International Project

Quantifying Agricultural Greenhouse Gases in Developing Countries

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Project Overview

Sponsoring and hosting organizations

The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University with support from The David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Climate Change Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) a research program of the CGIAR, The University of Vermont, and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.

Project Goal

To support the development of simple, low cost methods for the quantification of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions and removals at national and project scales to support enhanced management for mitigation and track performance for national planning, international financing, voluntary markets, regulatory markets, and supply chain initiatives.

Project Outcomes

1. Clarified levels of confidence and evidence desired for quantifying agricultural GHG emissions and removals and quantifying changes to track performance for a range of involved decision makers (e.g., corporate, national, regional, project).
2. Summary of critical data, analytical and knowledge gaps to improve quantification to levels necessary for decision makers (e.g., improving use of Tier 1 accounting and going beyond).
3. Proposed innovations for simple, low cost approaches to fill data needs for better quantification (remote sensing, project level data gathering, etc.) including consideration of data availability and capacity constraints.
4. A summary of expert opinion on progress possible in next decade that highlights priorities for funding – research, data, and capacity.
   
5. Synthesis of the state of quantification methods and a roadmap for progress on agricultural GHG quantification for policy audiences.
6. Approaches for building capacity to conduct this work, including the possibility of regional working groups.

Project Approach

Two background framing papers, a workshop, a special issue of the journal Environmental Research Letters, two policy briefs and a synthesis article are planned.

Background papers

These will be developed to provide context and guidance for the workshop and special issue.  

1. Setting the context: Who are the key users of information on agricultural GHGs (national inventories, private markets, public investors, supply chain initiatives); how does the information they need differ; what levels of confidence and evidence are required for these users and at what scales; what are the main data and analytical gaps.  [A survey of decision makers coordinated by Lydia Olander and Lini Wollenberg]
2. Starting the conversation: An initial assessment of the critical knowledge, analytical, and data gaps, and how might we address them.  [A multi-authored paper coordinated by Keith Paustian]

Timeline: Paper outlines fall 2011; revised drafts available at workshop in early 2012.

Workshop

A 2½ day workshop hosted by the FAO in Rome. Those involved in regional working groups would remain for additional 1 day meeting. Timing: April 2012

Special Issue

Papers to address critical data and analytical gaps will be explored at the workshop and published in Environmental Research Letters, a high impact open source journal by the end of 2012. Click here for information on the open call for articles.

Policy Summaries

• A framing brief - what are the issues for agricultural greenhouse gas quantification? (Release after workshop with workshop summary)
  
• A summary brief - where are we now and what are the priorities for progress on agricultural greenhouse gas quantification? (Release with special issue journal)
  

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Project Steering Group

• Lydia Olander, coordinator
  

• Lini Wollenberg, coordinator

• Christina Seeberg Elverfeldt, coordinator

• Francesco Tubiello, Natural Resources Officer (climate change mitigation) FAO

• Mario Herrero, Program Leader, Sustainable Livestock Futures, International Livestock Research Institute, Kenya

• Keith Paustian, Professor of Soil Ecology, Colorado State University, USA

• Pierre Gerber, Livestock Policy Officer, Animal Production and Health Division, Agriculture and Consumer Protection Department, FAO

• Pramod Kumar Agarwal, Regional Program Leader CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture, and Food Security (CCAFS) International Water Management Institute, NASC Complex, India

• Hayden Montgomery, Special Advisor for the Global Alliance on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases and lead negotiator for LULUCF in UNFCCC, New Zealand

• Elly Baroudy, The BioCarbon Fund, World Bank

• Martin Herold, Professor Remote Sensing, GOFC-GOLD,  Wageningen University, The Netherlands

• Magda Lima Embrapa, Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply, Brazil.

• Michael Obersteiner, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)

Additional Advisors

• Chuck Rice, University Distinguished Professor of Soil Microbiology, Department of Agronomy, Kansas State University (T-AGG team)

• Robert Jackson, Chair of Global Environmental Change at the Nicholas School and Professor in the Biology Department, Duke University (T-AGG team)

• William Salas, President and Chief Scientist, Applied Geosolutions, Inc.

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Regional Working Groups

CCAFS will support the development of regional working groups to help with capacity building, knowledge sharing and understanding regional application of methods and approaches. They are currently targeting representatives from East Africa, West Africa and South Asia. Members of regional working groups would be invited to attend this quantification workshop and an additional one-day meeting to explore the potential for building regional working groups and providing nodal points on quantification in developing countries. At the one-day meeting representatives would discuss how to build regional groups and the activities that they would like to conduct in the coming year. This meeting would include a representative from the working group initiative in the United States to share their model.

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