Sustainability: Agriculture & Forests
May 07, 2008
The raging monster upon the land is population growth. In its presence, sustainability is but a fragile theoretical construct. To say, as many do, that the difficulties of nations are not due to people but to poor ideology or land-use management is sophistic.
January 1995
E.O. Wilson
Rush for Biofuels Threatens Starvation on a Global Scale.
The rush towards biofuels is theatening world food production and the lives of billions of people. In his first important public speech since he was appointed, as Chief Scientific Advisor in the UK he described the potential impacts of food shortages as a problem which rivalled that of climate change.
It's very hard to imagine how we can see the world growing enough crops to produce renewable energy and at the same time meet the enormous demand for food.
By 2030,the world population would have increased and a 50% increase in food production would be needed. By 2080 it would need to double. But the rush to biofuels means that land has been given over to fuel rather than food.
Already biofuels have contributed to the rapid rise in international wheat prices. Shoppers in the UK faced price rises because of the soaring cost of feeding livestock.
The Government welcomed a target requiring 10% of all fuel sold in British service stations to be derived from plants within 12 years. The US Farmers planted 90.5 million acres of corn in 2007, 15% more than a year before. In due course 40% of that corn ends up in petrol tanks, and the world will face a costlier time feeding itself.
The prospect of food shortages over the next 20 years is so acute that all must tackle it immediately.
An extra six million people are born every month. Growing enough food for everyone was challenged, because of climate change, which was likely to lead to a shortage of water.
The supply of water will be put under further pressure because of the increased number of people who need it. The production of a tonne of wheat, for requires 50 tonnes of water.
Demand has grown enormously, particularly in China and India. By 2030 energy demand is going to be up by 50% and demand for food is going to be up by 50%.
March 07, 2008
Times Online
Asia Faces Growing Rice Crisis - Real One.
Leading rice-exporting nations are reducing sales overseas to check domestic price rises. Previously healthy buffer stocks in Thailand are shrinking.
The ban by India intensifies a worldwide rice shortage that drove up prices by nearly 40% last year. An additional 50 million tonnes of rice is needed each year up to 2015 to plug the demand-supply gap. Additional agricultural land for growing rice is extremely limited, while rice consumption is growing worldwide and wheat stocks are hitting record lows. Unregulated private cross-border trading makes exact figures hard to come by. India's rice export ban comes at a sensitive time ahead of the final annual budget. India's ban on rice exports follows a gradual limiting of exports over the past few months. The ban extends to all exports of rice except government-to-government trading, but excludes exports of basmati rice, a more fragrant, long-grained and expensive variety. Bangladesh, needs food grains after Cyclone Sidr in December destroyed $600 million worth of the country's rice crop. To cope with the crisis, the Bangladesh government floated global tender notices for 300,000 tonnes of various varieties of rice.
India's export ban caused 300 rice trucks to be stranded in India-Bangladesh border zones. A famine threatens remote areas of southeast Bangladesh after millions of rats devastated food crops. The animals turn to ravaging rice stalks and vegetables in the affected region. Higher incomes across Asia are leading to increased consumption of grains and vegetables and of meat, which leads to more grain being diverted for use as cattle fodder.
In the short term, prices can spike as natural disasters ranging from severe drought and floods cause havoc on agriculture. Vietnam suspended exports to protect domestic needs, while Thailand plans to auction an additional 500,000 tonnes of rice to cater to increasing international demand. Food scientists are developing sturdier varieties of rice that can withstand climate challenges as well as higher yielding seeds.
Microsoft chairman Bill Gates in January announced a grant of $19.9 million to help 400,000 small farmers in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa access to improved rice varieties and better growing technology.
February 25, 2008
Asia Times Online
Sustainable Future Will Require Food Production Innovation.
Doubling food production by 2050 while conserving resources, or even reducing the amount of land available for production agriculture, stands as a paradox.
Two forces are on a collision course: technology and sustainability. It is ironic how innovative production technologies such as cloning, bovine somatotropin and some bioengineered seeds are being shunned.
Equally pressing will be feeding a world population estimated to top 9 billion by 2050, which will require a second Green Revolution aimed at doubling food production in the first half of this century.
Doubling food production while conserving resources, which include maintaining or even reducing the amount of land available for agriculture, stands as a paradox. Success requires squeezing more crop production per acre, more milk per cow and more meat per chicken. To achieve such results, consumers must accept technology and the promise it holds for future production.
Bioengineered corn and soybeans have made significant penetration into the U.S. market, but wheat and rice are limited due to trade issues. Bovine somatotropin has made inroads into the U.S. market, but it faces a backlash in international acceptance and a push in the US for more "natural" foods.
Animal cloning, which the FDA proclaimed to be safe, has received a very cool reception. Despite the The U.S.D.A. called on technology providers to continue their voluntary moratorium on sending meat and milk from animal clones into the food supply. The International Dairy Food Association, supports the U.S.D.A.'s decision on the voluntary moratorium, citing the risk of losing access to international markets and the potential for a reduction in domestic milk demand.
A faulty criticism of biotechnology is it does much for producers, but little for consumers. As sustainability continues to gain momentum the opportunity looms for scientific innovation and environmental activism to merge.
Bioengineered seeds allow farmers to grow more crops per acre while using less pesticides, fertilizer and even water. Drawing more milk from fewer cows is beneficial; and the rapid genetic selection and breeding of the most productive livestock is beneficial. In the very near future, such benefits will be essential to nourish a growing global population while preserving environmental resources.
Karen Gaia says: Eating less meat is much more likely to be the necessary solution.
February 13, 2008
CattleNetwork.com
Sustainable Food Confronts Elitist Past.
Dinner at the Berkeley, Calif.-based Chez Panisse is a pricey education in sustainable food from the Yale Sustainable Food Project's inspiration: Alice Waters.
The idealistic Waters and her much-hallowed restaurant have become the epitome of the recent trend in food culture calling for a return to natural, local ingredients and seasonal cooking. Most Yalies come to sustainable foods working on the student farm, and the all-sustainable Thain Family Cafe.
At $28 to $80 per person for dinner, a subsidy from the University covers the additional cost of sustainable ingredients. But it's more than many students are willing pay to study food. Sustainable ingredients are more expensive than those that are conventionally produced, and have given sustainable food the reputation of being inaccessible and elitist.
The movement's proponents agree that it is more efficient in the long run to follow tenets of sustainable-food production.
Sustainable practices meet the need of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.
Something is sustainable if it does not degrade the resources upon which it depends. This means that fertilizers and pesticides made from fossil fuel are not used, and that the food doesn't travel farther than it has to.
Students had begun asking the University for organic food in the dining halls in 2000 and this led to an initiative focused on food, sustainablity and agriculture.
Chez Panisse menu items include herb jam with flatbread, lardons and chervil. Leek and Potato Galette, Grilled Chicken in Spiced Yogurt and Mint. and Olney's Squash Gratin.
There's a reaction to it being fancy food at a fancy university. But YSFP's menu items followed a Western gourmet aesthetic. Waters is not a proponent of fancy foods, her recent book is entitled The Art of Simple Food and its recipes are ordinary.
In 1994, Waters focused on educating children about their food and where it comes from. Students work in the garden, cook the harvested produce and finally eat their creations. There is usually initial resistance to the food they cook in the classroom, but students gradually turn toward eating the fresh produce they have grown. Unfortunately for YSFP, proponents of sustainable food have done little to alleviate that perception of gourmet elitism in the past. The University cannot avoid teaching about food; they instruct by purchasing ingredients and serving them in its dining halls.
