High Level Roundtable - “How can we make agricultural climate action more attractive?”

About the event

The Climate & Clean Air Coalition (CCAC), together with New Zealand's Ambassador to the United States, Tim Groser, is bringing a diverse mix of countries, states/provinces, farmers’ associations, youth organisations, NGOs, IGOs, philanthropic organisations, banks and companies to consider the question: How can we make agricultural climate action more attractive?

Participants will share ideas that can be implemented now, and that importantly combine the goals of improving livelihoods, mitigating climate change, and mitigating air pollution – and thus delivering on both the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals.

The event builds on the CCAC’s effort to spur increased agricultural climate action to reduce methane and black carbon, part of a global effort to reduce the rate of near-term warming by up to 0.6C, thus helping us stay within the 2C Paris Agreement goal, and at the same time delivering additional and multiple benefits annually of 2.4 million avoided deaths and 50+ tonnes of avoided crop losses.

Participation

Participation is by invitation only. If interested to attend, please contact: james.morris [at] un.org

Desired outcome from event

• Identification of work to do together to make agricultural climate action more attractive 
• Identification of a group of individuals from a diverse mix of governments and organisations to work towards something for the UN Climate Summit in September 2019

The CCAC’s work on agricultural climate action

The CCAC promotes climate-friendly agricultural practices that reduce methane and black carbon to simultaneously deliver climate and air quality benefits. These include: improved livestock and manure management, alternatives to continuously flooded rice fields, and options for conservation agriculture that avoid the need for burning. These practices can enhance productivity whilst reducing climate/air pollutants such as methane and black carbon and can provide immediate co-benefits for public health, food security and economic development, aligning with the SDGs and low-emissions agricultural development.

This event builds on the CCAC High Level Assembly’s voluntary commitments to take action to reduce methane and black carbon in the agriculture sector (captured in the 2017 CCAC Bonn Communique, with more detail online), as well as the 2017 UNFCCC Koronivia decision. More information on the CCAC’s agriculture work can be found here.