Adapting to Climate Change: Assessing the World Bank Group ...

CHAPTER 3CLIMATE VARIABILITYRESEARCH, EXTENSION, AND SEED DELIVERY3.16 A well-functioning agricultural research and extension system, includingstrengthened seed delivery systems (Langyintuo, Mwangi and others 2010), is critical toaddressing current yield gaps and adaptation gaps. Such systems are at the intersection ofACV and ACC. As climate changes, these institutions will need to be able detect thedirection and nature of change, devise adaptation responses, and disseminate them.Building rural capacity will be an essential part of this (Freeman 2009; Shiferaw, Prasannaand others 2011).3.17 IEG’s agriculture evaluation (IEG 2010b) found that Bank-supported extensionservices are evolving toward demand-driven approaches and are attempting to link withresearch and education. In Europe and Central Asia, nearly all extension projects and 83percent of research activities were rated satisfactory or better. In Sub-Saharan Africa, morethan 40 percent of research and extension activities were rated unsatisfactory, reflectingoverambitious design and lack of complementary inputs. Few research and extensionprojects reported on technology adoption. The Digital Green project (digitalgreen.org)provides an example of how modern technology can potentially enhance the effectivenessof extension services while providing useful real-time feedback on which technologies arebeing adopted by whom.3.18 An ongoing IFC project in Bangladesh seeks to enhance private sector capabilities todevelop and distribute high-yielding, stress tolerant seeds. Monitoring systems are in placeto determine the impact on the farmers’ income.WATERSHED MANAGEMENT AND SUSTAINABLE LAND AND WATER MANAGEMENT PROJECTS3.19 Much resilience-building activity goes under the broad and overlapping rubrics of“watershed management” and “sustainable land and water management” (SLWM). Goalsinclude maintenance of forest; cropland and grazing land productivity; reversal ofdegradation; mitigation of landslides, floods, erosion, and sedimentation; and maintenanceof dry season water flows. Typical interventions include natural or assisted revegetation,construction of terraces, irrigation, or other physical structures for managing water flows,changes in cropping systems, and promotion of conservation tillage. (A newer, relatedconcept, “climate-smart agriculture” holds that activities that improve soil organic contentwill tend to boost productivity, hold water, and sequester carbon.) Activities labeled“watershed management” are more likely to involve coordinated action at the level of amicrocatchment, as opposed to individual farm-level activities. All these interventionswould be expected to enhance resilience to climate variability.3.20 In order to assess Bank experience with this class of activities, IEG identified 22closed projects with outcome indicators that were largely devoted to watershedmanagement or SLWM. These projects, initiated between 1998 and 2011, spanned both37