Agmip's Transdisciplinary Approach to Regional Integrated Assessment of Climate Impact, Vulnerability and Adaptation of Agricultural Systems in Africa and South Asia.

This poster presents economic impact results (adoption/adaptation, production, income, poverty) from regional teams in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia that are part of the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP). All of the teams are utilizing the new integrated assessment methodology developed by AgMIP. This approach represents a departure from approaches in the literature in several dimensions. First, the approach is based on the analysis of agricultural systems (not individual crops) and is inherently trans-disciplinary: it is based on a deep collaboration among a team of climate scientists, agricultural scientists and economists to design and implement regional integrated assessments of agricultural systems.  Second, in contrast to previous approaches that have imposed future climate on models based on current socio-economic conditions, this approach combines bio-physical and economic models with a new type of pathway analysis (Representative Agricultural Pathways) to parameterize models consistent with a plausible future world in which climate change would be occurring. Third, adaptation packages for the agricultural systems in a region are designed by the research team with a level of detail that is useful to decision makers, such as research administrators and donors, who are making agricultural R&D investment decisions.  Finally, the approach represents not only "mean" impact the distribution of impacts among farm populations. The poster summarizes the impact assessment and adaptation analysis results, comparing and contrasting among study areas, and highlighting the role of the Representative Agricultural Pathways in climate impact assessment.