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Concrete actions to increase the sustainability of food and land still missing from COP26 climate pledges

By Alessandro Caprini, Marion Ferrat, and Micheline Khan

A new report by SDSN’s Food, Environment, Land and Development (FELD) Action Tracker explores the extent to which key countries include transformations of food and land systems—necessary to meet both climate and Sustainable Development Goals—in their Nationally Determined Contributions submitted before COP26.

As world leaders, negotiators, and thousands of representatives from NGOs, public and private organizations, youth movements, artists, and the media head home from Glasgow at the end of COP26, many will reflect on the outcomes of this 26th United Nations climate conference—the first big milestone since the 2015 Paris Agreement came into force. The two-week conference saw a number of positive pledges for nature, food and land use, with over 130 countries covering over 90% of the world’s forests committing to halt and reverse forest loss and land degradation by 2030, and over 100 countries signing a global methane pledge to curb 30% of emissions from this powerful greenhouse gas by 2030. Twelve countries, including the UK, the US, Canada, and EU member states, also pledged $12 billion of climate finance to support actions in the forestry sector.

Countries must now turn words into action to reflect these targets in their national plans, strategies and policies, starting with their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs).

Key food and land issues must be a central part of countries’ climate pledges

In our new report launched during Nature Day at COP26, we analyzed 15 NDCs—countries’ official climate pledges submitted every five years as part of the Paris Agreement—to see if, how, and to what extent they treat key transitions in the food and land sector. We specifically looked at pledges from G20 members, as well as Colombia and Ethiopia. Together, these countries are responsible for over 60% of global emissions.

We not only looked at whether NDCs include the food and land sector in their overall targets, but also at what information they provide in terms of tangible actions to meet these goals. This includes whether they mention policies related to reducing emissions or increasing carbon sinks from the food and land sector, explicitly commit public money to fund these policies and actions, or provide indications of technological innovation or spatial data to support them.

We also wanted to find out what specific policy measures are included in the NDCs regarding key food and land transitions based on the 10 critical transitions outlined in the Food and Land Use (FOLU) Coalition’s flagship Growing Better report. These include healthy diets, regenerative agriculture, developing a circular economy, or preserving and enhancing rural livelihoods.

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Why focus on the sustainability of food and land use?

The food and land sector lies at the heart of the global response to climate change.

  • It is responsible for approximately one third of global net greenhouse gas emissions—principally carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide. These emissions mainly arise through agricultural activities, deforestation, land degradation, and emissions from the food supply chain.
  • The food and land sector also plays a central role in tackling climate change because it takes up carbon from the atmosphere. To stay below 1.5°C of global warming by the end of the century, we need to reach net-zero CO2 emissions around 2050, which means we have to not only reduce emissions from all sectors, but also protect and enhance carbon sinks.
  • Land also provides the principal basis for our livelihoods and well-being: food and freshwater security depend on the way we use and manage our land, and land is home to local and Indigenous communities—and biodiversity—worldwide.

What we found: NDCs overall lack focus on concrete priorities and measures

At first glance, the role of agriculture, forests, and land use in mitigating and adapting to climate change is frequently mentioned in many NDCs. Most of them cover these sectors to some extent and provide information on priority actions to be taken at the national level. However, a deeper analysis shows that the NDCs often do not provide information on how these commitments will actually be implemented.

  • While actions in the sector are mentioned, only half of the analyzed NDCs describe policies that are directly linked to and support them, such as agricultural and forestry plans and laws. Only four NDCs provide policies related to both the food/agriculture and land use sectors.
  • Indications on funding are hard to come by, as only two NDCs provide specific information on public funding to support transitions toward more sustainable food and land systems. Other NDCs do mention the need for investment, but without clear indications of commitment.
  • Only five NDCs refer to integrated spatial information and planning, which underpins good land-use management, and none of them include land-use maps that can inform climate mitigation efforts.

NDCs also do not sufficiently address key food and land transitions

Using FOLU’s 10 critical transitions as a framework for investigating key actions in food and land use systems, we also found an overall lack of commitment to these key actions. Some transitions are addressed consistently throughout the NDCs, but many gaps remain.

  • The need to protect and restore nature and to develop productive and regenerative agriculture are often addressed in the documents.
  • Issues of a just transition, gender, and equality are addressed by most NDCs, but are not consistently linked to policy action.
  • The biggest gaps include a lack of focus on dietary shifts, the diversification of protein supplies, and the development of local food economies.

You can find all of our results per country and per transition in our brief and country profiles.

What next? NDCs must be ramped up to be ambitious, coherent, and implementable

COP26 provided a spark for the transformation of food and land use systems with deforestation, nature, and Indigenous rights all high on the agenda. It is imperative that national policymakers seize this momentum to align their national and subnational action with ambitious NDCs, break silos in ministry portfolios, and accelerate action for critical transitions to sustainable food and land use. Policymakers have an opportunity to ramp up their NDCs after COP26 and ahead of the first Global Stocktake in 2023. In doing so, they should seek to:

  1. Align NDCs and other international pledges and plans with national policy development and planning . Ultimately, NDCs need to provide clear directions for the development of domestic policies, in line with international commitments and implemented across sectors. More work is needed to improve processes around their development and coherence with national policy.
  2. Facilitate national level intersectoral policy dialogue to identify opportunities and concrete policy measures, and lift barriers to implementation.
  3. Learn from the positive examples set out by other countries. The report highlights several ambitious initiatives in different contexts. They deserve broad international support and attention, and can serve as shared experiences to drive progress across the world.

Unless the sustainability of food and land use systems is drastically improved in the next ten years, the goals of both the Paris Agreement and the SDGs will be out of reach.

We are grateful for the support of SDSN , in particular the Food and Land team , as well as the FOLU team, partners, and country platforms. We would also like to thank the external and internal reviewers for their insightful comments throughout the development of this work.