How do we make sustainable food not elitist anymore, how do we make it understandable that this is of the people, for the people?
The only viable solution is to establish organic farming on a massive scale with a jump-start investment by affluent environmentalists. Farms would make little profit at first, but once the price goes down organic produce will be competitive.
While each university has its own set of programs, most of them have run into similar criticisms of sustainable food being inaccessible or impossible to execute on their campuses. This generation will also be responsible for initiating a cultural shift in how much Americans are willing to pay for food. Sustainable food does cost more than what Americans are currently accustomed to spending. But processed foods made with corn or soybeans are usually heavily subsidized by the government. The complex farm subsidy system needs to be examined and revolutionized.
February 12, 2008
Yale Daily News
Why Ethanol Production Will Drive World Food Prices Even Higher in 2008.
The US is generating global food insecurity.
The world is facing a severe food price inflation as grain and soybean prices climb. Wheat trading breached $10 per bushel for the first time. On January 11th, soybeans traded at $13.42 per bushel, the highest price ever recorded.
Prices of food products made from these commodities and those made indirectly, such as pork, poultry, beef, milk, and eggs, are on the rise. In Mexico, corn meal prices are up 60%. In Pakistan, flour prices have doubled. China is facing the worst food price inflation in decades.
In industrial countries, prices of food staples are climbing. By late 2007, the U.S. price of a loaf of whole wheat bread was 12% higher than a year earlier, milk was up 29% and eggs 36%. In Italy, pasta prices were up 20%.
It is a matter of demand outpacing supply. In seven of the last eight years world grain production has fallen short of consumption. These shortfalls have been covered by drawing down grain stocks, but the carryover stocks have now dropped to 54 days of world consumption, the lowest on record.
From 1990 to 2005, world grain consumption, driven by population growth and rising consumption of grain-based animal products, climbed by an average of 21 million tons per year. Then came the demand for grain used in U.S. ethanol distilleries, which jumped from 54 million tons in 2006 to 81 million tons in 2007. This more than doubled the annual growth in world demand. If 80% of the 62 distilleries under construction are completed by 2008, grain used to produce fuel will climb to 114 million tons, or 28% of the projected 2008 U.S. grain harvest.
If the food value of grain is less than its fuel value, the market will move the grain into the energy economy. An economics team calculates that with oil at $50 a barrel, it is profitable to convert corn into ethanol as long as the price is below $4 a bushel. With oil at $100 a barrel, distillers can pay more than $7 a bushel for corn and still break even.
The World Bank reports that for each 1% rise in food prices, caloric intake among the poor drops 0.5%.
In early 2007 the update of projections, taking into account the biofuel effect on world food prices, showed the number of hungry people climbing to 1.2 billion by 2025. A rise in food prices shrinks food assistance. The WFP reports that 18,000 children are dying each day from hunger and related illnesses.
At the end of January, Russia will impose a 40% export tax on wheat, effectively banning exports. Argentina closed export registrations for wheat indefinitely. Viet Nam, the number two rice exporter after Thailand, has banned rice exports for several months.
Rising food prices are translating into social unrest. Recently rising bread prices in Pakistan have become a source of unrest. In Jakarta, 10,000 Indonesians gathered to protest the doubling of soybean prices that have raised the price of the national protein staple. As economic stresses translate into political stresses, the number of failing states could increase even faster.
We enter this new crop year with the lowest grain stocks on record, the highest grain prices ever, the prospect of a smaller U.S. grain harvest as several million acres of land go back to soybeans, the need to feed an additional 70 million people, and U.S. distillers wanting 33 million more tons of grain to supply the new ethanol distilleries. Corn futures for December 2008 delivery are higher than those for March, market analysts see even tighter supplies after the next harvest.
The crop program that satisfies scarcely 3% of U.S. gasoline needs is not worth the human suffering and political chaos it is causing. U.S. taxpayers, by subsidizing the conversion of grain into ethanol, are financing a rise in their food prices. It is time to end the subsidy for converting food into fuel and to do it quickly before the deteriorating world food situation spirals out of control.
January 24, 2008
Earth Policy Institute
Fertiliser at a Price - If You Can Get It.
Supply problem with fertilisers in spring 2008 is now a reality. World demand is outstripping supply. This coming season, the most likely situation is a shortage.
World demand for grain production for feed and biofuel was currently outstripping supply and that was driving the demand for fertilisers.
These are "unprecedented times" as far as the fertiliser market was concerned.
"We are sold forward for a few months now and are not actually offering product at the moment but we will re-issue prices when we have a better fix on the situation," an agent said.
"There is very good reason for having a soil anlaysis done and not spending money on a type of fertiliser you might not need."
"India still needs to buy more tonnes for December and with time and product running out fast in China expect this bull run to continue well in to 2008."
While UK farmers might be cringing at current prices, they were even higher in some markets and ammonium nitrate was not arriving in any volumes as vessels went to more lucrative destinations than the UK.
Ralph says:
As a boy I lived on a farm in Eastern England (Norfolk). A herd of cattle lived in a large covered enclosure where the straw that was left after removing the grain, was scattered every day as a clean bed for the animals. Once a year this bed, which was by this time about six feet thick, and soaked with manure, provided anough fertilizer for the hundreds of acres (and our garden) that was planted in the Spring. A totally closed loop. No fertilizers added.
November 28, 2007
Guardian (London)
Green Fuels Will Save the Earth - Or Not.
The earth is too small to accommodate all the biofuels projects, and this raises doubts whether green fuels will ever wean the world off crude oil.
The idea of producing an endless supply of inexpensive fuel seemed almost too good to be true.
It has become clear that it will not be possible to grow enough crops to cover global demand for food and fuel, especially as water is becoming scarce.
A biofuel boom has sharply boosted agricultural prices, sparking worries over food supply as the world's population continues to grow.
An analyst calculated that the world would need an additional 100 million hectares of farmland if all countries were to blend 5 percent of biofuels into the cars. The land, about half the size of Indonesia, would match roughly the total additional land available for farming on earth. While sugar was the most land-efficient feedstock for ethanol, it needs plenty of water.
It would take several years before we could turn agricultural waste into fuel ethanol. For biodiesel, there is also no alternative feedstock to edible oils, in the foreseeable future. Oil prices have soared 40% this year but once-lowly palm oil has jumped by 60%. So now palm oil costs $735 a tonne, making crude a bargain at $593 a tonne.
Even in the US, the world's top ethanol producer profits are squeezed at biofuel plants by high corn costs and low ethanol prices.
In Southeast Asia, many biodiesel projects have been also put on backburner due to the poor returns.
The rise in raw material prices for palm and corn is setting off alarm bells for governments worried about the rising cost of basic foods.
The world would need an additional 10 million tonnes of vegetable oils a year to meet demand from both the food and fuel sectors.
Global output of vegetable oils rose to 153 million last year from 100 million tonnes 10 years earlier. But the annual increase was falling short of the required 10 million this decade.
We are right at the beginning of the history of jatropha as a commercial crop, but in the first step we have taken, we have seen a more than 50% increase on the performance of the wild seed ... This gives us a lot of hope of what jatropha could do in future.
November 26, 2007
Reuters
Feed People, Not Cars.
A growing group of human rights and environmental activists point to the dangers that biofuels pose to environmental sustainability and the livelihoods of communities around the world.
