This series of technical briefs aims to provide a solid knowledge base for building or strengthening stakeholder capacities on climate-smart agriculture (CSA) and applying CSA practices to five crops that are critical to the global agri-food sector: coffee, cowpea, maize, rice and wheat. These briefing notes reflect the growing recognition of the need to share knowledge, best practices, lessons learned and experiences on CSA. They are intended to support stakeholders to make the transition to more sustainable and resilient crop production systems and, thereby reach targets laid out in the Sustainable Development Goals. It is our intent to reach a broad range of stakeholders with this knowledge, especially as we begin a new era of global dialogue on how to transform our food systems.