Background: Up to now, efforts to help local communities out of the food-insecurity trap were guided by researcher (or other actors)-led decisions on technologies to be implemented by the communities. This approach has proved inefficient because of low adoption of the so-called improved technologies. This paper describes the strategic approaches to the development of a climate-smart village (CSV) model in the groundnut basin of Senegal.

This paper describes the strategic approaches to the development of a climate-smart village (CSV) model in the groundnut basin of Senegal. A CSV model is a participatory integrated approach using climate information, improved context-based technologies/practices aiming at reaching improved productivity (food and nutrition security), climate resilient people and ecosystem and climate mitigation.

Recently, a new approach to extension and climate information services, namely Participatory Integrated Climate Services for Agriculture (PICSA) has been developed. PICSA makes use of historical climate records, participatory decision-making tools and forecasts to help farmers identify and better plan livelihood options that are suited to local climate features and farmers’ own circumstances.