Most of the policies envision substituting biofuels for fossil fuels without reducing our overall consumption of energy. These proposals are backed by agribusiness, biotech companies, and oil interests that are now investing billions in ethanol and biodiesel plants. But agrofuels are not easily renewable because the Earth's landmass is itself a finite resource. To produce 7% of the energy that the US gets from petroleum would require converting the country's entire corn crop to ethanol.
Growing agrofuels on a mass scale is already jacking up food prices, depleting soil and water supplies, destroying forests, and violating the rights of indigenous and local people.
Agrofuel plantations in Brazil and Southeast Asia are being created on the territories of indigenous peoples who have traditionally lived in and protected these ecosystems. Agrofuel expansion threatens to divert the world's grain supply from food to fuel. Corn will become more expensive. Already in June soaring demand for biofuels is contributing to a rise in global food import costs.
Small-scale farmers in Colombia, Rwanda, and Guatemala feel compelled to grow luxury crops such as flowers and coffee for export while their families go hungry. The crops required to make enough biofuel to fill a 25-gallon tank could feed one person for a year.
Agrofuels Don't necessarily reduce the greenhouse gas emissions. The most common method of turning palm oil into fuel produces more carbon dioxide emissions than refining petroleum. Corporate plans for expanding biofuel production involve destroying ecosystems to create massive plantations that rely on chemical fertilizers and toxic pesticides to maximize production. A five-year moratorium on the conversion of land for agrofuel production should be accompanied by the development of new energy technologies that do not compromise global food security.
Creative and practical solutions for meeting our energy requirements -including some local, sustainable biofuel programs - are being developed around the world.
We can support proposals for developing sustainable renewable energy sources, while recognizing the need to reduce overall consumption and protect everyone's basic right to food.
Ralph says: If the world population continues to grow the use of corn for bio-fuel will no make much difference. Many will starve.
October 31, 2007
Jerusalem Post
Soil Erosion a Global Threat: Dirt Isn't So Cheap After All.
Soil erosion is undermining food production and water availability, and is responsible for 30% of the greenhouse gases. Soil and vegetation is being lost at an alarming rate, which in turn has devastating effects on food production and accelerates climate change. Every year, 100,000 square km of land becomes degraded or turns into desert.
Food production has kept pace with population growth by increasing 50% between 1980 and 2000. But it is doubtful if there will be enough food in 2050 with three billion more mouths to feed.
Global food production is declining. Soil degradation is producing growing shortages of water. Soil and vegetation act as a sponge that holds and gradually releases water.
Soils are under greater pressure than ever with governments subsidising crops to produce biofuels.
Biofuel crops use a lot of water. In future, there will not be enough water to grow the food we need.
Biofuels do little to help the problem of climate change, but preventing deforestation and soil loss is the quickest and easiest way to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases.
Land degradation and desertification may account for 30% of the world's greenhouse gases. These changes to the land also alter the water, temperature and energy balance of the planet.
Climate change makes land degradation worse and more extensive, through changes in precipitation and increased evaporation that trigger more extreme weather.
Keeping carbon molecules in the soil, forests and grasslands is the quickest way to address climate change.
There is money to be made by storing carbon in the soil and vegetation. The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) rules under the Kyoto treaty need to be changed to ensure the triple benefits from climate mitigation, climate adaptation and sustainable development for the poor are achieved. Other policy changes are needed for conservation of soil and vegetation and restoration of degraded land to ensure humanity's future survival.
Ending the 30 billion dollars in food subsidies that contribute directly to land degradation would be a good start.
Soil, water, energy, climate, biodiversity, food production are all interconnected, which demands integrated policy-making. There is also no formal agreement on protecting the world's soils.
It is possible to restore degraded lands with enough resources. It is better to preserve than restore.
Karen Gaia says: and if we ignore population, all our gains will be wiped out.
October 06, 2007
IPS
India;: Ten Per Cent Growth Amid the Dance of Death.
Indian agriculture is again at crossroads. Growth in agriculture has decelerated and when forests are destroyed, soil fertility is diminished or water table plummets to dangerously low levels, the rural poor have no option but to migrate to towns and cities in search of jobs. For a country to be able to build up food-grain reserves, sustainable agriculture isthe path to equitable growth, development and national food security. But the green revolution technology came with enormous environmental costs. Monoculture, mechanical ploughing, soil erosion, the extension of crops into forests and the use and abuse of chemicals have contributed to the second-generation environmental impacts that the intensively farmed lands of the country are still grappling with.
The green revolution has collapsed. Village after village are turning into a cesspool of deprivation and mounting indebtedness arising from the blind adoption of intensive farming systems that the government promoted. Villages are being put on sale in many parts of the country.
The unforeseen slump in agriculture growth has affected the industrial growth rate which concerns the prime minister.
In a move to prop up agricultural growth, the prime minister has called for reversing the trend in investment in agriculture, stepping up credit flow to farmers, strengthening future farming, creating a single market for agricultural produce and providing the latest technology to farmers. The prime minister's approach is aimed at compounding the existing crisis.
What is needed is a fresh approach, but unfortunately, the prime minister is fostering a farm strategy that has failed in the US and Europe. In the US, only seven lakh farmers now remain on the farm. In Europe, one farmer every minute quits agriculture.
The strategy has to be different. Nearly 42 lakh government employees and two crore state employees will receive a salary bonanza that will cost the state exchequer more than Rs 1,00,000 crore a year. For the 11 crore farming families, all that is being promised is more credit. More than 1,200 farmers in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra have committed suicide after the prime minister's Rs 3,750-crore relief package was announced. In other parts, the rural landscape remains equally depressing. With agriculture turning into a losing proposition, more than 40% of the farming population has expressed the desire to migrate to urban centres.
The average income of a farm household in 2003 stood at a paltry Rs 2,115. A peon in government service has an average monthly packet at least five times more. The farmer is at the mercy of the moneylender or the banker.
For nearly 6% of the population, 85% of its earnings comes from crop cultivation and wages earned by family members. The farm earnings of marginal and poor farmers have dropped to less than that of a daily wage labourer.
Farm income over the years has eroded. While government employees continue to get the benefit of pay hikes, annual increments, medical allowances, paid holidays and financial loans, the farmer remains out of bound for all these bounties.
Surviving against all odds, and despite the low earnings, farmers have worked hard to ensure national food self-sufficiency. A healthy and vibrant farm sector will only benefit the national economy. Probably the only way to ensure the economic viability of the farm sector is to either enlarge the scope of the sixth pay commission to include farmers or to set up a separate pay commission for the farmers. Based on minimum land-holdings, and de-coupled from production, there is immediate need to ensure farmers get an assured income.
The National Farmers Commission should be entrusted to work out a minimum farm income. Irrespective of productivity, and depending upon the agro-climatic conditions in which a farm is situated, a formula that entails a minimum income has to be worked out. This is the least that needs to be attempted to provide the ailing farm sector a reprieve. There is no other way to pull agriculture out from the tragic abyss of the prevailing crisis.
Karen Gaia says: This is the price of unsustainability. The advantaged win while the disadvantaged pay the price.
September 29, 2007
HardNews Magazine
Fresh Water Scarcity - a Potential Cause for Warfare.
Less than 1% of the world's water is readily available freshwater. There is an increased chance of low-level armed conflicts regarding freshwater resources. Nations believe that water is of a strategic importance and due to this mentality, the development of a riparian policy that several countries will agree to is nearly impossible.
Most of the world's water supply is used for agriculture. The lack of a suitable water supply limits the amount and kind of industries a nation may undertake. This can cause tension within a country due to the inability to create employment and pay its debts.
