Climate-Smart Agriculture in South Asia: exploring practices, determinants, and contribution to Sustainable Development Goals

Abstract

In the face of unprecedented challenges arising from climate change, Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) emerges as a holistic solution for South Asia, addressing adaptation, mitigation, and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). However, a substantial knowledge gap exists regarding the current status of CSA practices, the factors influencing their adoption, and the specific SDGs that benefit from such adoption. Within this context, this study undertakes a systematic review of the literature (n = 78) concerning the adoption of CSA practices in South Asia, primarily drawing from three scholarly databases, viz. Web of Science, Scopus, and ScienceDirect. The results show that the widely adopted CSA practices in South Asia are climate-resilient seeds, zero tillage, water conservation, rescheduling planting, crop diversification, soil conservation, and water harvesting, agroforestry. Several factors, such as socio-economic factors (e.g. education, livestock ownership, age, landholding size, and market access), institutional factors (e.g. information and communication technology, credit availability, input subsidies, agricultural training and demonstration, direct cash transfer, and crop insurance), and climatic factors (e.g. increasing temperature, floods and droughts, decrease in rainfall, and delays in rainfall), are the major driving forces behind the adoption of CSA in South Asia. Implications of CSAs have positive impacts primarily on SDG-1, SDG-2, SDG-3, SDG-5, SDG-6, SDG-7, SDG-12, and SDG-13. The findings of this study hold important policy implications for creating an enabling environment that supports the widespread adoption of CSA practices. Key recommendations encompass establishing specialised training centres for women and elderly farmers, leveraging ICT tools, fostering collaboration between small and medium enterprises and agricultural agents, and enhancing market linkages and value chains for CSA products.