COP28 - Food’s role in climate change

Added on 03 January 2024

Tags

Photo: LettUsGROW

Attending COP28 was a unique experience. This year was marked by the significant attention given to food and agriculture, more than has ever been seen at a COP in previous years. COP28 introduced its first thematic day dedicated to food and agriculture, emphasising their role in climate change, along with the introduction of the Agri-food Systems Summit in the Innovation Zone.

This marked a step forward, particularly with the UAE Declaration on Sustainable Agriculture - signed by 158 nations. However it is worth noting that the declaration is neither legally binding nor contains an actionable roadmap for the countries to follow. Equally concerning is that while the final Global Stocktake does address food to some extent, there is a much greater focus on adaptation than mitigation - with the language revolving mostly around "resilience" and "safe-guarding" rather than actual emissions reductions.

This is troubling because - as we heard repeated consistently throughout the conference - a third of global emissions can be attributed to the food system. Despite this, only 2% of climate finance is directed towards agri-food. Even less of this finance - 0.03% - ends up in the hands of smallholder farmers. The voices of these crucial players in mitigation and adaptation were notably muted at COP28 - with big agri-business and innovation taking centre stage of many food related discussions. Much of the conversation at the COP28 Agri-food Systems Summit was dominated by sponsors like PepsiCo, Syngenta or Nestle.