Saudi Arabia will deplete its groundwater supplies in about fifty years. 216 rivers flow through two or more countries. Thirty-one nations receive more than one-third of their water from rivers that cross international borders. Water availability has been a problem in some parts of the world for a long time. This problem will be exacerbated by population growth in developing countries. The population in some areas of the world is too high for the quantity of water available and it is predicted that this issue will reach critical mass around 2035.
Increases in the level of development increase the amount of water consumed. Projects reduce the amount of protective vegetation. The vegetation slows water flow so that it can permeate the soil and renew groundwater supplies.
Some solutions: Desalination systems convert saltwater to freshwater. Some areas have polluted water and water filtration systems could be profitable. Farming could benefit from the development of more plants that are drought resistant. Irrigation systems could be improved to reduce water loss and hydroponics where the water is constantly reused.
September 17, 2007
Alt3.co.uk
Global Food Crisis Looms as Climate Change and Population Growth Strip Fertile Land: 'Ignorance, Need and Greed' Depleting Soil; Experts Warn Competition Will Lead to Conflict.
Climate change and increasing population could trigger a global food crisis as countries struggle for fertile land. To keep up with the growth in population, more food will have to be produced over the next 50 years than has been during the past 10,000 years combined.
In many countries poor farming practices and deforestation will be exacerbated by climate change leaving vast areas unsuitable for crops or grazing.
Competition may lead to conflicts and environmental destruction
Researchers called on countries to impose guidelines to ensure that soils are not degraded so badly they cannot recover.
This is urgent as securing food and reducing poverty can impact efforts to curb the flow of people, environmental refugees, inside countries as well as across national borders.
Land degradation is among the world's greatest environmental challenges. Some 40% of the world's agricultural land is seriously degraded. In Central America, 75% of land is infertile, Africa, a fifth of soil is degraded, and Asia, where 11% is unsuitable for farming.
The majority of soil erosion is caused by flooding or poor irrigation. Ploughing damages soil, as does repeated planting in fields. Some pressures on soil resources come from human needs, where people don't have any option but to grow crops or farm animals. But farmers try to meet markets. And sometimes, land is cleared that should not have been, or grazed when it shouldn't have been. Increased competition over depleted resources would lead to conflict. According to the UN, 854 million people do not have sufficient food. The population has risen between 1980 and 2000 from 4.4 billion to 6.1 billion and food production increased 50%.
Many countries are opting to plant biofuel crops.
If we can improve agricultural practices across the board we can dramatically increase our food production from existing lands, without having to clear more or put more pressure on soils. Crop rotation, sowing at the right time of year, basic weed control, are what is needed.
Karen Gaia says: it is always easy to give advice on what should be done, but somehow practice usually seems to lag behind the advice. Is it because it is not as simple as it sounds?
August 31, 2007
Guardian (London)
Between Hungry People and Climate Change, Soils Need Help.
To provide for a rapidly growing population, more food must be produced in the coming 50 years than in the last 10,000 years combined. But land degradation and desertification are undercutting the soil's ability to produce more food, causing a crisis that affects one-third of all people on Earth.
An international forum will highlight the roles land care and soil conservation play in the implementation of global environmental agreements. While caused in part by global warming, land degradation and desertification also contributes to climate change.
Soil and vegetation is being lost at an alarming rate which has devastating effects on food production and accelerates climate change. Land degradation and desertification may be a genuine threat to the future of humankind.
Between 1980 and 2000, the global population rose from 4.4 to 6.1 billion and food production increased 50%. Many countries are starting to grow biofuel crops.
Unless land quality is restored, securing food in many places will become a crisis of growing proportions. The same applies to services provided by the ecosystems of the world, such as water storage and biological diversity
Forests are being reduced at an alarming rate and large areas are being overgrazed.
Policy changes that improve conservation of soil and vegetation and restoration of degraded land are fundamental to humanity's future livelihood. This is an urgent task
Land degradation is linked to global climate change in many ways. It reduces carbon sequestration capacity of land, particularly as a result of loss of vegetation, and it creates adverse local weather patterns through loss of vegetation cover.
There is significant potential to harness carbon finance for restoration of land in such a way as to ensure triple benefits from climate mitigation, climate adaptation and sustainable development. The key principle of land care is that the people at a grassroots level have to be involved in designing and implementing soil conservation measures.
August 31, 2007
Environmental News Service
Global Food Crisis Looms as Climate Change and Population Growth Strip Fertile Land.
Climate change and an increasing population could trigger a global food crisis in the next half century. More food will have to be produced worldwide over the next 50 years than has been during the past 10,000 years combined.
But in many countries poor farming practices and deforestation will leave vast areas unsuitable for crops or grazing.
Competition may lead to conflicts and environmental destruction. Researchers at a UN-backed forum on sustainable development called on countries to impose farming guidelines to ensure that soils are not degraded so badly they cannot recover.
This is an urgent task as the quality of land for food production, as well as water storage, is fundamental to future peace.
The UN ranked land degradation among the world's greatest environmental challenges.
Some 40% of the agricultural land is seriously degraded. Among the worst affected regions are Central America, where 75% of land is infertile, Africa, where a fifth of soil is degraded, and Asia, where 11% is unsuitable for farming.
The majority of soil erosion is caused by water, through flooding, poor irrigation, and winds. Ploughing also damages soil, as does repeated planting. Some pressures on soil come from human needs, where people don't have any option but to grow crops or farm animals. But in other instances farmers try to meet markets. And sometimes, and that's cleared that should not have been, or grazed when it shouldn't have been. Increased competition over lead to conflict and the losers will inevitably be the environment and poor people.
854 million people do not have sufficient food for an active and healthy life.
The global population between 1980 and 2000 rose from 4.4 billion to 6.1 billion and food production increased 50%. By 2050 the population is expected to reach 9 billion.
The threat of a food crisis is exacerbated by fears over energy with many countries opting to plant biofuel in place of food crops. If we can improve agricultural practices we can dramatically increase our food production from existing lands. Simple things like good crop rotation, sowing at the right time of year, basic weed control, are what is needed.
August 31, 2007
Guardian (London)
With the World Population Growth Outpacing Food Supply, Say Goodbye to the Era of Unlimited Improvement.
The consequences of excessive rainfall in the late 18th century were predictable. Crops fail, the harvest would be dismal, food prices would rise and some people would starve. Nine years later, Malthus published "Essay on the Principle of Population." His insight was simple but devastating. "Population, when unchecked, increases in a geometrical ratio," but "subsistence increases only in an arithmetical ratio." Put it another way: humanity can increase like the number sequence 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 (average of four children per woman), whereas our food supply can increase no faster than the number sequence 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
We are much better at reproducing than feeding ourselves.
Superficially, mankind seems to have broken free of the Malthusian trap. The world's population has increased by more than six since Malthus' time. Yet the global average daily supply of calories consumed has also gone up on a per capita basis, exceeding 2,700 in the 1990s. The conventional explanation is the succession of revolutions in global agriculture, culminating in the postwar "green revolution" and the current wave of genetically modified crops. Since the 1950s, the area of the world under cultivation has increased by roughly 11%, while yields per hectare have increased by 120%. Yet as Malthus said, food production could increase only at an arithmetical rate, and a chart of world cereal yields since 1960 shows just such a linear progression, from below 1 1/2 metric tons to around 3.
Contraception and abortion have been employed to reduce family sizes. Wars, epidemics, disasters and famines have increased mortality. Together, vice and misery have managed to reduce the rate of population growth from 2.2% annually in the early 1960s to about 1.1% today.
