Climate services for food security in Guatemala: An exploration of institutional dynamics in a colonial and neoliberal system

Several governmental and nongovernmental institutions in Guatemala have been tasked with tackling the country’s problem of food insecurity. Although food insecurity has a variety of causes, the issue of climate change is beginning to attract initiatives to address the problem. Thus, Guatemalan institutions have begun utilizing climate services (CSs) to provide climate projections (of six months) for decision-making in agriculture. These services are communicated through agroclimatic bulletins that provide advice to peasants and small farmers on agricultural practices, particularly relating to beans, corn, coffee, and vegetables. While most research in this area has focused on small farmers and peasants, the present study focuses on international and Guatemalan institutions as well as the CS advocates and the governmental officials who implement these services. Through semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and a review of institutional reports, we see that the CSs tend to be implemented in a way that CSs advocates neglect the colonial and neoliberal dynamics. Drawing on the concept of climate coloniality, this article shows that despite efforts of inclusion, vulgarization, and coproduction of knowledge, the technical discussion displaces other deeper discussions, such as unequal access to land and water and institutional racism, which have been underscored by several Guatemalan academics. The promise of modernity and discourse of progress dominate the Ministry of Agriculture, both in reports and speeches and conversations with public officials.