Public policy instruments, institutional innovation, and agricultural adaptation to climate change in Brazil

Abstract

Despite the development of numerous policies and programs to adapt agriculture to climate change in recent years, their implementation remains deficient. This phenomenon can partly be explained by failures in climate governance, which require innovation and institutional transformation to accelerate policy implementation and build long-term impacts. This article has two main objectives: from a theoretical-methodological perspective, to introduce agricultural adaptation to climate change and innovation in climate governance through procedural instruments; and from an empirical perspective, to trace the agricultural climate adaptation instruments within Brazil's federal government, categorized as either procedural or substantive. As a result, 21 policies and programs related to agricultural climate adaptation were identified, comprising 136 instruments, of which 58 were procedural. The article discusses these findings in light of the literature and highlights research developments that contribute to filling the gap in the literature on procedural instruments.