All over Asia, small women and men farmers are experiencing extreme and intense weather events brought about by climate change. Almost all of them are caught unprepared by changing climate patterns: rains are heavier, storms and floods occur more often, dry seasons are more intense and last longer. They do not understand why this is happening. All they know is that they have to find a way to adapt to and survive these changes.
In 2008, Ka Lita, a woman rice farmer in the Philippines, stood in a long line to buy rice that was being sold by the National Food Authority (NFA), the government’s rice trading agency. She had been standing under the hot sun for several hours, but she had no choice but to wait for her turn to buy rice from the NFA. The rice being sold by the government’s rice trading agency was the only rice that she could afford with her money.
Rising food prices, increasing climate instability and food riots have sparked profound political changes around the world and put agriculture high on the international agenda. What kind of agriculture is best suited to respond to those challenges, however, is the subject of profound disagreement. Too much of the current policy debate on food security, climate change and agriculture assumes that industrial agriculture and related biotechnology are the only options for feeding a growing global population.
Addressing the problem of hunger in a world where food production systems, particularly in developing countries, are being eroded and undermined by climate change is one of the most important challenges of our time. Studies by the Food and Agriculture organization (FAO), Oxfam and the Asian Development Bank, among others, underscore the significance of climate change impacts on agriculture and food production (FAO 2007, Oxfam 2009, ADB 2009).
In the area of Policy Advocacy, we aimed at influencing key inter-governmental regional and international decision-making bodies on common agricultural issues affecting small farmers.
We targeted various inter-government bodies, such as ASEAN (on the frameworks on food security and climate change, as well as FTAs), FAO, IFAD, UNFCCC (on climate financing for adaptation and mitigation), and WB (on the GAFSP project).
Farmers' Voices, Farmers' Choices: In the Time of Climate Change
A short video about climate change impacts and responses among small coconut farmers in the Philppines
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