Supporting Small-Scale, Underserved, and Limited Resources Farmers for Climate-Smart Commodities
As a leading CO2 emitting state, Texas contributes substantially to climate warming. Climate changes hinder the desired biological plant productivity and threaten food security. U.S. Farmers and Ranchers represent the most scalable and cost-effective solution to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and address climate change. Success will require adopting climate-smart practices throughout the agricultural community, catalyzed by financial incentives from the private sector. While all farmers are impacted by climate change, climate change does not affect all farmers similarly.
Small-scale underserved and limited resources (SULR) farmers are most disadvantaged in the current agricultural system and most vulnerable to negative impacts of climate change. Hence, climate change poses a significant threat to them and undermines global progress toward poverty alleviation, food security, and sustainable development. In addition, these farmers are not well exposed and trained to understand the benefits of climate-smart farming, climate-smart commodities and methods and tools that can be used in farming or agricultural management for climate change mitigation. Majority of SULR farmers are unaware of climate-smart farming and its potential benefits. Overall, the challenges of larger producers and SULR farmers are different.
