More than 10 Latin American agriculture ministers joined forces in Egypt this month to portray their region’s economically powerful farm sector as a victim of climate change rather than a prominent contributor to it.

In dozens of side events at the COP27 Climate Conference in Sharm el Sheikh, the ministers spoke of plans their countries have put into effect in recent years to address climate-change mitigation and adaptation.

But their message was largely political. They argued that Latin American agricultural production is crucial for global food security, and insisted that the sector’s environmental footprint is smaller than critics charge. For instance, they cite the sector’s wide use of no-till agriculture, made possible by the use of transgenic crops, and the prevalence of grass-fed cattle operations, whose pastures store carbon.

At the same time, they made clear they would not take kindly to international policy proposals that aim to restrict the access of their agricultural products to foreign markets on climate-protection grounds. Their vigilance on that point comes in response to criticism by international environmental groups that Latin American agriculture is contributing significantly to climate change.

Climate advocates take particular aim at cattle ranching, saying it exacerbates global warming for reasons ranging from forest destruction caused as new pasture is cleared to methane emissions that occur as cows burp during digestion. (See "For climate’s sake, Brazil tests cow-burp control" —EcoAméricas, August 2022.)

Underlying such criticism is growing concern that while fossil-fuel use is the foremost source of greenhouse-gas emissions, climate protection will not be achieved by addressing energy alone. Food-production practices must be tackled, too, former Peruvian Environment Minister Manuel Pulgar Vidal noted in a conversation with EcoAméricas at COP27. “In the Amazon basin, 60% of greenhouse gasses are generated by deforestation and land-use change,” said Pulgar Vidal, who now oversees climate and energy issues at WWF. “In many countries in the Americas there still are public policies that encourage deforestation in connection with ranching, crop-farming and other activities. These have got to be reversed.”

Pulgar Vidal said that while he doesn’t believe climate talks should be used to develop sanctions on the farm sector, “[w]e should be more efficient, making farming and ranching higher-yield in smaller spaces, which would reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and be less destructive to biodiversity. We also must place greater value on standing forest. We still don’t pay appropriately for carbon sequestration in forests in order to stimulate more conservation.”

Agricultural officials argue much criticism they receive is unfair. “There is a great deal of hypocrisy on the part of European countries, which have made full use of their natural resources in the past and now want to lecture us on how to use ours,” Uruguayan Ranching and Agriculture Minister Fernando Mattos told EcoAméricas at COP27. “It should be clear that those who really pollute with fossil fuels are developed countries, and emerging countries with large populations, such as India and China.”

Crises set stage

COP27 occurred amid global crises that have stymied world efforts to eradicate hunger by 2030 in line with UN Sustainable Development Goals. Latin American ministers spotlighted this context in Sharm el Sheikh as they presented a statement they had drafted at a September meeting of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA). IICA Director Manuel Otero said the statement and presentations ministers made at COP27 advanced the view that agriculture is “part of the solution to climate change” and “there cannot be environmental sustainability if there is no food security.”

The statement, endorsed by agriculture officials throughout the Americas, notes that climate change has affected rural production and livelihoods, exacerbating poverty and hunger, and argues for guaranteed food security and developed-country financial help with climate adaptation and resilience work in agriculture. But it devotes relatively little attention to climate mitigation, saying “agriculture in the Americas has been increasing its sustainability for years.” This despite the fact that at last year’s climate talks—COP26, in Glasgow—great attention was given to the destructive climate effects of methane emissions, which are produced to a substantial degree by cattle. COP26 delegates pledged to cut methane emissions by 30% by 2030.

At one COP27 event, Paraguayan Agriculture Minister Santiago Bertoni downplayed such concerns. He said that because Paraguayan cattle are raised on natural-grass pastures that sequester carbon, their methane emissions are offset. He acknowledged, however, that this effect has yet to be quantified. “We have to have our own measuring systems that take carbon capture into account,” he said, adding that meanwhile, “We aren’t going to get carried away [with concern about criticism of agriculture’s climate effects], because livestock is part of our future.”

Regional coordination

Brazil’s agricultural spokesman at COP27, Commerce Undersecretary Fernando Zelner, decried “well organized and financed” criticism of Latin American agriculture’s climate impacts. He said he was encouraged that the region “is acting in a coordinated way,” adding: “Never have we seen so many agriculture ministers from the region in a climate change conference.”

Among them were ministers from Central American and Caribbean countries including El Salvador, the Dominican Republic and the Bahamas. Aside from working to challenge charges of unsustainability, they attempted to make a case for greater financial support for the region’s farm sector in the face of climate change. “We don’t have access to agricultural financing that is really possible for producers, for agricultural insurance or for technologies that allow them to be resilient,” Honduran Agriculture Minister Laura Suazo told EcoAméricas at the conference.

The COP27 document issued at the close of the conference was welcomed by Latin American and Caribbean agricultural officials because it emphasizes the need to ensure food security and protect agriculture from climate-change impacts. It also describes agricultural producers as “key agents of change” who are “stewards of the land and are inclined to apply sustainable land management approaches.”

Probably to the satisfaction of the farm sector and the frustration of some environmental advocates, the statement left wiggle room concerning mitigation efforts in agriculture. It said each country must proceed “taking into account different systems and national circumstances.”