The UN expects the world's population to pass the 9 billion mark by 2050. But can world food production keep pace? We must average 4 tons per hectare to support a population of 8 billion. Yields now are just 3 tons per hectare, and a world of 8 billion people may be less than 20 years away.
Global warming and the resulting climate change may well be inflicting permanent damage on some farming regions. Our effort to switch from fossil fuels to biofuels is taking large tracts of land out of food production.
World per capita cereal production has already passed its peak not least because of collapsing production in the former Soviet Union and sub-Saharan Africa. Meanwhile, there is a worldwide surge in food demand.
The IMF recorded a 23% rise in world food prices during the last 18 months. When I wanted a Philly cheese steak last week, I had to pay through the nose. That's because cheese inflation is 4%, steak inflation is 6% and bread inflation is 10%. Steak is now 53% dearer than it was 10 years ago.
For a long time, we have deluded ourselves that "illimitable improvement" was attainable. As the world approaches a new era of dearth, and misery we are set to make a mighty Malthusian comeback.
Karen Gaia says: While this article is accurate about the food supply and rate of population growth, it is not true that the mortality rate is going down. Not taken into account is the lowering of the infant mortality rate. The slowing of population growth can be attributed to voluntary family planning, which has resulted in the average birth rate in the world going down to less than three children per woman.
July 30, 2007
Los Angeles Times
Losing Soil.
In 2002 a UN team assessed the food situation in Lesotho, South Africa. Their finding was that agriculture faces a catastrophic future; crop production is declining and could cease altogether over large tracts of the country if steps are not taken to reverse soil erosion, degradation, and the decline in soil fertility. Nearly half of the children under five in Lesotho are stunted physically. Whether in Lesotho, or elsewhere, the health of the people cannot be separated from the health of the land. The thin layer of topsoil that covers the planet's land surface is the foundation of civilization. This soil was formed over long stretches of geological time as new soil formation exceeded the natural rate of erosion. Plants protect the soil from erosion. Human activity is disrupting this relationship.
Within the last century, soil erosion began to exceed new soil formation. The foundation of civilization is crumbling. The accelerating soil erosion can be seen in the dust bowls that form as vegetation is destroyed and wind erosion soars out of control. Each example of these is associated with overgrazing, deforestation, and agricultural expansion, followed by retrenchment as the soil begins to disappear.
The overplowing of the U.S. Great Plains for example, led to the 1930s Dust Bowl. Kazakhstan, saw its grainland area peak at just over 25 million hectares around 1980, then shrink to 14 million hectares today. Even on the remaining land, the average wheat yield is a far cry from the nearly 8 tons per hectare that farmers get in France.
A similar situation exists in Mongolia, which is now forced to import nearly 60 of its wheat.
Saharan dust storms have increased 10-fold during the last half-century. In Heilongjiang, Hunan, Tibet (Xizang), Qinghai, and Xinjiang, wind erosion of soil made it clear that the only sustainable use was controlled grazing. Chinese agriculture is now engaged in pulling back to land that can sustain crop production.
Water erosion also takes a toll on soils. Pakistan's two large reservoirs are losing roughly 1% of their storage capacity each year as they fill with silt from deforested watersheds.
Ethiopia, a mountainous country with highly erodible soils on steeply sloping land, is losing an estimated 1 billion tons of topsoil a year, washed away by rain. Fortunately there are ways to conserve and rebuild soils.
July 27, 2007
Earth Policy News
No Sustainability Since Agriculture.
Many have come to understand that we humans have to eaten and reproduced ourselves into a 'cul-de-sac' as our ability to produce food has been swallowed up by human reproduction excesses to go above and beyond even the enormous (but temporary) increases in carrying capacity offered by fossil fuel driven technological and cultural improvements in agricultural production.
There is a basic flaw in our food production culture. Agriculture is unsustainable in the long term because it opens up nutrient conservative ecosystems and allows leaching of fertilizer elements to the sea so over time the capacity of these lands decreases irreversibly in the absence of inputs of exogenous nutrient supplements.
The Amerindian practice of using fish (reversing to flow of nutrients to the sea) to fertilize, beans, corn and squash -- in temporary clearings in the forest (before the soil carbon had been burnt off by microbial activity) may have worked for a very long time to support a stable and small population of shifting agriculturalists.
July 22, 2007
The Future of Sustainability
Ageing Population Threat to Rural England.
The diversity and sustainability of communities in rural England are under threat as young people opt for urban living. There are now 400,000 fewer young people in rural areas than 20 years ago. Since 1987, the proportion of young people in rural areas has fallen from 21% to 15%.
The average age of people in the countryside is now 43.6 years, five years higher than in towns and cities. This is putting a strain on rural services, and the lack of affordable housing is another serious problem. The average price of a house in rural areas was 22% higher than in urban areas in 2006.
The area devoted to oil seed rape as an energy crop nearly doubled between 2005 and 2006 to 187,000 hectares.
There has been a 3.6 times increase in wind power capacity over the last three years, enough to supply around 300,00 homes.
More than 4m hectares of farmland is under an agri-environment scheme.
Land that is organically farmed or in conversion to organic is a fraction of total agricultural land but has increased from 2.7% in 2003 to 3.1%, and there are now nearly 400 vineyards in England and Wales.
The government must reverse the damage it has done and ensure villages and market towns become sustainable communities. That means building more affordable homes and investing in better services.
A spokeswoman for Rural Affairs (Defra) responded: "The majority of rural areas are thriving and the government seeks to ensure that people have equality of opportunity in both rural and urban areas.
July 17, 2007
Guardian (London)
Organic Farming Yields as Good or Better.
US researchers claim that organic farming can yield up to three times as much food as conventional farming. Findings contradict arguments that organic farming is not as efficient as conventional techniques.
Model estimates indicate that organic methods could produce enough food to sustain the current human population, and potentially an even larger population, without increasing the agricultural land base. Corporate interest in agriculture and the way agriculture research has been conducted have been playing an important role in convincing the public that you need to have chemicals and pesticides to produce food.
July 11, 2007
Planet Ark
Humans Gobble One Quarter of Food Chain's Foundation.
The original farmer did not have an large impact on the world. Now, thousands of years later, modern agrarians-along with engineers, foresters and consumers control 23.8% of all the world's photosynthesis. Using FAO statistics for 2000, an ecologist calculated the difference between the energy produced by plants in the absence of humans and the photosynthetic energy available to ecosystems after humans have taken their share.
Due to human activities, in particular land use, 23.8% less photosynthetic energy remains than would be available without human activities. More than half of the human share of photosynthetic energy comes from farming. The human share is 63% in southern Asia and 11% in central Asia and Russia.
As the human population continues to rise the human share will eat up more and more of the available biomass. That share could rise should a shift to biofuels occur. Land-use on a local scale undercut the web of life in Austria-from breeding bird species to crickets to the plants themselves. It is clear that a remarkable share of global photosynthetic production is used to satisfy the needs and wants of the humans on this earth.
July 02, 2007
David Biello
The Fight for the World's Food.
In Britain the price of cereals has jumped by 12% in the past year. And milk on the global market has leapt by nearly 60%. We may be reaching the end of cheap food.
Sixty years ago an average British family spent more than one-third of its income on food. Today, that figure has dropped to one-tenth. But agricultural commodity prices are surging. Two main drivers suggest that cheap food is about to become a thing of the past due to the increased consumption and the use of crops as an alternative energy resource.
As these two forces combine they are setting off warning bells around the world.
Rice prices are climbing, butter in Europe has spiked by 40% in the past year. Wheat futures are at their highest level for a decade. In Mexico there have been riots in response to a 60% rise in the cost of tortillas.
