by MuwOnge David – NUCAFE
Description
Global warming by 2 degrees Celsius could shrink Uganda’s coffee-growing areas to almost less than 30% of the current area. Drought is the most crucial cause of crop failure in coffee in Uganda. The mitigation measures for using irrigations were previously prohibitive in terms of cost, and the COVID 19 made it even harder to get the needed funds to install irrigation. Climate change is manifested in more severe and more frequent drought events, which lead to loss of flowers and thus lower productivity when this occurs at the flowering stage. Other interventions have also been challenged due to the COVID 19 situation effect on access to inputs such as fertilizer since most are imported, longer sales cycles due to shipment challenges, etc.
Climate-smart Agriculture practices adopted by the National Union of Coffee Agribusinesses and Farm Enterprises (NUCAFE) are:
- Farm level demonstrations:
- Irrigation using Solar powered pumps.
- Soil and water conservation methods
- Use of shade trees and agroforestry practices.
- Sustainable intensification 3 x1 meter planting.
- Value chain level:
- Eco friendly coffee processing using solar energy.
- Coffee Crop Drought Indexed Insurance, De-risking Coffee Farming.
- Bankable Business planning:
- Formation of a Business wing to attract long term Capital to invest in climate change mitigation in medium and long-term.
Strategic partnerships and Advocacy for climate resilience.
Results
Farmers benefits from the coffee industry. This leads to sustainable livelihoods, consumer satisfaction and societal transformation. Smallholder farmers are empowered and organized by using the farmer ownership model to assume more roles and functions within the value chain. This body has registered significant landmarks as a champion in offering exceptionally high-quality coffee to high end market off takers and in advancing much resource constrained smallholder farmers into the profitable nodes of the coffee value chain for enhanced profitability.
Climate smartness*
This is an interesting story of a comprehensive CSA approach as it integrates different actions that cover different stages of the value chain, including on-farm production with practices that take care of the water and the soil, integrating an essential element in sustainable agricultural production, as are the trees, in agroforestry systems. In addition to the direct benefits for food security and climate change adaptation at on-farm production, the transition to clean energy sources by integrating solar energy during the production and processing stages, increases farmers’ resilience by minimizing the use and dependency on fossil fuels, with potential co-benefits in mitigation through the reduction of overall carbon footprint in the agricultural system. Mainstreaming of Drought index insurance and De-risk agricultural value chain approaches provide strong support to strategic and climate sensitive planning, contributing to greater stability and projection capacity of the agricultural business models of farmers, and encouraging the emergence of opportunities for diversification of livelihoods, thus strengthening the adaptive capacity of the territories.
*This is done in the framework of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) approach. Climate-smartness in agriculture means understanding impacts of climate change and variability along with the agricultural activity, which includes the planning of what crop to plant, when to plant, what variety to plant and what type of management practices are needed to reduce the impact on the environment (e.g. emissions reduction), maintain or increase productivity (e.g. yields) while increasing resilience and improving livelihoods.