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Climate change impacts in one country can lead to impacts in distant locations, for example, via internationally traded crops. Previous work has highlighted a need to include cross-border climate change impacts in climate risk assessments, to describe the exposure and transmission of cross-border climate risk across actors, and understand options for managing this risk. In a case study of the Brazil-Europe soy supply chain, this paper aims to explore how stakeholders perceive past and future shocks, how climate change impacts affect stakeholders differently, and how they might respond. Soy is a key internationally traded commodity and Europe relies on imports for the majority of its soy consumption, used widely in livestock feed. Via 96 semi-structured expert interviews, we found different stakeholder groups are vulnerable to different types of weather shocks, experience different price and supply consequences, and have different capacities to respond. While some responses can reduce risk of impacts across the supply chain (e.g. new soy cultivars, improving transport infrastructure), we also identified examples where responses exacerbate risk for other stakeholders (e.g. export bans, changing demand). A holistic cross-border approach to analysing risk in the soy supply chain can help avoid maladaptation and offer opportunities for more collaborative adaptation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The agricultural and livestock sector has caused approximately 24% of total greenhouse gas emissions (GEE) in Brazil in 2017. In 2009, the Brazilian administration established sectorial plans for the mitigation of climatic changes. The Agricultural Plan for Low Carbon (ABC) and the ABC Program are responsible for target projections to mitigate climatic changes and financial incentives for their implementation. Current paper investigates whether available credit for this public policy is being used in technological processes with great potential for the mitigation of GEEs. Secondary sources of data on the amount of credit of ABC program and GEE emissions have been researched. The historical series of emissions revealed that, within agricultural activities, enteric fermentation of animals and the use of agricultural soil are the main causes of GEEs, with almost 86% of emissions. Results also demonstrated that, within seven priority areas, one has specially received highest investment rates, or rather, the recovery of degraded pastureland, with approximately 30% of investments. Further, 15% of amounts initially projected by the ABN program have been available and only 9% have been effectively spent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With a worldwide increase in disasters, the effects of climate change are already being felt, and it is the urban poor in developing countries who are most at risk. There is an urgent need to better understand the factors that determine people's capacity to cope with and adapt to adverse climate conditions. This paper examines the influence of formal education in determining the adaptive capacity of the residents of two low-income settlements: Los Manantiales in San Salvador (El Salvador) and Rocinha in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), where climate-related disasters are recurrent. In both case study areas, it was found that the average levels of education were lower for households living at high risk, as opposed to residents of lower risk areas. In this context, the influence of people's level of education was identified to be twofold due to (a) its direct effect on aspects that reduce risk, and (b) its mitigating effect on aspects that increase risk. The results further suggest that education plays a more determinant role for women than for men in relation to their capacity to adapt. In light of these results, the limited effectiveness of institutional support identified by this study might also relate to the fact that the role of formal education has so far not been sufficiently explored. Promoting (improved access to and quality of) formal education as a way to increase people's adaptive capacity is further supported with respect to the negative effects of disasters on people's level of education, which in turn reduce their adaptive capacity, resulting in a vicious circle of increasing risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]