The CGIAR is undertaking a global reform, oneCGIAR, to deploy faster, at larger scale agricultural innovations for a more inclusive and systemic transformation of smallholder agriculture in the developing countries. France has been supporting this reform since 2018 and IRD is fully engaged with CGIAR research teams to develop impactful global research programs called initiatives, which have started since January 2022 under three science groups: Systems transformation, Resilient Agrifood Systems and Genetic Innovation. The action plan signed between France and the international organization CGIAR in February 2021 aims at strengthening collaboration between French research organizations and CGIAR along three priority development themes: adapting and mitigating against climate change (theme coordinated by IRD), nutrition and agroecological transformation of farming and food systems in the South.
Under the climate change theme, a first inception 2 Degree workshop was co-organized by the CGIAR research programme on climate change (CCAFS) and IRD - DIADE in 2019 (read the synopsis for further details). Six themes of potential collaboration were discussed: One health (aligned with the PREZODE international initiative); adapting to multiple stresses; climate security in the MENA region; resilient and adaptive water systems; securing Asian mega deltas; circular bioeconomy.
Several France CGIAR collaborations emerged from this workshop including:
- DESIRA project “Strengthening the evidence base for a climate resilient and low-carbon small-holder agriculture through agroecology in Latin America” developed and launched in 2020, with the participation of IRD and CIRAD teams.
- CCAFS funded literature review « Agroecology and climate change: a case study of CCAFS research programme » published in 2020 (Andrieu N., Kebede Y., 2020).
- A BRIDGE concept note was submitted to the DEvelopment Smart Innovation through Research in Agriculture (DESIRA) on low-cost digital decision tools to improve water efficiency and cli-mate resilience of legume-based systems. While not successful due to tight deadline, its unique inter and transdisciplinary approach has attracted positive feedback for donors and research partners.
One promising area of climate change research collaboration between France and CGIAR is the co-creation of holistic climate and water smart decision-support systems. Data revolution and more integrated model-based approaches could help water and agriculture stakeholders better evaluate the potential impact and trade-offs of various climate adaptation options to select locally adapted, robust solutions for a much needed sustainable and inclusive transformation of the agriculture and food sector.
This approach is called BRIDGE for co-Building Resilient climate and water smart farming systems with Interdisciplinary and Integrated models and multi-actor Decision and chanGE platforms. For more details about BRIDGE, read 1-CGIAR_BRIDGE_brief.docx
A BRIDGE research consortium has been set up to pursue this trans and interdisciplinary research for development roadmap. BRIDGE is composed of researchers from DIADE (Dr. Vincent Vadez, BRIDGE coordinator), other IRD teams (EspaceDev, Naila), CIRAD, the International Center for Advanced Mediterranean Agronomic Studies (CIHEAM), University Mohamed VI Polytechnique (UM6P and its center for remote sensing applications CRSA and the international water research institute IWRI), the Institute of Environmental Geosciences (IGE) and their national research and development partners in water-scarce MENA and Sahel regions (Morocco, Tunisia, Senegal). The consortium is engaged with CGIAR in the CGIAR initiative on climate resilience called ClimBeR since 2021.
BRIDGE is working in two of the six ClimBeR target countries: Morocco and Senegal, closely with ICARDA to co-develop a cross-scale water and climate resilience integrated assessment framework called Climate Smart Systemic Solutions and Scaling (C4S). This work is done under the ClimBeR work package 3 “climate adaptation instruments / policy pathways”, led by Leeds University (PI: Dr. Andy Challinor). Some teams explore multidisciplinary / integrated modelling approaches (crop, hydrological and socioeconomic in silico assessment). Others look at processes and methodologies used for the co-development of climate adaptation decision-support frameworks and tools.
Within this dataset, you will find the following information:
- Brief, methodological note and description of the research teams and type of activities conducted under ClimBeR initiative
- Slidedecks presenting each BRIDGE team proposition in Morocco, Tunisia and Senegal
- A folder "C4S research agenda" gathers cross-cutting notes and interdisciplinary meeting minutes since end 2021.
- A folder "BRIDGE lit-review" to document the literature review work carried out by BRIDGE on integrated modelling and co-construction methodologies, initiated since 2021 with CCAFS.
- Two folders for all the research and development research and stakeholder consultation conducted in 2022 in Morocco and Senegal.
- A final folder gathering the different knowledge products generated by the 8 BRIDGE teams (2022).
For more details, please refer to the
table of contents.
