The challenges of multi-actor collaborations in climate-smart agriculture under the landscape approach

A. Dellevoet*, R. Kurtzahn

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference article in proceedingProfessional

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Abstract

With a growing world population to around 9 billion people in 2050 and the rise of global warming, there are growing concerns about food security for a large part of the world population. This is compounded by other
environmental disasters such as deforestation, desertification, water scarcity, pollution and loss of bio
-diversity.
Human activity is putting more and more pressure on the natural environment. Hence, there is widespread
consensus that a more sustainable balance must be struck between human needs and the preservation of
natural resources such as land, water and forests (World Resources Institute, 2019).
Generally, the solution to such large and complex issues, has been to call for multi
-actor collaboration at
international, national and local levels. In 2015, the UN emphasized PPPs as the key vehicle to reach the
sustainable development goals. Large programs such as REDD+ concerning deforestation, were set up.
Multilateral organizations such as the FAO and World Bank promoted the concept of Climate
-Smart Agriculture
(CSA) which aims to increase agricultural productivity, enhance resilience and reduce emissions (World Bank,
2020). Management of the these “commons” is achieved through a landscape approach, which aims at multi
-
actor collaboration. It looks beyond agriculture, integrating it with forestry and other land uses to forge a
comprehensive agenda for sustainable development to eradicate poverty, strengthen food and nutrition
security (FAO, 2013).
However, these big concepts also face a number of challenges. Empirical evidence about the efficiency of the
landscape approach is still scarce and often not as unambiguous as underlined in theory due to many obstacles
and measurement challenges (The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, 2013). One particular
challenge is the institutional side of the landscape approach, in terms of its legal, administrative or even political
aspects. This paper dives deeper into this topic by focusing on the institutional and governance aspects of the
landscape approach in CSA and compares these with another framework for multi
-actor collaboration, namely
High Performance Partnerships (HPP), to assess which approach might be more successful to achieve the goals
of CSA.
Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationClimate Smart Agriculture and Water in the Global South
Subtitle of host publicationExperiences with support of the Nuffic
EditorsM.P. van Dijk, H. Nijhoff, D. de Boer
Place of PublicationMaastricht
PublisherMSM
Pages15-20
Publication statusPublished - 2021

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