‘Triple wins’ or ‘triple faults’? Analysing the equity implications of policy discourses on climate-smart agriculture (CSA)

Abstract

This paper analyses contrasting discourses of ‘climate-smart agriculture’ (CSA) for their implications on control over and access to changing resources in agriculture. One of the principal areas of contestation around CSA relates to equity, including who wins and who loses, who is able to participate, and whose knowledge and perspectives count in the process. Yet to date, the equity implications of CSA remain an under-researched area. We apply an equity framework centred on procedure, distribution and recognition, to four different discourses. Depending on which discourses are mobilised, the analysis helps to illuminate: (1) how CSA may transfer the burden of responsibility for climate change mitigation to marginalised producers and resource managers (distributive equity); (2) how CSA discourses generally fail to confront entrenched power relations that may constrain or block the emergence of more ‘pro-poor’ forms of agricultural development, adaptation to climate change, or carbon sequestration and storage (procedural equity); (3) how CSA discourses can have tangible implications for the bargaining power of the poorest and most vulnerable groups (recognition). The paper contributes to work showing the need for deeper acknowledgement of the political nature of the transformations necessary to address the challenges caused by a changing climate for the agricultural sector.

Keywords:

• political economy
• triple wins
• climate-smart agriculture
• climate change
• discourses

Acknowledgements

An earlier version of the paper was published as CCAFS Working Paper 197 (2017), and a draft was presented at the conference ‘Contested Agronomies’, held at IDS, Brighton, UK, 23–26 February 2016. We would like to express our thanks for all comments and suggestions received from CCAFS and their partners, as well as from six anonymous reviewers. Remaining errors and omissions are the responsibility of the authors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 e.g. the Global Science Conferences on CSA (Cirad 2014), climate-smart agriculture websites (e.g. FAO 2017), and a number of online fora (see see FAO 2017b).

2 The articulation of ‘triple wins’ varies considerably among actors. Some actors, such as the Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security programme (CCAFS) of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) does not give priority to achieving triple wins, but rather draws attention to how multiple objectives interact at different scales and levels when implementing CSA in particular contexts. See CCAFS' website at http://ccafs.cgiar.org/ (last accessed 25 May 2017).

3 For a counter-critique of Rawlsian approaches to justice in relation to climate change, see Forsyth (2014).

4 The Paris Agreement is an international agreement under the UNFCCC. The Agreement was negotiated by representatives of 195 countries at COP21 in Paris and adopted by consensus on 12 December 2015 (UNFCCC 2015) (accessed 9 December 2016).

5 The SDGs are a new, universal set of 17 goals and 169 targets agreed by United Nations (UN) member states at the UN Sustainable Development Summit on 25–27 September 2015 in New York, USA, which are outlined in the document Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (UN 2015). The goals include ending poverty and hunger, improving health and education, making cities more sustainable, protecting oceans and forests, and combating climate change. (accessed 9 December 2016).

6 This is elaborated in the High-Level Expert Forum Issues Paper on ‘Global Agriculture Towards 2050’ (FAO 2009) http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/wsfs/docs/Issues_papers/HLEF2050_Global_Agriculture.pdf (accessed 9 December 2016).

7 REDD+ stands for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries (Kissinger et al. 2012).

8 In our other work we have probed the limitations of participatory processes in development (Nightingale 2005). However, we also recognise that failure to attempt inclusive processes, particularly at the discursive level, is equally problematic.

9 Personal communication, 2015. It should be noted that accessibility issues in Nepal are significant. Many of the most vulnerable populations live several days’ walk from roads, and even those with road access can be difficult to reach in bad weather.

10 As of April 2017, GACSA had 162 members, see (FAO 2017a) (accessed 25^th May 2017)

11 Agroecology is a principle for sustainable agriculture based on applying ecological principles to agricultural production systems, as well as minimising external inputs.

12 See e.g. list at (Climate Smart Agriculture Concerns 2015)

13 See (Chappell and Majot 2014)

Additional information

Funding

The authors are grateful for financial support for this study from the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS). Naess and Thompson would like to acknowledge additional support from the Sussex Sustainability Research Programme (SSRP).

Notes on contributors

Linus Karlsson

Linus Karlsson is a PhD student in the Department of Urban and Rural Development at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. He holds an MSc in global studies from the University of Gothenburg. His research interests include critical agrarian studies, property–authority relations, subject formation, and anthropology/sociology of the state. Email: [email protected]

Lars Otto Naess

Lars Otto Naess is a Research Fellow in the Resource Politics Cluster of the Institute of Development Studies, UK. He is a social scientist with a doctorate from the University of East Anglia. His current research interests centre on social and institutional dimensions of climate change adaptation, policy processes on climate change and agriculture, the role of local knowledge for adaptation to climate change, and adaptation planning in the context of international development.

Andrea Nightingale

Professor Andrea J. Nightingale is a geographer by training and presently Chair of Rural Development in the Global South. Her current research interests include: political violence in climate change adaptation programmes; climate change adaptation and transformation debates; public authority, collective action and state formation; and feminist work on emotion and subjectivity in relation to theories of development, collective action and cooperation. Her forthcoming textbook is Environment and sustainability in a globalizing world (Routledge, 2017). Corresponding author: [email protected]

John Thompson

John Thompson is a senior Research Fellow in the Rural Futures Cluster of the Institute of Development Studies, UK, where his research focuses on analysing the dynamics of agri-food systems in risk-prone environments and the political ecology of sustainability transformations. Currently, he serves as Director of Agricultural Policy Research in Africa (APRA), a major research programme examining agricultural commercialisation processes and their differential impacts on rural livelihoods and economies in eight countries in sub-Saharan Africa. Email: [email protected]