State Secretariat for Economic Affairs SECO through the SWISSCO Landscapes Programme
Colombia is highly affected by climate change, as it is increasingly vulnerable to flooding, landslides and water shortages, which impact agriculture, human health, economic activities, and critical infrastructure. In February 2020, the governor of Antioquia declared a state of climate emergency, with the emission of greenhouse gases and deforestation as the most urgent concerns. The Landscape Approach is becoming a driving paradigm in the international agriculture and environmental development sector. It is promoted by academics and practitioners alike to enhance climate change adaptive capacity and mitigation potential of agriculture in the tropic.
The Sustainable Landscapes project has the goal of collectively engaging local stakeholders in the development of sustainable sourcing landscapes in selected jurisdictions. The approach will have two layers:
The project aims to contribute to increase farmer’s income (Sustainable Development Goal SDG 1), decrease deforestation (SDG 3 and SDG 15), and strengthen traceability and transparency along the cocoa value chain (SDG 2). This shall be reached by:
The project will improve sustainability in three Colombian cocoa sourcing landscapes by increasing resilience to climate change of at least 11,533 hectares from 1,462 cocoa-producing households, sequestering or reducing 121,104 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) accumulated over 3 years, and increasing their income, exceeding the rural poverty line through three mechanisms:
In addition, the project will build the capacity of local public and private advisory services and input providers to deliver innovatively, state-of-the-art science-based and climate-smart/regenerative recommendations, practices, and technologies.