This policy brief from World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) addresses the major challenges of and opportunities for financing climate change mitigation and adaptation pathways for smallholder farmers in developing nations. It underlines the need for an innovative and integrated approach to climate finance that can connect rural farmers to public and private finance at the global level. It also provides recommendations for future actions that can meet adaptation, development and mitigation aims.

This report is part of a series of annual progress reports by the Adaptation Sub-Committee to assess how the UK is preparing for the major risks and opportunities from climate change. Together these reports will provide the baseline evidence for the Committee’s statutory report to Parliament on preparedness due in 2015.

Cassava is a "survivor" crop, able to thrive in the expected higher temperatures caused by climate change. An alliance of scientists has recently been formed to help promote cassava cultivation. The 300 scientists attending the second International Scientific Conference of the Global Cassava Partnership for the 21st Century, held in Kampala Uganda presented a new initiative called Global Cassava Modelling Consortium. The Consortium aims to help researchers share information on this increasingly important crop, to better understand the physiology of the plant and to explore avenues for protecting it from attacks.

This paper focuses on how countries can take practical steps to adapt their agriculture to climate change even in the face of considerable uncertainties in the climate models as to how change will play out on the ground for farmers. Amid fears of wasted investments and imprecise science (which themselves become politically motivated excuses for inaction), it shows how countries can adopt a  ‘regret-free’ approach to adapting agriculture to climate change – actions that will benefit farmers and society regardless of specifically how and when climate change plays out on the ground. The paper notes that this very uncertainty often becomes an excuse for inaction.

This paper highlights the impacts of heat stress on yields of maize in France.  It finds that while irrigation can be used to adapt to reduced rainfall, heat stress is a concern that cannot be so easily managed.  It finds that assuming current climate projections, yields per hectare will need to improve by 12% between 2016 and 2035 simply to maintain current production levels.

A paper published in the journal Annual Review of Environment and Resources explores the connection between climate change and food systems, and assesses and the impact the former willl have on agricultural yields and earnings, food prices, reliability of delivery, food quality and food safety. It also discusses a number of interventions that could mitigate this impact.

The CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture, and Food Security (CCAFS) has launched the “Big Facts” website, a set of 30 facts integrating research on topics that include food demand, agricultural emissions, climate impacts, adaptation, and mitigation.