East Africa’s rain-fed smallholder agriculture is expected to be heavily affected by climate change, which, together with a growing population and increasing competition for resources, will result in an increasing challenge in the future to achieve food security for households and regions. The resulting need to increase food productivity for food security simultaneously with the capacity of agricultural systems to adapt to climate change while also reducing greenhouse gas emissions lead to the development of the concept ‘Climate-Smart Agriculture’ (CSA). CSA is currently promoted to East African policy makers who are challenged to increase food security in a changing climate.
For comprehensive policy planning, the question arises to what extent CSA-related farm management changes can increase household level and regional food security while ensuring sustainable resource use. Studies that take into account dynamics and cumulative effects of farm management changes at the landscape scale are lacking.
This study therefore aims to assess food security at different scales considering future changes and to determine the potential of CSA-practices for increasing food security under sustainable use of natural resources. For this, a simple scaling approach will be developed that enables us to identify promising CSA-intervention options at regional and national scales. We will determine correlations between household level food security and spatial characteristics across Tanzania and Uganda and test the applicability of household data for determining food security and its key drivers at different scales. CSA-practices will be tested for their potential to increase food security while considering future changes and sustainable natural resource use.