USDA officials and industry stakeholders on Nov. 29 held a send-off rally for this year’s United Nations climate conference to prepare for two weeks of “negotiating, cajoling and convincing” delegates and groups from other countries to come around to the U.S. view that “voluntary, incentive-based” climate-smart farming is the pathway forward for agricultural policy and climate change.
This year’s United Nations “Conference of the Parties,” known as COP28, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), opened Nov. 30 and runs until Dec. 12.
COP28 will put more focus on agriculture and food than any of the previous COP events. That includes an entire day, Dec. 10, to focus on the launch of aggressive action—a “climate policy toolkit for food.” The UAE is putting forward the “Emirates Declaration on Resilient Food Systems, Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Action,” which expects commitments from large agricultural countries to commit to new actions that would lower emissions from agriculture and food production.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told USDA staff and a group of industry stakeholders that USDA and the Biden administration will show up to the COP laying out a series of investments in conservation and renewable energy. There will be “significant announcements” and commitments that will be hammered out over the next two weeks, he said.
At the heart of the U.S. efforts is the $3.1 million Partnership for Climate-Smart Commodities, which USDA expects will reach as many as 60,000 farmers in the next few years of enrollment. Vilsack pointed to 175 farming practices and more than 90 commodities tied to the program. Along with that goes the $19.5 billion in the Inflation Reduction Act to boost climate-smart practices in USDA’s traditional suite of conservation programs.
“America can talk about this and can actually show they are doing it. Many countries can talk about plans they have. We can show what we’re doing,” Vilsack said.
A COP meeting typically has three tracks. There’s the “presidency track” where the lead country helps spotlight certain themes, which include “food systems” this year. There’s the knowledge space: the pavilions and expos where every group makes their case about what should be done or not done about climate change. An estimated 70,000 people will attend COP28 in some capacity.
And there’s the policy track where leaders from nearly 200 countries are negotiating their next commitments to lower emissions and help underdeveloped countries address climate change. In agriculture, for instance, there are efforts to get greater commitments to lower emissions, such as methane from livestock. Already, groups and corporations are sending notices of major announcements they plan to make about commitments to reduce emissions.
“These negotiations have implications for what we do domestically and how we do it,” said Bill Hohenstein, director of USDA’s Office of Energy and Environmental Policy, stressing the outcomes of COP meetings.
More US farmer voices
Ernie Shea, executive director of Solutions From the Land, will lead a delegation of nine farmers who will split time at the conference. In an interview, Shea said the gameplan for his group at the COP is always to bring the voice of American farmers to the climate summit to offer a counterweight to some of the more extreme environmental arguments.
“These forums are always platforms where all kinds of actors show up wanting to change agriculture,” Shea said. “For many of them, their core message is the food and agriculture system is broken, it is contributing massively to greenhouse gas emissions, and we need to turn things around. They typically focus on agroecology as a preferred solution. They shun technology and innovation, and they don’t embrace incentive approaches for farmers to help themselves and the planet.”
More U.S. agricultural groups are attending the COP events now, which Shea said, “is refreshing and good.” The U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance, for instance, has gotten more engaged in recent COP events and is sending a group of board members. The U.S. Soybean Export Council, U.S. Grains Council, the U.S. Dairy Export Council and the North American Meat Institute are just a few of the groups expected to participate in this year’s conference.
“There’s a long list,” Shea said. “Many of them have events at the COP this year. That’s a new piece of the puzzle that more ag groups are showing up, and we welcome that because agriculture is so diverse that we need multiple voices.”
A key for U.S. agriculture is incentivizing action rather than prescribing it. “This is where the fault lines start to form,” Shea said. “We’re there saying follow our guiding principles, while others are there saying we need to impose limits such as restricting livestock in certain areas. There are groups that really take a government-centric, command-and-control approach. We’re saying there’s a downside to doing that.”— Chris Clayton, DTN ag policy editor
