Sustainable agriculture development requires a shift towards climate and agroecological approaches that promote regenerative climate change adaptation and mitigation, natural resource use, and equitable decision-making.
The Agroecological TRANSITIONS program, supported by the EU, advocates for climate and agroecological transitions by addressing several challenges. The program has three projects: investigating holistic metrics to assess food and agricultural systems and guide policy and investment decisions; exploring public-private incentives and innovative pathways for sustainable practices; and developing digital tool innovations to support farmers and extension practitioners assess performance.
TRANSITIONS’ Inclusive Digital Tools (ATDT) Project looks at how digital resources can boost inclusivity and empower farmers in co-creating sustainable practices. ATDT has evaluated digital resources for technical advice and performance assessment to understand how they support agroecological transition. Regional partners and teams have developed and tested digital tools to support agroecology in Vietnam for rice and in Brazil for livestock. As the ATDT project comes to a close this year, we seek to exchange ideas with a wider group of organizations and stakeholders actively working with digital resources. Through this work and the parallel projects on metrics and public-private incentives, the TRANSITIONS projects aim to improve food security, minimize negative ecological impacts, and foster climate-informed agroecological transitions in LMICs.
Purpose
In this interactive workshop, we will advance understanding of opportunities and challenges to scale climate and agroecological transitions using digital resources. The objective is to share knowledge and exchange ideas among leaders and experts in this area on the following topics:
- Climate and agroecology indicators in digital tools
- Principles for digital inclusion of smallholder farmers
- Digital tool design for co-creation
- Incentives and pathways to scale digital tools for climate & agroecological transitions
Panelists will highlight how digital tools can support farmer agency and negotiate top-down and corporate influence in digital tool design. How digital tools can best serve farmer needs through co-creation of knowledge and avoiding the pitfalls of current digital tool business models driven by non-farmer interests will also be discussed. We will discuss how aligning metrics, policy, incentives, and digital tools can help integrate climate change adaptation and mitigation into agroecological practices and technical advice.
Agenda
Digital tools for an agroecological transition?
Lini Wollenberg
Co-creating agroecology practices for livestock in Brazil: Solis
Violaine Laurens
Vertically integrated digital performance assessment for the 1 Must Do 5 Reductions in Vietnam
Trang Vu/Katie Nelson, IRRI
Leveraging digital traceability tools for agroecology transitions
Fancisco Hidalgo
Q&A
Sandhya Kumar
Metrics for holistic assessment in digital tools
Mary Crossland
Principles for socially inclusive digital tools for smallholder farmers
Kyle Dittmer
Q&A
Facilitator
Panel: Will this work? What will it take?
Alesha Miller
Plenary discussion: Q&A, Priorities for a digital agroecology transition
Lini Wollenberg
Concluding statements
