UPSCALING CLIMATE-SMART AGRICULTURE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA

This policy brief examines the barriers to upscaling Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) in sub-Saharan Africa and proposes policy interventions to enhance food security and climate resilience.

• Agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa is highly vulnerable to climate change, with reduced rainfall, hotter and shorter growing seasons, and more frequent extreme weather events negatively impacting the productivity of forestry, fisheries, livestock, and crops.
• The agricultural sector is a major contributor to climate change, accounting for 30% of total greenhouse gas emissions, including methane, nitrous oxide, and carbon dioxide, making it the world's second largest emitter after the energy sector.
• Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) is a context-specific approach developed by the FAO to improve food security through three main pillars: sustainably increasing agricultural productivity and incomes, adapting and building resilience to climate change, and reducing or removing greenhouse gas emissions.
• Implementation of CSA has shown positive results in specific cases, such as in Malawi, where evergreen agriculture has doubled or tripled crop yields and increased soil fertility, and in Zambia, where maize production tripled when grown under indigenous African acacia (Faidherbia albida).
• Barriers to the adoption of CSA are divided into physical input constraints—such as limited access to credit, fragmented landholdings, and a lack of high-yielding, disease-resistant seed varieties—and enabling environment constraints, including inconsistent agrarian policies and institutional inefficiencies.
• To upscale CSA, the document recommends four priority policy areas: improving tenure security to encourage land investment; increasing access to capital and farm implements through micro-credit, crop insurance, and carbon sequestration payments; creating a functional governance system and supportive institutional arrangements; and strengthening scientific research and technical training.

APA

Suleman, K. K. (2017). UPSCALING CLIMATE-SMART AGRICULTURE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA. South African Institute of International Affairs. https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Policy-Insights-48.pdf

Chicago

Suleman, Kassahun Keliifa. UPSCALING CLIMATE-SMART AGRICULTURE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA. South African Institute of International Affairs, 2017. https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Policy-Insights-48.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Suleman |first1=Kassahun Keliifa |title=UPSCALING CLIMATE-SMART AGRICULTURE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA |publisher=South African Institute of International Affairs |date=July 2017 |url=https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Policy-Insights-48.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{suleman2017upscaling, author = {Suleman, Kassahun Keliifa}, title = {{UPSCALING CLIMATE-SMART AGRICULTURE IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA}}, institution = {South African Institute of International Affairs}, year = {2017}, month = jul, url = {https://saiia.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Policy-Insights-48.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }