Enhancing cooperation in agricultural greenhouse gas research

Laura HoggNew Zealand Ministry of Agriculture & Forestry

The challenges• Agriculture’s contribution to global greenhouse gas

emissions

• Projected increases in emissions as global demand for food grows

• Agriculture has a part to play in overall mitigation efforts, however…

• It makes up a large proportion of many economies and is a key contributor to growth and development

• Increasing food production is central to food security

• Mitigation solutions can be difficult to implement

• One-off technological fixes won’t work for agriculture (needs sustained application of processes and management practices by millions of individuals (farmers)

The opportunities

• In many cases increased productivity and efficiency is positively correlated with reduced emissions intensity, and increased resilience and food security

• The good news is that many countries are already investing in this area and we can leverage this collective effort and make the best use of resources

• Opens up a wide field for RD&E and better connections with policy-making

The importance of RD&E

• The global agriculture sector needs good information and viable options

• RD&E is core to this:- Critical to measurement and estimation of emissions- Critical to improving our knowledge of production systems- Helps ensure evidence-based policy making- The only way we can develop mitigation options that represent

viable, win-win solutions

The Alliance

• Brings countries together to find ways to grow more food without growing greenhouse gas emissions

• Specifically, the Alliance will help:- Find ways to reduce the emissions intensity of agricultural

production and increase its potential for soil carbon sequestration, while enhancing food security

- Improve understanding, measurement and estimation of agricultural emissions

- Improve farmers’ access to agricultural mitigation technologies and best practices

The idea

• Create a global community of scientists, policy makers, farmer organisations and others

• Strengthen collaboration and leverage collective effort

• Not “science for science’s sake” - outcome focused

• Bottom up and voluntary - recognising each other’s contexts and drivers

• Links efforts across sub-sectors

Membership

Now 31 member countries:

Observers: Brazil, China, European Commission, Korea, South Africa

NetherlandsNew ZealandNorwayPakistanPeruPhilippinesRussia

GhanaIndiaIndonesiaIrelandJapanMalaysiaMexico

SpainSwedenSwitzerlandThailandUKUnited States UruguayVietnam

ArgentinaAustraliaCanadaChileColombiaDenmarkFinlandFranceGermany

Structure

At the centre:

• Three Research Groups:– Livestock (NZ / Netherlands)– Paddy Rice (Japan)– Croplands (USA)

• Two cross-cutting issues – Soil carbon and nitrogen cycling (France / Australia)– Inventories and measurement (Canada / Netherlands)

Held together by a Charter and supported by a Secretariat

A few other details

• Designed to complement and support the work of key initiatives, e.g. CGIAR

• Is not part of the UNFCCC negotiations

• Does not have a central funding mechanism

Progress update

• Stock-take exercise of countries’ activities

• Meetings of the Research Groups (Sept-Nov) and short-term projects:

– Standardised guidelines and protocols, and best practice manuals– Information and data sharing networks of genomics experts– Synthesis papers and database of existing research

• Charter drafting – governance structure and membership

• Outreach to potential new members and other interested organisations

• Second full meeting (March, France)

• Ministerial Summit and start of “working phase” (June)

www.globalresearchalliance.org

secretariat@globalresearchalliance.org