Climate change has devastated the livelihoods of millions of farmers in the developing world. As frequent droughts threaten countries’ food security, the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) has recommended farmers undertake climate-smart farming initiatives. Climate-smart farming techniques include zero-till farming, surface seeding, laser land leveling, and organic crops usage. While the literature on the efficiency of climate-smart farming is sparse, several countries have shown promising results.

Success in Vietnam

Researchers from Ritsumeikan University found that climate-smart farming adaptations actually improved rice yields in Vietnam. The study looked at the technical efficiency of 352 farmers in the Mekong Delta, 71% of which practiced climate-smart farming. CSA pilot programs in the Mekong Delta provided local farmers with different rice varieties, sustainable fertilizers, and knowledge on new eco-friendly farming techniques.

While farmers often experience trade-offs in production when implementing sustainable farming techniques, climate-smart farmers in the Mekong Delta saw 13-14% increased efficiency. The authors defined technical efficiency to measure how competitive farmers were compared to peers.

Improving outcomes for women in Nepal

Over the past few decades, much of Nepal has experienced a cultural shift. As more men have moved to find migrant work, women have taken on huge labor burdens in agriculture. Therefore, improving agricultural efficiency is important for reducing poverty and labor inequality for women. Researchers from the Nepal Development Research Institute found that climate-smart farming reduced labor hours for Nepalese women.

Techniques like surface sowing and new technologies greatly reduced the number of labor hours women had to spend in the fields. Researchers hope that this reduced labor burden will allow women to have more time for education, other employment, and household decisions. Thus, climate-smart farming can be a surprisingly important tool for improving gender equality.

Growth potential in Africa

Many parts of Southern and Eastern Africa suffer from frequent droughts. Food production is also mostly supplied by small-scale farmers who are often not equipped to deal with extreme weather. Luckily, researchers, investors, and organizations have taken notice of the need for climate smart farming in Sub Saharan Africa. Over the next few years over $500 million will be invested in climate-smart farming programs in Sub Saharan Africa.

Kenya livestock insurance program

The Kenya Livestock Insurance Program (KLIP) was a unique climate-smart agriculture case since it dealt with livestock rather than crop yields. The Kenyan government partnered with the private sector to use satellites to monitor vegetation in pastures.

Based on vegetation levels, the government issued payouts to help farmers keep their livestock alive during droughts. As of 2019, the program covers over 18,000 farmers. Programs similar to the KLIP can be implemented across the world, but adoption is still low.

Further expansion

While climate-smart agriculture has shown promising results, there are still barriers to adoption. Researchers at the World Agroforestry Center reviewed about 150 papers on climate-smart agriculture. Based on said papers. They argue a lack of research on the economic results of climate-smart agriculture deters would-be investors.

Improving research on climate-smart agriculture’s effects on output and efficiency is key to accelerating the adoption of climate-smart agriculture.

Austin Wang

Austin is a writer at The Rising and an Economics student at the University of Chicago.

Microsoft has long been an environmentally-conscious company. In fact, it declared itself a carbon-neutral company as early as 2012.

Yesterday, Microsoft announced four new initiatives that would help it become a more sustainable company. These initiatives range from the more fundamental steps,

Building sustainable campuses and data centers.

To begin, Microsoft is looking to build 17 more buildings that won’t run on fossil fuels and will be instead run on 100% carbon-free electricity. Additionally, Microsoft hopes to decrease carbon levels associated with construction by some 15%.

Augmenting its efforts to build more sustainable campuses, Microsoft is looking to power its data centers with renewable energy as much as possible.

Taking More Data-Driven Approaches To Research

In 2017, Microsoft launched AI for Earth, an initiative that allows people working on sustainability issues to gain deeper, more numerically-backed insights into how the environment is changing.

Microsoft is also hosting large governmental datasets on its cloud-computing platform, Azure. These datasets contain satellite imagery, among other insights, and with Microsofts APIs, can be analyzed.

Besides the government, Microsoft also seems to be working with the people. Having given out some 230 grants to people tackling climate change, Microsoft is inspiring everyone to go out and tackle these problems.

Helping Its Customers Be More Sustainable

Aside from becoming a more sustainable company itself, Microsoft is also helping its clients become more environmentally-friendly. For instance, it’s helping Ecolab improve its water conservation efforts with Azure, IoT, and AI.

On a smaller scale, it’s also working with startup Silvia Terra. With AI for Earth, Microsoft has been able to keep a “national inventory of forests“.

The scope of Azure’s applications seems endless.

Advocating for Policy Change

Microsoft has also joined the Climate Leadership Council, a policy institute composed of business leaders, economists, and environmental leaders. As leaders in the public and private sector continue to find ways to collaborate towards solving problems in sustainability.

Conclusions

Microsoft is joining companies like Apple, Tesla, and Nespresso in becoming more environmentally sustainable. But like any other initiative, it’ll be imperative to see if the results are what Microsoft expect.

Steven Li

Steven is the Founder and Editor at The Rising, where he covers brands, climate policy, and greentech. He is also a Computer Science student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. If you want to pitch him a story, you can reach him at steven@mediusventures.com.

Although owning a Keurig is convenient, the single-serve plastic coffee pods have a drastic environmental impact. Inevitably, consumers use plastic coffee pods once and then discard them into landfills. Allegedly, the amount of K-cups that have been discarded into the landfills could wrap the planet more than ten times. Nespresso introduces a more sustainable solution: recyclable coffee pods.

A More Sustainable Coffee Pod

Nespresso has created a different kind of single-serve coffee pod made out of aluminum, which can be recycled continuously. It even encourages pod recycling by providing a recycling bag to consumers, which they can use to return up to 200 used capsules for recycling, free of charge.

Nespresso has been involved in sustainability efforts since starting their first recycling program in 1991, and has continued to pursue higher levels of sustainability, with a goal of reaching 100% pod recycling by 2020.

Next Steps

Now, Nespresso’s next step in sustainability is an invite to other coffee manufacturers to join their recycling program. The Nespresso Sustainability Advisory Board (NSAB) also supported this motion at their annual meeting in Geneva.

It’s idea? If other coffee companies switch to aluminum, then the coffee industry can eventually become a completely waste-free enterprise.

Nespresso’s CEO, Jean-Marc Duvoisin, said: “Aluminum is a valuable material and is infinitely recyclable. We [invite] other companies to join our system, we hope to offer a solution for the whole category.” Duvoisin additionally adds that this “decision is aligned with our global initiatives to shape a waste-free future and drive behavior change toward a circular economy.”

According to Nespresso, their recycled coffee pods have a variety of uses, from car engines and computers to cans. Nespresso typically puts its leftover coffee grounds to good use too, using them to produce natural fertilizer.

Conclusions

Opening this recycling program to their competitors opens several doors, as most countries do not have a public recycling system that allows for items such as coffee pods, as these products are simply too light for collection to be viable. As companies like Nespresso make recycling both more accessible and practical, other companies are likely going to follow suit.

Nespresso’s use of responsibly-sourced aluminum and the implementation of a widespread recycling program sounds commendable. However, like any other green initiative, we’ll have to see how it works out.

Madeline Barone

Madeline is a Writer at The Rising and an Environmental Sustainability and Psychology student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.