The supermarkets cannot shield us for long. The European Commission no longer has reserves to cushion its citizens. Its mountains of unsold butter and meat have disappeared after reforms to the Common Agricultural Policy.
Corn is consumed indirectly. The milk, eggs, cheese, butter, chicken, beef, ice cream and yoghurt is all produced using corn and the price is influenced by the price of corn. In the past 12 months the global corn price has doubled. In six of the past seven years, we have used more grain worldwide than we have produced. World grain reserves have dwindled to 57 days the lowest level of grain reserves in 34 years.
The reason is the diversion of grain crops into the production of ethanol. 30% of next year's grain harvest in the US will go straight to an ethanol distillery. In Europe farmers are switching to fuel crops to meet the EU requirement that bio-fuels account for 20% of the energy mix.
But bio-fuels are not a green panacea,and the stage is set for competition for grain between the 800 million people who own automobiles, and the world's 2 billion poorest.
The ethanol boom has seen sugar prices track oil prices and the same is set to happen with grain.
In the developed world this could mean a change of lifestyle. Elsewhere it could cost lives. Soaring food prices have already sparked riots in poor countries that depend on grain imports. More will follow. Jean Ziegler, the UN special rapporteur on the right to food, accused the US and EU of hypocrisy for promoting ethanol production. He said producing ethanol instead of food would condemn hundreds of thousands of people to death from hunger.
Ralph says: Not a word about the basic cause of this (and so many other) problems. OVERPOPULATION!
June 23, 2007
The Independent
Neglecting Our Soil May Be the Root Cause of Many Environmental Problems.
Head of Soil Research at Aberdeen said that healthy soils form the basis of agriculture, forestry and ultimately our water and tourist industries.
However, Scotland's soils are increasingly subject to man-made threats, including climate change, new building, and pollution.
All that Scotland is famous for depends on healthy soil and we must take care of this vital resource.
There are very few aspects of our daily lives that aren't dependent on our soils and once soil is gone, it is effectively gone forever.
In some areas the growing of certain crops and the regulation of water quality could soon become compromised. Higher temperatures will lead to the loss of organic matter and alter the sort of crops grown, whereas the predicted increased rainfall is likely to lead to greater soil erosion. A soil monitoring system has started compiling a Scottish soil strategy.
A report critically assesses the current evidence on soils, and makes a number of recommendations. One of the main threats comes from building pressure. An area of soil equivalent in size to Dunfermline is lost permanently every year through new building.
Much of this is likely to have been prime agricultural land, and questions must be asked regarding the long term sustainability of this trend.
The area of agricultural land lost per annum could produce approximately 9000 tonnes of wheat.
The main pollution threats come from acid rain in the uplands, and the heavy metals within organic wastes applied on lowland agricultural areas.
There are more living things in a teaspoon full of soil than there are people on the planet. And soils can become unwell and even die if not cared for properly.
June 22, 2007
Innovations report
U.S.;: Family Feud Why Agribusiness Giants Are Facing Off Over Corn Ethanol.
The rapid price increase for corn, inspired by federal policies that encourage transforming corn into ethanol, is jacking up food prices and squeezing low-income people.
This has given rise to a "food vs. fuel" debate. You either support cheap corn, and a food supply that serves the poor, or you support the ethanol boom, whose goal is to "break our dependence on foreign oil."
A report by The Wall Street Journal outlines the growing rift within the agribiz lobby.
When corn was cheap and overproduced the entire agribusiness lobby rallied around the ethanol cause. But now that ethanol is taking food from feedlots, the community has grown less friendly. Tyson has been complaining about corn prices. Its CEO told the Wall Street Journal that elevated grain prices, linked to ethanol, would add $300 million to the company's costs this year.
The National Cattlemen's Beef Association is raising its voice as well. It finds government intervention and the group has demanded an end to government tax credits for ethanol and a cut to the import tariff on foreign ethanol. They are demanding free markets and free trade. The growing rift in the agribiz lobby is concerning the politicians who cater to it. Presidential hopefuls feel compelled to favor the allegedly fuel that's going to free us from Middle East oil, but support for corn-based ethanol is starting to wane.
Legislators continue to aid ever-increasing ethanol use, but more of them are capping the amount of corn that can be used. The shine is off corn ethanol, and its explosive growth appears to have peaked.
The corn-based ethanol never had a shot at significantly reducing petroleum use. Its energy-saving potential is thin, if not imaginary. The backlash plays into Tyson and its peers, who hate ethanol because it interferes with feeding cheap corn to confined animals.
Last fall, U.S. farmers scrambled to plant corn anywhere they could and will likely harvest the largest corn crop in U.S. history.
If Congress pulls back support for ethanol, the corn price will tumble and will mean a windfall for feedlot operators, and will likely spur government commodity payments to corn growers under the farm bill.
In essence, we're being asked to choose between low-quality food and low-quality fuel. We should reject both.
Karen Gaia says: if we hadn't produced so many people, there would be enough food and fuel for all.
May 24, 2007
Grist Magazine
Crop Prices Soar, Pushing Up Cost of Food Globally.
The rise in food prices is causing distress, especially in poor nations and could contribute to slower global growth. Politicians in markets where costs are sensitive are moving to counter rising prices before they cause unrest. But it remains unclear whether a longer-term bout of food-price inflation is in the offing.
One of the chief causes is demand for ethanol and biodiesel which has driven up the price commodities, leading to higher costs for everything from beef to eggs to soft drinks. Several years of economic growth is also raising food consumption. In China, food prices are climbing at 6%, more more than three times of a year ago. The U.S. is seeing food costs rising 3.1% in February from the year before and are expected to rise faster than the general rate of inflation this year. U.S. consumers are likely to see higher prices for everything from milk to cereal to soda pop, since corn is used to feed livestock and make high-fructose corn syrup.
Some economists believe the increase in crop demand can be met without straining the global economy. Prices could come back down over time, if more land that could be put under cultivation. Technological advances could also help boost production.
Higher farm prices could boost incomes for the rural poor in developing nations. But many countries are facing shortages of land and water. Average food prices in China have grown faster in the past five years, as more agricultural land is taken up for factories or high-rise condominiums.
China and India appear to be reaching a point at which nothing short of a bumper crop will meet local needs and prevent surges in food prices. In fact, they have achieved high production of some crops only to see prices continue to climb.
Global grain stocks are at their lowest level in 30 years, and could become even tighter if farmers divert more crops to make ethanol.
Central banks have tried to ignore surges in food prices as long as they didn't get out of hand. But a sustained food-price inflation, could force banks to keep interest rates higher. India, has increased interest rates several times over the past year in part to combat food-price inflation.
Since the 1970s, central banks have come to believe that they can avoid raising interest rates in the face of transitory increases in food and energy prices if they have established enough credibility as inflation fighters. The inflation risks may be greatest in developing economies. In the Philippines, food accounts for 50% of the price index. In Thailand, about 35%. In the U.S., only about 15%.
China has begun limiting corn-based ethanol plants to ensure there is enough corn for humans and livestock. Chinese stockpiles of surplus corn now stand at only about 30 million metric tons, down from more than 100 million tons at the end of the past decade. Although China remains a net exporter of corn, analysts believe it will become an importer in the next few years.
China will have to allow the proliferation of large but efficient corporate farms. This would be difficult for China because it needs to preserve jobs for the millions who live in rural areas.
In addition to raising interest rates, Indian officials have also lifted import duties on corn and barred exports of wheat, to make sure supplies are available for domestic consumption.
