Op-Ed by Tina Joemat-Pettersson and Andrew Steer

November 27, 2011 - This month, as the world’s population reached 7 billion people, 194 nations will be gathering in Durban, South Africa, to address climate change. While there, they will have an opportunity to make decisions that will improve the prospects of feeding this already vast population, and the additional 2-3 billion that will join their number by 2050.

The challenge we face is unprecedented. To feed the growing population, and allow for rising incomes, food production must increase by 70 percent by 2050. And this at a time when scientists estimate that, absent strong adaptation measures, yields are likely to fall by 10 – 20 percent due to the higher temperatures, and more variable rainfall caused by climate change.

And remember that the starting point is not one of plenty. Today, already, one in seven – nearly a billion people—people will go to bed hungry.

For Africa the challenge is staggering. Demand for food will rise by 200 percent by 2050, while yields, in the absence of urgent action, will be falling 20-30 percent. Yet, agriculture remains Africa’s life blood. Over 70% of Africa’s population is involved in farming, and the vast majority are small-holders and women. Cereal yields in Africa remain less than a quarter of global average and have barely increased in thirty years.

To meet the challenges of the coming decades Africa needs nothing less than a transformation in agriculture. To achieve this, agricultural, development and climate finance are essential.

In Africa and beyond, we need agriculture that will strengthen food security, adaptation and mitigation where farmers use proven conservation agriculture techniques together with innovative technologies such as drought and flood tolerant crops, improved early warning systems and risk insurance.

We need agriculture that can contribute to sequestering green house gas emissions and capturing carbon in the soil, agriculture that can move from being part of the problem - agriculture currently emits about 14 percent of global green house emissions and indirectly another 17 percent - to part of the solution.

We need climate –smart agriculture, which can provide a triple win for farmers by creating higher yields and increasing climate resilience, while reducing greenhouse gas emissions and storing carbon in plants and the soil.

Last month, leading scientists from 38 countries agreed. Gathering in the Dutch town of Wageningen, to share research findings on this phenomenon, they were united in calling on the negotiators in Durban to recognize and support the potential that Climate-Smart Agriculture offers.

They are not alone. In September, the Government of South Africa hosted a meeting of African Agricultural Ministers who noted the crucial opportunity of a "triple win" for African farmers, and called for support from the international community to incorporate Climate-Smart Agriculture into existing regional and national agriculture plans.

African leaders know that early action is needed to identify and scale up best practices, to build capacity and experience, and to help clarify future policy choices. Such investments are not hugely expensive, but would need to be eligible for climate change finance.

There are already compelling examples of climate-smart agriculture in place in Africa. Zambia, for example, has supported widespread adoption of conservation agriculture. Ethiopia, has a productive social safety net program that combines improved land management with early warning systems and social protection measures.

Kenya is supporting a pilot program on triple win agriculture for 60,000 small-holder farmers. The program is expected to enrich degraded soils and boost farmers’ yields, as well as increase carbon sequestered in its soils and above ground vegetation. If the sequestration occurs as expected, farmers will receive payments as part of a carbon finance scheme. But revenues from carbon financing are just an added bonus to increasing productivity and resilience.

To get to the world we envision, we need to ensure that farmers are in a position to mitigate against the risk associated with climatic challenges – on time. In addition, farmers should have the ability to start planning properly in their production systems. Farming practices should not impact negatively on the environment.

So as global leaders gather in Durban to negotiate a global climate change agreement farmers and the rest of us should be watching carefully. Any serious effort to address climate change must include agriculture. Food security, poverty and climate change are so closely linked, that we cannot separate them.

Durban is an opportunity to pave the way for a world where every child gets three meals a day, farmers are supported as they adapt to increasingly erratic weather, and communities strive to mitigate their greenhouse gas emissions. Such a world can be created, but it will take global leadership and conviction, to make it so.

Ms. Tina Joemat-Pettersson is the South African Minster for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries

Mr. Steer is the World Bank’s Special Envoy for Climate Change

This Op-Ed appeared in The Sunday Times (South Africa) on 27 November 2011.