AGRICULTURE

BOX 21
THE AGRICULTURE SECTORS
AND UNFCCC
How the agriculture sectors are taken into
consideration in UNFCCC discussions is often
misunderstood, with frequent statements that
agriculture was not included, or was even
excluded, from the negotiations. The United
Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change embraces all anthropogenic sources of
GHG emissions, as well as all impacts of
climate change. The question, therefore, is not
whether the agriculture sectors are integrated in
the scope of the Convention, but how their
specificities are accounted for.
There are several points that enable the specific
consideration of issues related to agriculture
and food security. The first one is the
UNFCCC’s recognition of the importance of
food production – Article 2 of the Convention,
which states its objective, says that this
objective should be achieved while ensuring
that “food production is not threatened”. The
Paris Agreement, adopted in COP21, further
recognizes “the fundamental priority of
safeguarding food security and ending hunger,
and the particular vulnerabilities of food
production systems to the adverse effects of
climate change”.
The second point is the recognition,
reaffirmed in the Paris Agreement, of the
important role of land use, land-use change
and forestry in addressing climate change.
This has prompted diverse work streams,
under the climate convention, on how to take
into account the specificities of sources and
sinks in accounting rules and financial
mechanisms. Among the principal issues
considered are the distinction between natural
and anthropogenic causes of sources and
sinks, and how to deal with the nonpermanence
of emission reductions through
sinks. It has also led to an initiative, launched
in 2008, to reduce deforestation and forest
degradation (REDD+) by providing payments
to developing countries. Forests are quite
prominent in the Paris Agreement. Article 5
recognizes the central role of forests in
achieving the 2 °C goal through mitigation
options covered by REDD+. It also
acknowledges the potential of forests for joint
mitigation and adaptation approaches, and
their important role in yielding non-carbon
benefits.
Third, since the Bali Conference (COP13) in
2007, a specific work stream on agriculture,
intended in this context as crop and livestock
production, has been developed. It has
advanced through four thematic workshops in
the UNFCCC’s Subsidiary Body for Scientific
and Technological Advice, on early warning
systems, vulnerability, adaptation and
productivity. The results will be discussed in
COP22, in Marrakech.
Finally, the need for mechanisms and tools that
recognize and are adapted to the specificities
of the agriculture sectors emerges as a crosscutting
theme, both in the above-mentioned
work streams, and in all the activities under the
Convention. Emissions and emission reductions,
including sources and sinks, are more difficult
to assess and monitor in agriculture than in
most other sectors. The sheer number and small
size of actors in the agriculture sectors are also
a major source of difficulties and transaction
costs for the implementation and monitoring of
mechanisms that have been conceived,
generally, for the energy and industrial sectors.
Moreover, the fact that mitigation and
adaptation are treated separately in the
UNFCCC impedes a proper valuation of the
synergies, as well as the trade-offs, between
adaptation and mitigation actions, which are
particularly important in the agriculture sectors.
As underlined in the INDCs, actions in the
agriculture sectors are particularly significant in
terms of potential co-benefits or trade-offs with
environmental, economic and social issues.
These issues are important to the agriculture
sectors, but are not taken into account in most
UNFCCC discussions and mechanisms.
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