Climate change is linked to the human impact on the natural environment and the social, cultural, and economic disparities it has generated over the past centuries. Although this is a global issue, responsibility and negative impacts are not globally distributed: the most ecologically fragile landscapes will suffer more and sooner, increasing the vulnerability that already exists and that has been reinforced by the last centuries. Mediterranean-type ecosystems are particularly fragile in terms of agricultural activity and food production. In the face of climate change, small farmers should expect increased desertification and loss of agricultural productivity (lower yields and higher maintenance costs).

However, there is hope: from a climate perspective, climate-smart agriculture allows small and new farmers to implement management practices that have the simultaneous effect of increasing yields, improving soil properties, efficiently capturing atmospheric carbon dioxide, and storing it underground. The soil types and climate of Mediterranean Europe combine both the opportunity and the need to implement such changes, and because of their important but fragile heritage, small and new farmers are the perfect target audience to start with.

The CarboNostrum project offers small and new farmers across Mediterranean Europe, the tools to rethink or change their land management practices, in order to effectively combat climate change and desertification and increase their economic sustainability.