Guatemala Strengthens Livestock Climate Monitoring Through Training Led by CATIE and MAGA

• Fourteen technicians and professionals from Petén participated in a training program to measure greenhouse gas emissions and carbon sequestration in sustainable livestock farms.

The Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center (CATIE), in coordination with the Vice Ministry for Petén Affairs of Guatemala’s Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food (MAGA), successfully concluded a specialized training workshop aimed at strengthening technical capacities for monitoring greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the livestock sector. The workshop, held from June 1–5 in Petén, Guatemala, will contribute to fulfilling the climate commitments assumed by Guatemala under the Paris Agreement.

The training brought together 14 professionals and technicians from MAGA’s Vice Ministry for Petén Affairs , as well as representatives from the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources (MARN), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Fundación PROPETEN, Fundación Naturaleza para la Vida (NPV), and Rainforest Alliance.

The main objective of the workshop was to strengthen institutional capacities for collecting field data and using tools that enable the quantification of the contribution of sustainable livestock practices to emissions reductions and carbon sequestration. This information will be critical for tracking Guatemala’s Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and for preparing the Biennial Transparency Reports submitted by the country to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

As a result of the process, MAGA’s technical team now has updated tools adapted to the productive conditions of Petén to collect data, measure key variables, and estimate carbon emissions and removals generated by livestock production systems.

During the workshop, participants also validated a greenhouse gas emissions and removals calculation tool. This effort was complemented by a digital data collection application developed in Survey123 through the project Strengthening the Transparency Framework through National Capacity Building to Implement the Paris Agreement in Guatemala (CBIT), with support from CATIE’s National Office in Guatemala. Both digital tools have been tailored to the livestock production context of Petén.

“This process provides MAGA with technical tools adapted to local conditions and trained personnel capable of leading data collection efforts, thereby strengthening the monitoring and reporting of climate progress within the livestock sector,” said Jerson Quevedo, Coordinator of the CBIT Project.

The results will contribute to strengthening the National Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) System being developed by MARN and MAGA to track the country’s climate commitments. In addition, this process will generate databases, baseline information, and emissions projections that will improve the assessment of the environmental, social, and economic impacts of sustainable livestock production.

According to Aldo Rodas, following the planning and implementation of sustainable practices on 130 livestock farms in Petén during 2025, this training process and the subsequent data collection efforts will provide an opportunity to assess the impact of the technologies implemented at the farm level.

Through these actions, Guatemala continues advancing toward more robust and transparent information systems to demonstrate the results of its climate mitigation efforts and promote more sustainable livestock production.

The calculation tool was developed and updated in Microsoft Office Excel format with support from CATIE’s Livestock and Environmental Management Unit (GAMMA), in collaboration with the CBIT Project. The tool is CATIE’s intellectual property, and its use is authorized exclusively for academic, technical, scientific, research, and non-commercial purposes. It was developed based on methodologies established by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and adapted to the national context.

CATIE is the institution responsible for implementing the CBIT Project, with financial support from the Global Environment Facility (GEF), administered by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in coordination with the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources (MARN).