CDFA Undersecretary Christine Birdsong, along with staff from the department’s Office of Environmental Farming and Innovation, highlighted California’s climate smart agricultural leadership as well as trade this week in Mexico City.
In collaboration with Mexico’s Secretariat of Agriculture and Rural Development (SADER), CDFA hosted a Climate Smart Agriculture Workshop at Casa de la Universidad de California — the location of California’s Trade and Service Desk in Mexico. Established in 2019, the Trade and Service Desk is a venue to promote two-way trade and strengthen California’s economic, political and cultural relationship with Mexico.
The Climate Smart Agricultural Workshop brought together researchers, government representatives and academia to focus on opportunities related to water-use efficiency, healthy soils and sustainable pest management. The CDFA team was joined by representatives from UC Merced and UC Davis. The workshop was a follow-up to a Memorandum of Agreement CDFA signed with SADER signed in 2019.
CDFA continues international collaboration and engagement on climate smart agricultural policies and practices to strengthen connections between academia, government and farmers on climate resilience. Partnerships strengthen research collaboration and ag tech innovations while furthering the adoption of on-farm practices to advance sustainability and soil health.
CDFA leveraged the visit to Mexico City to promote California agriculture to trade representatives and media in collaboration with in-market trade associations, and had opportunities this week to meet with representatives from SADER, the USDA’s Agricultural Trade Office, and CIMMYT, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center.
