In the green fields of western Uganda where I farm, the rhythm of life used to be dictated by the seasons. We would plant in February, harvest beans in May and maize in July, and expect rains in August. That doesn’t happen any more. Climate change means that we plant not knowing when the rains will come, or how heavy they’ll be.
Earlier this year extreme rains and floods have killed thousands of livestock and destroyed over 27,000 acres of cropland across East Africa sparking fears of a food shortage. Our urgent need to adapt is glaringly obvious.
Others are beginning to realise this too. There is growing recognition that the new climate finance goal – set to be agreed at COP29 in Azerbaijan – needs to be a lot more ambitious. Climate finance for agrifood systems alone must increase sevenfold to reach even the most conservative estimated needs.
But we also need better finance. This means ensuring more of the available funding gets to the grassroots where it can have the most impact. Small-scale producers who produce over a third of the world’s food, received just 0.3% of international climate finance in 2021. Many are already vulnerable – decades of underinvestment in agriculture, an unfair global food system, poverty and inequality, means they lack the infrastructure, technology, and resources to cope with ever more extreme and erratic weather. Access to climate finance could be the difference between resilience and ruin. When my newly-planted field was washed away by extreme rains, I had the money to pay for seeds, materials and labour to re-plant and keep growing. With little government support, no savings to fall back on, or access to affordable insurance many of my neighbours were not so lucky.
This isn’t just a problem for farmers in Africa: it hits consumers too. Price spikes in staples like cocoa reveal the extent of our interconnected vulnerabilities. Much of what you eat and drink relies on supply chains powered by small farmers: nine out of ten cocoa growers are smallholders and around three-quarters (73%) of all coffee is grown on family farms. When African farmers are left alone to cope with the devastation of climate change, consumers across the globe see empty shelves and higher prices.
So why are small scale producers – and the organisations which represent and support them – locked out of finance flows?
Eighty percent of climate finance for food and agriculture is channelled through governments and donor country NGOs whose application processes for funding are often highly technical, hugely bureaucratic and incredibly time consuming – accessing funds can take years. For family farmer organisations facing mounting climate impacts with limited resources, it’s almost impossible to navigate and too long to wait. When finance is made available it is often delivered through commercial banks in the form of loans with interest rates as high as 25% – putting it well beyond our reach.
Donors often favour tech fixes and research over the practical support farmers need. Techniques like planting windbreaks, intercropping, mixed farming and mulching are part of our farming heritage and key to adaptation. Reviving those practices would be the real innovation. The European Union’s Horizon 2020 project, which will spend €20M for agroecology research in Sub-Saharan Africa, sounds impressive. But with little funding for farmers to implement its findings, what’s the point?
We have to find a way to bridge the gap between financiers and farmers, policymakers and ploughed fields. Family farmers must have a say in how food and climate plans are developed – not tagged on as ‘beneficiaries’ after all the important decisions have been made. The hard-earned experience of farmers must be front and centre.
Governments and funders must also ensure that more finance is directed at family farmers organisations who have a deep understanding of the challenges farmers face and the ability to reach out into communities to deliver the support they need. This funding should be long-term, flexible and include grants – not just loans. That way farmers organisations can deliver on farmers priorities instead of government or industry goals.
Small-scale producers across the globe are fighting for the future of food – day by day, field by field. Governments can’t climate proof our food system or end hunger without us. It’s time they worked with us.
