A new report was published this month by representatives of the Climate Land Ambition and Rights Alliance (CLARA), a consortium of advocates, faith-based organisations and scientists concerned with climate mitigation and adaptation. The report, Missing Pathways to 1.5°C: The role of the land sector in ambitious climate action, provides an alternate response to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change’s request to the IPCC to analyse impacts of warming to 1.5°C and related greenhouse gas emission pathways.
“Our study is not meant to either contradict or complement the IPCC report,” said Doreen Stabinsky, a co-author of Missing Pathways. “The IPCC looks very generally at pathways to 1.5 degrees C. We dive into the literature to find what would be useful, specific contributions from the land sector to stay within a 1.5-degree pathway.”
The report therefore responds specifically to the concern that many IPCC pathways rely heavily on untested mitigation approaches such as bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS). CLARA supports the IPCC’s objective of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change while meeting sustainable development goals and reducing poverty.
CLARA’s report, however, confines solution pathways to low-risk land-sector approaches that protect, restore and sustainably manage natural ecosystems, while respecting human rights. In other words the report asks: What level of climate ambition can be based on approaches that are already available, and that safeguard food security and food sovereignty, land rights, and biodiversity?
Emphasising climate solutions that put the needs of people and planet first, especially the role that forests and improved agricultural practices can play, the report proposes a series of tactical approaches and quantified carbon sequestration goals to address the intertwined crises of climate change and global biodiversity loss. It draws the following conclusions, many of which add support to the recommendations made in our own Grow Green campaign.
- Land rights are key to ecosystem protection.
- Deforestation must end, globally, not just on a ‘net’ basis but on an absolute basis.
- Restoration, natural regeneration, reforestation, and improved forest management all represent important, separate opportunities for increasing mitigation ambition.
- A focus on biodiversity and rights delivers greater mitigation ambition than only focusing on carbon. Adaptation in agriculture delivers substantial mitigation benefits as well.
- Food production systems must be restructured toward agroecological approaches.
- Equitably reducing consumption, particularly of animal products, represents the single most effective climate intervention in the land sector.
- Climate-compatible food systems increase resilience while reducing hunger and ‘richcountry’ diseases indicative of poor diet.
Full text of the report available here [accessed 22/10/2018]
The views expressed by our Research News contributors are not necessarily the views of The Vegan Society.
The views expressed by our Research News contributors are not necessarily the views of The Vegan Society.
