|
||
|
TWN Briefing Paper #1 Global Conference on Agriculture, Food Security
and Climate Change 31 October – 5 November 2010, Published by ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ecological Agriculture is ‘Development-Smart’ … for food security, farmers and livelihoods,
and addressing climate change By Lim Li Ching, Climate change threatens the livelihoods and food
security of billions of the planet’s poor and vulnerable. According
to the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and
Technology for Development[1]
(IAASTD), climate change, coincident with increasing demand for food,
feed, fibre and fuel, could irreversibly damage the natural resource
base on which agriculture depends, with significant consequences for
food insecurity. While agriculture and food security will be adversely
affected by climate change, it also contributes to the problem, particularly
in its industrialized form as practiced in developed countries and increasingly,
in many developing countries. According to the Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change (IPCC), agriculture directly releases into the atmosphere
a significant amount of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, amounting
to around 10-12 percent of global anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions
annually[2].
More current estimates put the figure at 14 percent. Of global anthropogenic
emissions in 2005, agriculture accounted for about 58 percent of nitrous
oxide and about 47 percent of methane, both of which have far greater
global warming impact than carbon dioxide. If indirect contributions (e.g., land conversion
to agriculture, synthetic fertilizer production and distribution and
farm operations) are factored in, it is estimated that the contribution
of agriculture could be as high as 17-32 per cent of global anthropogenic
emissions[3].
In particular, land use change, driven by industrial agricultural production
methods, would account for more than half of total (direct and indirect)
agricultural emissions. Conventional industrial agriculture is also heavily
reliant on fossil fuels. The manufacture and distribution of synthetic
fertilizers contributes a significant amount of greenhouse gas emissions,
between 0.6-1.2 per cent of the world’s total[4].
This is because the production of fertilizers is energy-intensive and
emits carbon dioxide, while nitrate production also generates nitrous
oxide. The industrial model of agricultural production
characterized by monocultures, hybrid seeds, chemical inputs and mechanized
farming thus threatens the viability of ecosystems and contributes massively
to climate change. Nothing less than a system change is needed in the
face of the climate change threat. This was a clear conclusion of the
IAASTD, whereby the ‘business-as-usual’ scenario of industrial farming,
input and energy intensiveness, damage to the environment and marginalization
of small-scale farmers was judged no longer tenable. The new buzzword for the kind of agriculture needed
for the future that has been coined for the Hague Conference on Agriculture,
Food Security and Climate Change (31 October – 5 November) is ‘climate-smart’
agriculture. The FAO defines climate-smart agriculture as “agriculture
that sustainably increases productivity, resilience (adaptation), reduces/removes
GHGs (mitigation), and enhances achievement of national food security
and development goals.”[5] But the same agribusiness interests that promoted
industrialized agriculture are now recommending further technological
fixes, in the form of genetically modified (GM) crops and other patented
technologies and practices, including seeds protected by intellectual
property rights. These technologies are not only prohibitively costly
for developing countries, but also create new forms of corporate control
over agricultural plant and animal genetic resources[6]. According to the UN Special Rapporteur on the
Right to Food[7],
the ensuing dependencies engendered by intellectual property rights
(including patents and patent-like plant variety protection) are a very
serious threat to poor farmers in developing countries, risking indebtedness
in the face of unstable incomes. These approaches jeopardize farmers’
seed systems, which are a source of economic independence and resilience
in the face of threats such as pests, diseases and climate change, as
well as the related agrobiodiversity. They are therefore a threat to
agricultural adaptation to climate change. Moreover, the safety of GMOs is in doubt, and
environmental, social and economic harm has already occurred from their
use. Their risks are widely acknowledged, as evident in international
regulation governing their use, for example, the Cartagena Protocol
on Biosafety. In sharp contrast, the ecological model of agricultural
production, based on principles that create healthy soils and cultivate
biological diversity, and which prioritizes farmers and traditional
knowledge, is climate resilient. These are the bases for the adaptation
efforts so urgently needed by developing country farmers, who will suffer
disproportionately more from the effects of climate change. Agricultural biodiversity is the keystone of ecological
agriculture, and resiliency to climate disasters is closely linked to
agricultural biodiversity. Practices that enhance biodiversity allow
farms to mimic natural ecological processes, enabling them to better
respond to change and reduce risk. Thus, farmers who increase interspecific
diversity suffer less damage during adverse weather events, compared
to conventional farmers planting monocultures[8].
Moreover, the use of intraspecific diversity (different cultivars of
the same crop) is insurance against future environmental change. Diverse
agroecosystems can also adapt to new pests or increased pest numbers. Ecological agriculture practices such as composting,
green manures and cover crops help increase soil organic matter. This
in turn enhances soil fertility and quality, improves water-holding
capacity and hence reduces the negative effects of drought, enhances
water capture in soils and hence significantly reduces the risk of floods,
and increases productivity and resilience, which are all important for
adaptation to future climate change[9]. The IAASTD calls on the international community
and national governments to systematically redirect agricultural knowledge,
science and technology towards sustainable, biodiversity-based ecological
agriculture and the underlying agroecological sciences. This is the development-smart agriculture for
food security, farmers, livelihoods and addressing climate change that
the world urgently needs. [1]
The IAASTD is the most recent and comprehensive assessment of agriculture
and was co-sponsored by the World Bank, FAO, UNEP, UNDP, WHO, UNESCO
and GEF. Its reports, which drew on the work of over 400 experts, were
approved by 58 governments in 2008. See IAASTD (2009). Agriculture at
a Crossroads. International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science
and Technology for Development, Island Press, [2]
Smith, P. et al. (2007). “Agriculture”, in Climate Change 2007: Mitigation.
Contribution of Working Group III to the Fourth Assessment Report of
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University
Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY, USA. [3]
See, for instance, Bellarby, J, et al. (2008). Cool Farming: Climate
Impacts of Agriculture and Mitigation Potential, Greenpeace International,
[4]
Bellarby, J. et al. (2008). Ibid. [5]
FAO (2010). “Climate-Smart” Agriculture: Policies, Practices and Financing
for Food Security, Adaptation and Mitigation. FAO, [6]
Seventy-five percent of patent applications worldwide on so-called ‘climate
genes’ – those deemed necessary to provide drought and other stress
tolerances – are held by transnational seed and agrochemical companies
such as Monsanto, BASF, DuPont and Syngenta. [7]
Report to the UN General Assembly. 2009. Seed Policies and the Right
to Food: Enhancing Agrobiodiversity and Encouraging Innovation. http://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/food/annual.htm [8]
Altieri, M.A. and Koohafkan, P. (2008). Enduring Farms: Climate Change,
Smallholders and Traditional Farming Communities, TWN Environment and
Development Series 6. Third World Network, [9]
See: International Trade Centre (ITC) UNCTAD/WTO and Research Institute
of Organic Agriculture (FiBL) (2007). Organic Farming and Climate Change,
ITC,
|
||