The main problem is that yields of some crops aren't growing fast enough to keep up with India's rapidly increasing food demand. India's corn production has climbed about 4% a year since 2001, while demand has been increasing nearly 5.5%. The requirements are going up much faster than what you can produce in India.
Ralph says: Here we go again, all the great experts giving their ideas and NO ONE even mentions POPULATION GROWTH.
Why is India fast running into famine??? Too many people and then the rest of the world will be expected to provide food. --- Offer them condoms.
April 09, 2007
Wall Street Journal
Uganda;: Desertification is Staring You in the Face.
Uganda's population was six million in 1962, and is now 28 million. Yet the area of land remains the same, apart from new miles of land where Lake Victoria and other Lakes have dried up.
There is high population pressure, and consequently pressure on land. The government and its leaders enacted Article 237 (b) of the 1995 Ugandan Constitution that calls for environmental conservation.
Environment affairs concern us; but issues of conservation have hit centre stage without any reaction from society. Environmental sustainability is an obvious factor for increased agricultural production and the sustainability of the environment promotes sustainable utilisation of the natural resources when environmentally friendly practices are upheld.
The government of Uganda put in place the relevant laws so that actors are automatically authorised to carry out this work without any antagonism. The immediate strategy is to train farmers and other natural resource users on best practices, especially on the mountain sides and other areas susceptible to degradation.
Karen Gaia says: Somehow I don't think that conservation is going to be enough.
March 28, 2007
Africa News Service
Bangladesh;: Planned Use of Precious Land.
It is important for Bangladesh to make the best use of its lands. Bangladesh is limited to 55,000 square miles of land whereas its population is over 140 million, 200 million people by the year 2030. That means meeting their needs of food, housing, industry, environmental sustainability and recreation from such limited land. There is need to make the best possible use of land. Bangladesh has remained economically viable, because it could produce nearly all the food required. But, the supply of agricultural land is shrinking. Urbanisation, expansion of homesteads for an ever-increasing number of people and other non-agricultural uses lead to the loss of a significant area of agricultural land annually.
The unregulated growth of urban life, absence of effective zoning of lands have been leading to loss of agricultural lands. Lands are getting degraded from unregulated polluting activities. Preservation of land or maintaining bio-diversity are the most neglected areas. All need to be addressed under a comprehensive land use plan. This exists in paper but needs to be updated and made comprehensive. More significant would be its effective implementation without any loss of time. Few things have been done to start the implementation of the National Land Use Policy that was adopted in 2001.
Ralph says: No mention of reducing the population growth. Of course with the loss of space for crops the population will eventually be depleted. --- in a natural and cruel manner.
March 27, 2007
The New Nation
World's Most Important Crops Hit by Global Warming Effects.
Global warming has led to a fall in the yield of some food crops. Rising temperatures between 1981 and 2002 caused a loss in production of wheat, corn and barley that amounted to 40 million tons a year. Scientists warned that the findings demonstrated how climate change was having an impact on the global production of staple foods.
The study analysed yields of cereals from around the world.
There was a trend showing cereal crops had lower yields during a time when the use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides became more intensive. The fall in cereal yields could be linked with increased temperatures during the period.
The impacts are small compared to the technological yield gains over the same period, but demonstrate the negative impacts of climate trends on crop yields.
Production of wheat, rice, maize, soybeans, barley and sorghum accounts for more than 40% of the land in the world used for crops, 55% of the non-meat calories in food and more than 70% of animal feed.
It was assumed that farmers have not adapted to climate change by selecting new crop varieties.
The study revealed a fall of between 3% and 5% for every 0.5C increase in average temperatures.
March 19, 2007
The Independent
India;: Pitfalls of the Second Green Revolution.
Indian agriculture is in the midst of a crisis by preparing to introduce a second Green Revolution that will push farmers out of agriculture altogether.
The number of people migrating from rural areas to urban centres in India by the year 2010 would be close to 200 million in search of menial jobs. By 2020, India could have the world's largest number of megacities, with populations of over 10 million each. Numerous national policies are facilitating this distress with the policies that make way for the big agro-industries.
Indian industry and business are upbeat about the potential of agriculture. the 'reforms' are clearly aimed at bringing profits for the owners of the industries.
Policies that encourage contract farming, future trading in agricultural commodities, leasing of land, the formation of land-sharing companies, and the setting up of special purchase centres, will all drive a majority of India's farmers out of agriculture.
The agricultural reforms that are being introduced are destroying the land's capacity to produce. Industry-driven agriculture will aggravate the existing crisis. The new technology will keep a majority of farmers outside its ambit. Reforms, such as enlarging the scope of future trading are aimed at helping agribusinesses.
Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh invested huge amounts into industry-driven agriculture that destroyed millions of rural livelihoods. The rate of farmer suicides in both states has been increasing as they have made it smoother for big agri-industry to move into the rural areas. The RS Indo-US Knowledge Initiative in Agricultural Research and Education, launched by George Bush, is expected to bring Indian agriculture under the direct control of US corporate groups. Two multinational giants Wal-Mart and Monsanto are part of this initiative. They have said they are interested in the increased trading opportunities that India offers.
One objective is a transfer of genetic engineering. The US has used the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to ask India why it is curtailing the import of genetically modified food, without ascertaining the reasons for the agrarian crisis, which is due to the imposition of a damaging technology.
In America, the entry of retail chains in the agricultural sector has transferred the profits and farmers earn only 4% from whatever they sell. In 1990, farmers could earn 70%. Nowhere in the world has big agribusines worked in cooperation with farmers. In North America and Europe, agribusiness companies have pushed farmers out of agriculture. Only 900,000 farming families are left in the US. In 15 countries of the European Union, the number of farmers has dwindled to less than 7 million. A similar process will lead to a catastrophe in India. The Economic Survey talks of dismantling the minimum support price and the procurement-based food subsidy system in India. This will enable food retailers to directly purchase from farmers and have to face the vagaries of the market. The big challenge lies in making agriculture more sustainable for the small and marginal farmers. In some areas agriculture faces a severe crisis of sustainability. Punjab and Haryana are fast heading towards desertification.
The private corporations, bank on intensified farming practices, drain the soil of nutrients, suck groundwater in a few years and leave the once-fertile lands almost barren after four or five years. They then hand back the barren and unproductive land to the farmers. Contract farming is the modern version of 'slash and burn' agriculture.
We must ask how will the second Green Revolution aggravate the existing crisis? Will it allow agribusinesses to take possession of the farm land and then destroy its production capacity? With what untold consequences will the vital power to produce food be shifted into the profiteering hands of multinational food giants?
January 15, 2007
Word Press
Eating Meat Contributes to Climate Change, UN Study Confirms.
A FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization) report is the latest research linking meat-eating with environmental destruction. Animal farming presents a "major threat to the environment" and should rank as a focus for environmental policy.
The livestock sector is affecting climate change through greenhouse-gas production. The ranching and slaughter of animals generates an estimated 18% of greenhouse-gas emissions.
Livestock emit methane and other greenhouse gasses through excrement and belching. The FAO estimates that cow manure and flatulence generate 30% to 40% of total methane emissions from human-influenced activities.
As demand for meat grows, so does the need for pasture and cropland, making deforestation an additional concern. Extensive grazing also takes a toll on arable land.
The livestock sector accounts for 8% of human water use. Animal wastes, antibiotics and hormones, chemicals from tanneries and pesticides also contaminate water supplies.
