change, including climate change, on agriculture. Adaptation research to date has largely been about educating the sector about potential risks and possible adaptation strategies. As we move to more “client-based” research, these recommendations will need to be more precise and tailored to individual decision-makers. Given the likely changes in the sector, much adaptation information may be delivered to farmers through recommendations on crops, pest management, and other inputs and products delivered by input manufactures and suppliers, and so these organizations will be as, if not more important clients for adaptation research. Research also needs to focus on where markets may fail in being adequately prepared, such as from the risk of abrupt climate change. The challenge ahead for adaptation research is how to come up with concrete, tested, and robust strategies that are responsive to the decision time frames in agriculture (10–20 years), given the significant variability and noise in climate.