Adapting Smallholder Agriculture to Climate Change

Agriculture and climate change are mutually impacted. The worst affected are the small and marginal farmers who constitute more than 70 per cent of the farming community in India. Extreme weather events like increased frequency of heatwaves and cold spells, droughts and floods in the last decade have become common. In India agriculture contributes about 28 per cent of the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; about 78 per cent of methane and nitrous oxide emissions are estimated to be due to the current agricultural practices. Sustainable agriculture approaches are now acknowledged for the wide range of ecological and economic benefits that accrue to the practitioners as well as consumers of agricultural products. These approaches, based on low external inputs, are also less energy-intensive and less polluting and so mitigate and help in adapting to climate change. Combined with coordinated action by groups or communities at the local level, and supportive external institutions working in partnership with farmers, sustainable agriculture will help to mitigate and adapt to climate change.