Climate-Smart Agriculture to Secure Jobs, Water, Food

This policy brief by the Institute for Economic Justice (IEJ) argues for the mainstreaming of Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) in South Africa to address risks to food security, water supply, and rural employment. The document proposes a transition toward agro-ecology and conservation agriculture (CA) to restore degraded land and protect strategic water source areas, suggesting that these labour-intensive practices can create new jobs in a 'Catchment Economy' and within the biofuel sector.

• The South African agricultural sector faces significant risks from unsustainable water use and climate change impacts, including droughts and shifting rainfall patterns. Current farming practices contribute to land degradation and water stress, which threatens food security and the maintenance of decent jobs.
• Strategic water source areas (SWSAs) are critical to the country's water security, as a small land area of 8% provides half of South Africa's river flow. The document suggests that creating a 'Catchment Economy' focused on landscape regeneration could generate new jobs while improving water yields for downstream users.
• Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA), encompassing agro-ecology and conservation agriculture (CA), is proposed as a way to diversify farming and create jobs. CA specifically involves minimal mechanical soil disturbance, permanent soil cover, and crop rotation. While 15% of commercial grain farmers have adopted CA, only 5% of smallholder farmers have done so, hindered by costs, lack of knowledge, and insufficient extension support.
• The document identifies several opportunities for job creation through land and water rehabilitation. These include converting public works programmes (Working for Water, Working on Wetlands, and Working on Fire) into secure jobs, developing SMEs to use invasive alien vegetation biomass for bioenergy and soil conditioners, and establishing rehabilitation enterprises in abandoned mines.
• The production of jet biofuels using perennial feedstocks or crop residues presents a potential economic opportunity. It is estimated that the introduction of energy cropping for biofuel production in South Africa could create between 50,000 and 100,000 person-years of employment.
• To enable the transition to CSA, the document calls for scaled financing, including the use of Green or Blue (water) Bonds and the Land Bank acting as a first funder for farms converting to CA. It also emphasizes the need for policy certainty regarding land expropriation and water reforms to attract sustained investment.

APA

Naudé, L., & Rivett-Carnac, K. (2018). Climate-Smart Agriculture to Secure Jobs, Water, Food. Institute for Economic Justice. https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Stream-1-Policy-Brief-2a-Climate-Smart-Agriculture-to-Secure-Jobs-Water-Food.pdf

Chicago

Naudé, Louise, and Kate Rivett-Carnac. Climate-Smart Agriculture to Secure Jobs, Water, Food. Institute for Economic Justice, 2018. https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Stream-1-Policy-Brief-2a-Climate-Smart-Agriculture-to-Secure-Jobs-Water-Food.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Naudé |first1=Louise |last2=Rivett-Carnac |first2=Kate |title=Climate-Smart Agriculture to Secure Jobs, Water, Food |publisher=Institute for Economic Justice |date=August 2018 |url=https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Stream-1-Policy-Brief-2a-Climate-Smart-Agriculture-to-Secure-Jobs-Water-Food.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{naud2018climatesmart, author = {Naudé, Louise and Rivett-Carnac, Kate}, title = {{Climate-Smart Agriculture to Secure Jobs, Water, Food}}, institution = {Institute for Economic Justice}, year = {2018}, month = aug, url = {https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Stream-1-Policy-Brief-2a-Climate-Smart-Agriculture-to-Secure-Jobs-Water-Food.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }