Valle del Cauca takes its first steps in climate resilience with the implementation of the Agroclimatic Technical Table

The territory of Valle del Cauca is not alien to the effects of climate change and variability. According to the Department's Comprehensive Climate Change Plan, the increase in intensity and frequency of climate variability phenomena would be constant.

These climatic phenomena would considerably affect the agricultural sector, which must implement actions to adapt and mitigate the effects of climate variability and Climate Change, if it wants to continue to be productive and profitable. To this end, the approach of the Agroclimatic Technical Tables (MTA) and their implementation in Valle de Cauca play a vital role in increasing the climatic resilience of the agricultural sector and reducing agroclimatic risks, so that the Valle del Cauca countryside remains productive. .

On December 10, the first session of the Valle del Cauca MTA was held with the participation of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Government of Valle, Cenicaña, the International Bioversity Alliance, the International Center for Tropical Agriculture, the Program for CGIAR Research on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS), the Regional Autonomous Corporation of Valle del Cauca (CVC), Asohofrucol and representatives of the National University of Colombia.

In that first meeting, the first steps were taken to start the work of the MTA of Valle del Cauca, by identifying the main municipalities that would benefit from the agroclimatic information, the most representative crops and the topics of work at the community, municipal and departmental levels. , the meteorological stations whose information is involved in the analysis and projections and the role of the participating institutions.

“These are tables that have quite important ingredients that will lead us to have a more competitive, more resilient, low-carbon agriculture. It is not a task that corresponds to the Government, but it is achieved by working as a team all the public and private entities, research centers and all those who want to support these initiatives, "said Angelo Quintero, director of the Directorate of Innovation, Technological Development and Sanitary Protection of the Ministry of Agriculture.

The Secretary of Environment, Agriculture and Fisheries of Valle del Cauca, Andrés Murillo, said, for his part, that "the Agroclimatic Technical Table will allow to advise, diagnose and prevent those risks that small and medium farmers in Valle del Cauca have."

Steps to follow

For an MTA to be successful, a combination of different factors is needed, such as the interest of the parties, the commitment of the participants, the participation of experts from the agricultural and climate sector, and the willingness for constant learning that allows the consolidation of the approach and dissemination of the Agroclimatic Bulletin.

In this sense, in the first session of the MTA we found several examples of this commitment and participation. Freddy Fernando Garcés Obando, CEO of Cenicaña, commented: “Joining the Valle del Cauca Technical Agroclimatic Table is taking a step towards a more regional integration, which will facilitate the analysis of climate information, as well as recommending measures that not only they mitigate the effect of climate variability, but rather contribute to the daily life faced by small and medium-sized growers in Valle del Cauca ”.

For his part, Yeison Meneses, technical assistant of the Hortofrutícola Association of Colombia (Asohofrucol), hopes to find tools in the MTA for a more sustainable production: "We hope to contribute to the strategies of the Agroclimatic Technical Table of Valle del Cauca to promote development of the fruit and vegetable subsector facing the challenges of climate change and the needs of agriculture through the management of soil, water, fauna and flora. In this way we will be able to produce food under technical parameters of quality, safety and environmental sustainability, and producers will be able to reduce production costs while being responsible for the environment "

Germán Rueda, a professor at the National University based in Palmira, highlighted the capacity of the MTA to create synergies that allow us to achieve food security in the department: “This table will allow us to unite those strengths and generate a synergy that allows us to advance significantly on what is really important: food sovereignty. The University can put on the table its strengths such as training, the analysis of information and the generation of new knowledge; in this way, each entity will have a significant role at the table ”.

In the MTAs, everyone must contribute and actively participate to jointly define adaptation and mitigation measures that allow large producers and small farmers in Valle del Cauca to know and know how to use agro-climatic information to make better decisions about their crops.

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