Climate Change Mitigation and Agriculture

This book reviews the state of agricultural climate change mitigation globally, with a focus on identifying the feasibility, opportunities and challenges for achieving mitigation among smallholder farmers. The purpose is ultimately to accelerate efforts towards mitigating land-based climate change. While much attention has been focused on forestry for its reputed cost-effectiveness, the agricultural sector contributes about ten to twelve per cent of emissions and has a large technical and economic potential for reducing greenhouse gases. The book does not dwell on the science of emissions reduction, as this is well covered elsewhere; rather, it focuses on the design and practical implementation of mitigation activities through changing farming systems.

Climate Change Mitigation and Agriculture includes chapters about experiences in developed countries, such as Canada and Australia, where these efforts also have lessons for mitigation options for smallholders in poorer nations, as well as industrialising countries such as Brazil and China. A wide range of agroecological zones and of aspects or types of farming, including livestock, crops, fish farming, fertilizer use and agroforestry, as well as economics and finance, is included. The volume presents a synthesis of current knowledge and research activities on this emerging subject. Together the chapters capture an exciting period in the development of land-based climate change mitigation as attention is increasingly focused on agriculture's role in contributing to climate change.

Eva 'Lini' Wollenberg is a social scientist and faculty member at the University of Vermont coordinating mitigation research for the Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security Research Program of the CGIAR.

Marja-Liisa Tapio-Bistrom is an agricultural economist and coordinator of the FAO Mitigation of Climate Change in Agriculture (MICCA) program.

Maryanne Grieg-Gran is Principal Researcher in the Sustainable Markets Group at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), London, UK.

Alison Nihart is a masters student in Natural Resources at the University of Vermont, USA.