COP24 is taking place in Katowice, Poland, from 3 Dec 2018 to 14 Dec 2018. I will be attending the conference as an observer for the first week. As a student attending the Conference of Parties (COP) for the first time, I will bring you through the COP with a focus on the topic of food security. I ask the research question:
How do state and non-state actors play a role in enhancing food security?
At the conference, I will be attending events related to food and agriculture!
The first side event that I will attend is “A Farmers’ Driven Climate Agenda – the Climate Change Agricultural Alliance” on Wednesday. At this event, I intend to speak to farmers as well as food-related NGO representatives, with the intention of answering the following questions:
- What are the challenges that the agriculture sector faces as a result of climate change?
- What do you think is the responsibility of the government in helping farmers to mitigate the upcoming challenges with regard to climate change?
- What are your strategies, as a farmer/food-related organization, to reduce the impact of climate change on agriculture?
I will also be speaking to government representatives about strategies that they will be taking in order to ensure sustainable food supply in the long run, as well as strategies or actions to reduce the impact of climate change on agricultural production.
Another side event that I will be attending is “How do we get there? The role of agriculture, energy and systemic change to meet the Paris Agreement” on Thursday. This event seeks to “explore ways in which agriculture, energy and broader changes at societal level would allow us to reach the Paris Long Term Goal without relying on geoengineering and negative emissions technologies.” The Paris Agreement aims to limit the increase in global temperature to “well below 2 degrees C above pre-industrial levels”, and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5 degrees C. At this event, I intend to speak to representatives from civil society organizations. I will be asking them about the challenges that they are facing in ensuring food supply and food security. I also intend to speak to academic representatives to find out about the impact of climate change on agricultural production, as well as what they think the role of government should be, in attempting to meet the Paris Agreement.
At the conference, I will also be focusing on food security in two countries: Singapore and Malaysia. I aim to speak to country leaders from Singapore and Malaysia with regards to the governments’ specific strategies in ensuring household food security. Singapore is a country that is largely reliant on import of food, thus it is essential for Singapore to strategize its sources of food supply. For Malaysia, as it largely depends on palm oil as its cash crops, I intend to find out more about the impact of climate change on palm oil production, as well as strategies that Malaysia is taking in order to reduce the impact of palm oil on climate change. In order to hear from various perspectives, I will also be speaking to environmental NGO representatives about the challenges that Malaysia is facing in order to ensure sustainable palm oil production.
All in all, on a broader scheme I intend to find out from specific government leaders about what they hope to achieve through this conference in negotiating with different leaders.
I will also be picking up event schedules by at the Malaysia and Singapore country pavilions, and will keep everyone updated! 🙂
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