This book is open access under a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO license.The book uses an economic lens to
identify the main features of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) its likely impact and the
challenges associated with its implementation. Drawing upon theory and concepts from
agricultural development institutional and resource economics this book expands and
formalizes the conceptual foundations of CSA. Focusing on the adaptation resilience dimension
of CSA the text embraces a mixture of conceptual analyses including theory empirical and
policy analysis and case studies to look at adaptation and resilience through three possible
avenues: ex-ante reduction of vulnerability increasing adaptive capacity and ex-post risk
coping. The book is divided into three sections. The first section provides conceptual framing
giving an overview of the CSA concept and grounding it in core economic principles. The second
section is devoted to a set of case studies illustrating the economic basis of CSA in terms of
reducing vulnerability increasing adaptive capacity and ex-post risk coping. The final section
addresses policy issues related to climate change. Providing information on this new and
important field in an approachable way this book helps make sense of CSA and fills
intellectual and policy gaps by defining the concept and placing it within an economic
decision-making framework. This book will be of interest to agricultural environmental and
natural resource economists development economists and scholars of development studies
climate change and agriculture. It will also appeal to policy-makers development
practitioners and members of governmental and non-governmental organizations interested in
agriculture food security and climate change.
