With 10 days left to COP17 in Durban, South Africa, a critical element of the discussions in Durban must be around financing adaptation. Outcomes of the talks must provide sufficient support to tackle the adaptation needs of farmers in developing countries who have done very little to cause climate change yet are vulnerable to its effects. Fairtrade farmers are no exception and despite the support Fairtrade provides, they remain inadequately resourced to deal with the present and predicted impacts of the climate change phenomenon.

Farmers are often overlooked in the current Climate Change policy frameworks. Fairtrade calls upon world leaders, at COP17 and beyond, to prioritise policies geared to facilitate the smooth adaptation of agriculture dependent communities, to the changes that have been precipitated by climate change. The urgency of such policy formulation is evident in the wake of the increasingly negative effects of climate change. Farmers have been unable to adequately adapt to the effects due to lack of financial muscle, or access to other resources that are needed for them to salvage their livelihoods. 

Fairtrade farmers are representative of a critically important element of many developing country economies – export agriculture. If the impacts already being experienced by Fairtrade farmers are replicated at national and regional levels, then many countries will be pushed ever deeper in a situation of dependency.

Fairtrade hails the establishment of the Green Climate Fund but reiterates this Fund needs to make agriculture a priority with a focus on adaptation to climate change. At the same time it must ensure that disbursement mechanisms enable vulnerable communities to adequately benefit from it. It is imperative that this fund become functional and help communities adapt to the effects of climate change.

For more information please contact:
Nokutula Mhene
Email: n.mhene@fairtradeafrica.net
Tel: +27(0)21 448 8911 | www.fairtradeafrica.net