Puzzling questions on climate change
This year’s World Food Day was marked under the theme “Climate is changing. Food and agriculture must too.” All farmers must revise their methods of production and do some things differently. Most parts of Uganda have not received sufficient rain in recent months and farmers are puzzled how to proceed with agriculture under unpredictable and extreme weather conditions.
President Museveni bought a bicycle and used it to carry water to teach farmers about drip irrigation. He is in line with the World Food Day slogan. Under the changed climatic conditions, there is an urgent need to support smallholders in adapting to climate change by introducing them to new technologies. Climate change, poverty and hunger must be addressed together.
The World Food Day slogan meant that farming must be carried out with climate change mitigation in mind. Many questions however still beg answers. We are told to plant trees to absorb carbon dioxide, which is one of three global warming gases. How many trees shall we plant to absorb how much carbon dioxide? We discovered oil, we are importing more cars and tractors, and we want to open up industries—all of which emit carbon dioxide.
Yet centuries of burning fossil fuels like oil and coal in the industrialised countries released massive volumes of carbon dioxide that have resulted in the climate change we are experiencing today. We are an agricultural country but agriculture is known to make small contributions of carbon dioxide, and other equally dangerous global warming gases, methane, and nitrous oxide (www.panos.org.uk).
Apart from emphasising irrigation, what else are we doing to help the farmers mitigate climate change?
We are told to preserve forests. They promote bio-diversity and have many other environmental benefits. But they are vulnerable to disasters like fires and human activities like timber harvesting, herbal medicine making, and clearing them to create space for agriculture, given our rapidly growing population. When we plant coffee trees, oranges, palm trees, cocoa trees, paw-paw, banana trees, cassava, maize, beans, and other crops, do they not absorb carbon dioxide and mitigate climate change?
E-mail: [email protected]
