Gates Foundation Calls for Bold and Immediate Action at COP27, Announces New Commitment to Meet the Climate Adaptation Needs of Smallholder Farmers

Today, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation echoed African leaders’ calls for countries to rapidly scale-up finance for climate adaptation and pledged to invest $1.4 billion to help smallholder farmers address the immediate and long-term impacts of climate change. The announcement was made by Gates Foundation CEO Mark Suzman at the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27).

For many regions, climate change is a food and economic crisis without precedent. More than 2 billion people depend on smallholder farms for food and income, yet less than 2% of global climate finance is devoted to helping these farms adapt to climate change. Food and economic crises will last longer and become more severe as climate threats escalate and further threaten food security by limiting smallholder farmers’ yields and resilience.

“The effects of climate change have already been devastating, and every moment the world delays action, more people suffer, and the solutions become more complex and costly,” said Suzman. “Our commitment will help smallholder farmers adapt today and build resilience for the future. It is essential for this climate summit to produce bold commitments that address immediate and long-term needs. Leaders must listen to the voices of African farmers and governments to understand their priorities and respond with urgency.”

The foundation’s commitment will fund immediate action and long-term initiatives over four years to help smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia build resilience and food security. Funding will focus on spurring African-led innovation to build a pipeline of climate-smart agriculture projects, new applications of digital technologies, climate-smart innovations for smallholder livestock farming, and support for women smallholder farmers to capitalize on their untapped potential.

To accelerate the development of new adaptation innovations, the foundation is continuing to work with a coalition of partners to double the budget for the CGIAR agriculture research system. The CGIAR Excellence in Agronomy initiative partners with African research institutes, local businesses, and farmer organizations. Together, they are using big data, analytics, and digital platforms to deliver insights that can boost incomes, food security, and ecosystem health in smallholder farming communities.

“The climate crisis is causing enormous harm every day as it jeopardizes entire regions of people and economies,” said Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “More funding is necessary to ensure agricultural and technological innovations are widely available to vulnerable communities, helping them to adapt to climate change, save lives and increase economic growth.”

Additional investments included in the commitment announced today will support:

This funding builds on more than a decade of investments and the foundation’s recent announcement during the United Nations General Assembly of $100 million in funding to help alleviate the current food crisis in Africa and South Asia and address its underlying causes. It also builds on funding commitments focused on agriculture adaptation made at previous climate summits: