Though the COP30 Summit, held in Belém, Brazil, might have come and gone, but what has continued to re-echo is the renewed calls by African leaders for stronger financing to restore degraded soils, expand climate-smart agriculture, and strengthen nutrition outcomes .

Food systems emerged as a major theme, with Africa pushing hard to ensure its priorities were centered in global climate negotiations. With agriculture employing most of the continent’s workforce and climate shocks intensifying, this year’s summit placed renewed emphasis on transforming food systems for resilience, equity, and sustainability.

A major highlight for Africa was the announcement of new global investments targeted at smallholder farmers, including a multi-year commitment focused on helping farmers access climate-smart tools, climate data, and more efficient production systems. This comes at a critical time, less than one per cent of global climate finance currently reaches food systems, despite agriculture being one of the most climate-vulnerable sectors.

Food system governance was another key theme. United Nations partners encouraged countries including many African governments to better align national food system strategies with climate commitments, ensuring nutrition, resilience, and sustainability move together.

President Kashim Shettima called on global leaders at the summit to move from empty promises to concrete climate action. He urged the summit to be remembered as the turning point “from pledges to performance, from ambition to action, and from dialogue to delivery.” 

He reaffirmed Nigeria’s commitment to cutting emissions by 32 per cent by 2035, anchored by the launch of a National Carbon Market Framework and a Climate Change Fund. He emphasised that good intentions aren’t enough to fund climate action, adding that the system needs to be fair and reflect the realities of developing countries.

During a side event convened at the Food & Agriculture Pavilion in Belém, the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA), in partnership with the African Development Bank (AfDB), the CGIAR/Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT), experts spoke on how proven climate adaptation and resilience innovations can be effectively mainstreamed into International Financial Institutions’ (IFIs) large-scale agricultural projects, creating tangible benefits for farmers.