Dec 2021 Executive Summary Digitally integrated approaches for managing climate risk and increasing food security AgroClimas Project Phase II Digitally integrated approaches for managing climate risk and increasing food security Executive Summary Background What are climate services? Building on previous experiences and partnering with IRI-ACToday, Agroclimas Phase II Oftentimes, we rely on what our local meteorologists tell us project, helped to develop a user-centered, digitally integrated, and scalable system to about the weather for any given day or the climate for the support information generation, use, and exchange within the SICA (Central American next few months. But, how well can we forecast weather Integration System) through cutting-edge approaches of climate services. and climate? And what can we do with these forecasts? The system has been co-designed with stakeholders from the regional level Agricultural climate services (CS) involve the generation, (CA-COF) through to the meso (Local Technical Agroclimatic Committees -MTA) translation, transfer, and use of climate knowledge and and local level (extension services, Participatory Integrated Climate Services information. We deliver site-specific, reliable climate for Agriculture -PICSA- for farmers). The system improved information to farmers (understanding the past and agro-advisory systems and food security management in Central projecting relevant information on the future) in a America, strengthening institutional capacities at various levels, demand-driven and timely manner, to enable better and ultimately increasing the resilience and food security of informed farming decisions. thousands of farmers in the region. Our Approach Peten Quiche Alta Verapaz We believe that CS process must begin and end with the user in mind. For that, we followed three principes: MEXICO Huehuetenango Baja Verapaz San Marcos El Progreso 1Diagnose user Empowement based Jutiapa demands and needs, 3 on capacity building Chiapas Zacapa usually through extension Provide of stakeholders and Chiquimula stakeholder consultation. 2 better predictions institutions. EdoMex Santa Barbara Izabal as well as predictions GUATEMALA Valle de Lean of the crops’ responses Comayagua Oaxaca HONDURAS Olancho Totonicapán Quetzaltenango El Paraíso Sololá Golfo de Fonseca EL SALVADOR Sur-Occidente San Andrés Magdalena, Cesar Escuintla & Guajira Centro Providencia Santa Rosa NICARAGUA Sucre Jalapa Región Occiental Coclé Caribe PAR Intibucá CórdobaAG y Pacífico CHILE UAY San Miguel Somotillo Santander Ñeembucu PANAMA San Juan Misiones Chiriquí Itapua Veraguas Herrera Región de Los Santos Caldas O’Higgins Boyacá Risaralda Tolima Valle del Cauca Local Technical Cauca Huila Agro-climatic Committees (MTA) Nariño They are innovative way for local stakeholders to be Putumayo COLOMBIA informed about the expected climatic variations in their region, and how these can affect their crops. MTA (innitials in Manabi Spanish) allow open and clear dialogues about seasonal ECUADOR climate forecastsat multiple timescales, how these can affect crops, and the design of measures to reduce crop loss, particularly providing agronomic recommendations to farmers. Alliances with farmer organizations, national public and private and regional climate outlook forums help deliver improved and accurate climate information to users. PERU Lambayeque Our Work At a regional level, a new generation of forecast system (NextGen) promoted by IRI-AcToday is incrementally adopting. Through the CA-COF, NextGen capacities have been built in all SICA countries, therefore allowing the generation of a consistent and high-performance climate outlook with local relevance but regional coverage. In parallel, we helped to establish a regional agricultural discussion group (RADG) to translate the climate forecasts into agricultural recommendations, which are disseminated through a regional agroclimatic bulletin (in coordination with the Central America Council -CAC, the Regional Committee of Hydraulic Resources -CRRH), met services and agricultural ministries of SICA), The RADG now meets every CA-COF, producing agronomic recommendations that are then scaled down to local levels. At mesoscale, with regional and national partners we have scaled out Local Technical Agroclimatic Committees (MTA). The participatory nature and diverse composition of MTA at the territorial level (i.e.,public sector, NGOs-private sector, farmers-civil society among other types of institutions) allowed the generation of a powerful governance structure for rural development and resilience to climate variations from the community level. This required CCAFS scientists to form strategic alliances with the national governments to facilitate national-level coordination on CRM with 420+ other institutions, to deliver timely and accurate agroclimatic information to users. CRM approaches bridge across scales, with MTAs connecting directly and tailoring the outputs of the CA-COF to the local context, while at the same time generating local recommendations in support of decision making for local organizations, extension agents, and farmers, and feeding back local needs to the regional scale. At the local scale, as a result of democratizing climate knowledge, decisions on farming practices are made by farmers on the basis of climate information. According to the investigation, it is estimated that 40% of the producing families that receive information from the LTACs effectively try to transform their practices. Participatory climate services for agriculture (PICSA) are key here providing inputs to make better-informed decisions about agricultural practices in a changing climate through the use of locally contextualized agro-climatic information. Field trials experiments with beans on the Climate-Smart Villages (CSV) generated evidence of the effectiveness of climate-informed decisions