This study investigates the impact of climate change on land-use change and land-cover (LCLUC)-induced greenhouse gas emissions in Africa. In particular, it tests the hypothesis that increasing agricultural productivity can be a land-based climate mitigation strategy to address the issue of LCLUC-induced emissions. The results confirm the well-known fact that climate change will have a devastating impact on Africa’s agricultural sector and therefore the welfare of the people. However, the results also clearly demonstrate that technology can be leveraged to improve agricultural productivity, which will not only enhance food production and improve food security but also mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Specifically, we show that employing agricultural intensification strategies based on lifting total factor productivity can increase agricultural output with less land use, thereby saving millions of hectares of land from being brought into cultivation for staple crop production.
