Food systems

If you missed it, our Learning Lab on Resilience Thinking offers sessions with experts from ODI Global. The first explores what resilience truly means and why managing trade-offs is central to resilience practice, the second focuses on applying resilience in action to improve programming and decision-making and the further explore how we can measure resilience.

The Climate Adaptation and Rural Development Project (CARD) is a five-year development project, implemented by Helvetas in Ethiopia, with support from the SDC and other donors. The project aims to strengthen communities’ resilience to the impacts of climate change. One key strategy is the establishment of seed security initiatives to ensure access to quality crop seeds, even during periods of climate stress. A robust seed system can empower farmers by providing them with access to improved varieties, information, and resources, enabling them to make informed decisions about their crops. Developing and promoting climate-resilient seeds (e.g., drought-tolerant or flood-resistant varieties) helps farmers adapt to changing environmental conditions.

In the Andes region of South America, climate change threatens the livelihoods of smallholder farmers with unpredictable climate events. This article explores how co-produced climate services can help farmers adapt to the changing climate. Through the projects ENANDES and ENANDES+ the Colombian Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology, and Environmental Studies (IDEAM) are co-producing with farmers agroclimatic bulletins. These are produced during community agroclimatic roundtables and field schools that integrate scientific information with local observations and measurements. Together, IDEAM and the Bern University of Applied Sciences (BFH) studied the socioeconomic benefits of climate information services. The study showed how active collaboration with farmers builds resilience, strengthens trust in meteorological institutions, and supports decision-making to potentially reduce production losses.