with substantial traction among stakeholders and farming communities, promoting their scaling out especially in in zones of the Central America dry corridor. Our Outcomes, Impact and Reach We have helped transforming establish In across agriculture in ~60 Latin MTA America 11 Confidence in the Latin quality agro-climatic information empowering 420 500,000+ American about countries Democratization of agro-climatic institutions farmers Colombia knowledge with agro-climatic Latin American Guatemala Mexico information Transformation of of maize, rice, beans, coffee, Honduras Chile knowledge in fruits, vegetables and Panamá productive practices[ 300 livestock are making better Peru40+ decisions using agro-MTA institutions ] Nicaragua Ecuador National and climatic informationin Central Paraguay institutional policy America El Salvador changes To date, more than 130+ 1000 25+people institutions Tailored are applying has been trained in agro-climatic climate CSA PICSA practices 6 Latin products prediction climate approach in American and some of bean farmers climate change PICSA potentially countries in Colombia and has been designed services reaching agro-climatic Guatemala areincluding CRM modeling 35,000+ through farmers doubling and radio-spots 25+ particularly in the sometimesbulletins tripling post-graduate courses, Central American workshops, courses, among dry corridor productivity other types of training videos Publications Relevant publications Alvarez Toro P, Navarro-Racines C, Ríos D, Martínez JD, Uclés M, Martínez O, Muñoz A, Obando D, Agroclimas II and Ramírez-Villegas J. 2020. Monitoreo de los efectos de la COVID-19 en la seguridad alimentaria. CCAFS Info publications Note. Cali, Colombia: CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS). bi-lateral associated https://hdl.handle.net/10568/110108 projects during Barrios-Perez, C., Okada, K., Varón, G. G., Ramirez-Villegas, J., Rebolledo, M. C., & Prager, S. D. (2021). How does El Niño Southern Oscillation affect rice-producing environments in central Colombia? Agricultural and have generated 190 2019-21 Forest Meteorology, 306, 108443. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.agrformet.2021.108443 more than including Giraldo DC, Camacho K, Navarro-Racines C, Martinez-Baron D, Prager SD, Ramírez-Villegas J. 2020. Outcome Harvesting: Assessment of the transformations generated by Local Technical Agroclimatic Committees In Latin America. CCAFS Working paper No.299. CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and 20+ 25+ 40+ Food Security (CCAFS). https://hdl.handle.net/10568/108492 Giraldo-Mendez D, Navarro-Racines C, Martínez-Barón D, Loboguerrero AM, Gumucio T, Martínez JD, Guzmán-Lopez H, Ramírez-Villegas J. 2021. Local Technical Agroclimatic Committees (MTA): A detailed guide Discussion/ for implementing, Step-by-Step - Second Edition. Cali, Colombia: CGIAR Research Program on Climate Journal Articles Blogposts/ Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS). https://hdl.handle.net/10568/114943 (peer reviewed) working papers newsletters Müller A, Bouroncle C, Gaytán A, Girón E, Granados A, Mora V, Portillo F, van Etten J. 2020. Good data are not enough: Understanding limited information use for climate risk and food security management in 30+ Guatemala. Climate Risk Management 30:100248. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.crm.2020.100248 10+ 9 Navarro-Racines C, Álvarez-Toro P, Ríos D, Borja R, Padilla G, Montalvo D, Oyarzún P, Orrego P, Renato O, Taipe D, Canto R, Franco A, Arce A. 2021. Implementación de Servicios Integrados Participativos de Clima Presentation/ para la Agricultura (PICSA) en comunidades de Ecuador, Perú y Colombia con enfoque agroecológico. CCAFS Briefing/policy Data Portals/ Working Paper no.402. Programa de Investigación de CGIAR en Cambio Climático, Agricultura y Seguridad poster/ training Alimentaria (CCAFS). https://hdl.handle.net/10568/116717 materials papers tools/softwares Navarro-Racines C, Zúñiga A, Ajquejay S, Muñoz A, González-Romero C, Ríos D, Giraldo D, Ramírez-Villegas J. 2020. Desarrollo de un instrumento de monitoreo y evaluación para las Mesas Técnicas Agroclimáticas 6 40+ (MTA). CCAFS Working paper No.352. CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food 10+ Security (CCAFS). https://hdl.handle.net/10568/111714Sotelo S, Guevara E, Llanos-Herrera L, Agudelo D, Esquivel A, Rodríguez J, Ordoñez L, Mesa J, Muñoz Borja LA, Howland FC, Amariles S, Rojas A, Valencia JJ, Segura CC, Grajales F, Hernández F, Cote F, Saavedra E, Ruiz F, Guidebooks/ Multimedia Other types of Serna J, Jimenez D, Tapasco J, Prager SD, Epanchin P, Ramirez-Villegas J. 2020. Pronosticos AClimateColombia: handbooks materials documentation A system for the provision of information for climate risk reduction in Colombia. Computers and Electronics in Agriculture. 174:105486. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2020.105486 Other project resources / links Digitally integrated approaches for managing climate risk and increasing food security https://ccafs.cgiar.org/research/projects/agro-climatic-digitally-integrated-solutions Pronósticos AClimateColombia online platform http://pronosticos.aclimatecolombia.org Adapting Agriculture to Climate Today, for Tomorrow (AcToday) https://iri.columbia.edu/actoday Our partners Columbia Climate School International Research Institute for C limate and Society Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical CONTACTS Agriculture (CIAT) are part of CGIAR, a global research partnership Julián Ramírez-Villegas for a food-secure future. j.r.villegas@cgiar.org Bioversity International is the operating name of the International Carlos Navarro-Racines Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI). c.e.navarro@cgiar.org Deissy Martí n e z - B arón www.bioversityinternational.org ww w . c g i a r . o r g www.ciat.cgiar.org d.m.baron@cgiar.org