Press and News Livestock stakeholders from Latin America shared experiences and approaches in mitigation
Researchers are learning how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from cattle in a number of countries in the region. Most of the 20 countries that comprise Latin America share not only a common language but also common issues, like vulnerability to climate change and potential to mitigate greenhouse gases, especially, in agriculture and livestock production.
To speed this along, exchanges of knowledge and technology are critical. A three-day workshop, held from November 6-8, at the Colombia headquarters of CIAT with representatives from various Latin American countries set out to strengthen eco-efficient livestock management options and greenhouse-gas mitigation technologies developed by the Supporting Low Emissions Development in the Latin American Cattle Sector (LivestockPlus) project.
LivestockPlus aims to sustainably intensify forage-based livestock systems through improved pastures, better ecological management, and enhanced livelihoods, providing technical support and generating critical information and guidelines necessary to identify mitigation options. It supports planning and policies for expanding the scale of national adaptation and mitigation actions, helping to determine technical options for low-emission pasture development in Latin America. “We been working with LivestockPlus and CIAT for four years now, receiving technical and economic support,” said Mauricio Chacón from the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock of Costa Rica. “The project also has allowed us to share the experience with other countries and institutions, like in this workshop. In addition, these three days of exchange helped us a lot to clarify the actual possibilities of including low-cost MRV systems. We learned a couple of options that we will discuss at the ministry and hopefully implement in our country”.
LivestockPlus is being implemented in Colombia and Costa Rica, led by CIAT as a strategic initiative with support from the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security. The knowledge gained from the work in the two countries is being shared throughout the region. The World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) is a key partner along with the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center, national ministries of agriculture, environment, forestry, risk, and development and planning, and universities in both countries.
At the workshop, technical experts and others from Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Honduras and Peru, learned about experiments conducted at the CIAT campus, such as a silvopastoral trial and a polytunnel technique to measure greenhouse-gases from ruminants, and discussed monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) of silvopastoral systems (SSP) towards meeting nationally determined contributions.
The workshop was also the starting point of a regional network of technical experts and others interested in improving SSP visibility and recognition of the contribution to climate-change mitigation. A regional perspective was developed on the limits and ‘low-hanging fruit’ of SSP MRV, sharing successful experience toward greater sectorial cooperation. Three meetings of the network are planned for November and December 2018. “We have learned a lot from all the experience of the participating countries, especially the great experience generated by the project in Colombia and Costa Rica,” said Carglos Gauggel from the Honduran Presidential Roundtable for Climate Change. “In my country, 80% of the territory is forestry-devoted, so silvopastoral systems are a great added value that will create more opportunities for better incomes and preserve the environment”. “My expectations about the workshop were fulfilled,” said Deyanira Bido from the Ministry of Agriculture of Dominican Republic. “There was a lot of knowledge shared: lessons learned and what does not work so well. Each of us strengthened their knowledge with the achievements and approaches that we exchanged.”