From 2000 to 2002, consumers in the US ate on average approximately 38.5 million tons of meat per year.
North America had one of the highest methane emissions from livestock manure management in the world in 2004. The US is a leader in CO2 emissions from the burning of fossil fuels in the manufacture of nitrogen fertilizer. But the National Cattleman's Beef Association said that "animal agriculture in the US contributes minimally to the production of total greenhouse gases."
The EPA shows agriculture, including non-livestock activities, accounted for 6% of national greenhouse-gas emissions in 2004. The transportation sector accounted for approximately 27%.
But a national food-education organization said that US consumers are harming the environment through their appetite for meat, and American food choices are being exported.
Meat is becoming a staple in diets of countries that once ate few animal products.
World meat production is expected to double by 2050.
It is probably not a bad idea to suggest that if more people used less animal products we can sustain a larger number of people on earth.
The FAO advocated technological solutions and changes in farming policies.
The UN suggested soil-conservation methods, feeding methods that reduce livestock's gas emissions, and improved irrigation and manure management systems.
Work with livestock contributes 40% of global agriculture Gross Domestic Product and employs 1.3 billion people.
Educating consumers about their food choices is essential.
Karen Gaia says: the more people there are, the more animal farming has an impact on the world. And even the developing world has a large share of the farm animals.
December 07, 2006
http://newstandardnews.net/content/?action=show_item&it
Exploding U.S. Grain Demand for Automotive Fuel Threatens World Food Security and Political Stability.
This year's harvest of 1,967 million tons is falling short of consumption by 73 million tons. In six of the last seven years world grain production has fallen short of use. The growth in world grain consumption during the six years since 2000 averaged 31 million tons per year with 24 million tons consumed as food or feed. The growth in grain used to produce ethanol averaged nearly 7 million tons per year.
Investment in crop-based fuel production is now driven by the price of oil and has become hugely profitable.
This has led to a jump in groundbreakings for new ethanol distilleries. These plants will consume 39 million tons of grain per year.
Considering recent acceleration in new groundbreakings and the scores of new ethanol plants in the planning stages, and these distilleries could easily absorb an additional 40 million tons of grain.
By 2007, we need a rise of 73 million tons to overcome the 2006 production shortfall and 24 million tons of additional output to cover the growth in food and feed needs. If we add 39 million tons to supply the new distilleries cited above, for the U.S. alone we are looking at a growth in demand of 136 million tons of additional grain.
The chances of such a huge jump in the harvest are not good: Farmers must also contend with shortages of irrigation water and the prospect of heat waves as the earth's temperature rises.
Escalating competition is already driving up prices.
The one-third of the corn byproduct that emerges from the distillery will offset the loss of corn for feeding. Consisting mostly of fiber and protein and containing little energy, it is better suited to feed beef and dairy cattle. Corn importers like Japan, Egypt, and Mexico are also worried about the reduction in U.S. corn exports, which are 70% of the world total. In some importing countries in sub-Saharan Africa and in Mexico, corn is the staple food. Wheat and corn prices have climbed by a third or more over the past several months. Wheat and rice prices will likely follow corn prices upward. By the end of 2007, the competition between automobile owners and the world's 2 billion people who want simply to survive will be on center stage. 854 million people are chronically hungry and some 24,000 of them, mostly children, die each day.
The world needs a strategy to deal with the emerging food-fuel competition.
November 03, 2006
Earth Policy Institute
Saving Life on the Edges of the World.
Communities that lived off fishing and forest produce in the south of Chile for centuries have begun to leave because the environment cannot sustain many of them.
In North Africa communities that lived around oases for centuries have begun to move out. The indigenous people of these areas are working with the environment to develop new sustenance for themselves and others.
But as conditions become close to impossible, many of these places need help. An initiative identified about 200 agricultural systems that are threatened by climate change, rural impoverishment, exodus to urban areas, and other such dangers.
These systems provide food security and potentially all humanity will need them in the future. 75% of rural poor are custodians of amazing agricultural methods. But globalisation is a challenge and small-scale farmers, and humanity could lose these heritages.
The GIAHS (Globally Important Agriculture Heritage Systems) initiative has identified seven pilot sites in Peru, Chile, China, the Philippines, and at oases in the Maghreb in Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria.
In Morocco, 36% are living below the poverty line. The increasing population pressure on the resources of the oases and the intrinsic poverty are destabilising the ecosystem.
Over the next seven years the GIAHS project will work with indigenous communities to implement new conservation methods. The objective is building on local people and communities to recognise the importance of these systems so that they can maintain them. One site is located around Machu Picchu at 1900 metres above sea level, going up to Lake Titicaca at 3,800 metres. The path links two different municipalities and four communities of 1,800 peasant families.
The project here is aiming to conserve ancient traditional agricultural technologies. You increase the possibility to earn from the land, you can limit migration. There has been 20% reduction of permanent migration and 50% reduction of temporary migration due to direct participation of local communities in land preservation.
While men more and more frequently go to the big cities to work, women stay at home and rediscover the traditions which otherwise would have been lost.
The GIAHS project is intended to eventually encompass 100 to 150 such systems worldwide and guarantee the sustainability of these agro-eco systems.
October 26, 2006
IPS News
Chemically Dependent Decades After Silent Spring, Pesticides Remain a Menace --Especially to Farmworkers.
According to a USDA report, between 1964 and 1982, pesticide use in the U.S. by three yimes, peaking at 600 million pounds annually.
This has been accompanied by mounting evidence of their ill effects on public health, particularly that of farmworkers. A study from Canada shows that women who had worked on farms were nearly three times as likely to develop breast cancer.
A joint venture of several public-health agencies has revealed direct links between chemical farming and both prostate cancer and retinal degeneration. A link has also been established between pesticide use and Parkinson's disease.
The book Silent Spring sparked a backlash against pesticides, which build up over time in soil, groundwater, and the bodies of animals. The chemical industry's response was to promote pesticides that break down rapidly. But they are more dangerous at the time of application. This shifts the risk onto farm ecosystems and farmworkers.
The shift occurred later in Mexico and chemicals that had been banned in the US were reappearing in Mexican fruit and vegetables.
Use of the quicker-to-break-down chemicals then exploded in the global south, which had tragic consequences for farmworkers. Despite strong standards requiring respirators, rubber coveralls, and other gear, such requirements werey violated by large landowners.
Fully one-third California's farmers violated regulations and 88% of the violations stemmed from employer negligence.
Many products from the pesticide class of organophosphates-- which began as a nerve gas developed by Germany during World War II, remain legal in the United States. Two months ago, the EPA approved use of 32 organophosphates .
Heavy pesticide use helped bring about short-term gains in crop yields and to these firms, pesticide-related deaths and maladies are a cost that lands in someone else's ledger.
Farmworker health has become a sacrifice at the altar of cheap food. Consumers owe it to farmworkers to demand an end to, or at least a severe reduction in, pesticide use.
October 18, 2006
Grist Magazine
Pollinators' Decline Called Threat to Crops.
Species that pollinate North American plant life are losing population. This trend could damage commercially important crops, since three-quarters of all flowering plants depend on pollinators for fertilization.
American honeybees, which pollinate more than 90 commercial crops in the US, have declined by 30% in the last 20 years. This poses a challenge to agricultural interests such as California almond farmers, who need about 1.4 million colonies of honeybees to pollinate 550,000 acres of their trees. By 2012, the state's almond farmers are expected to need bees to pollinate 800,000 acres.
Birds, bees, bats and other species that pollinate North American plant life are losing population, according to a study released yesterday by the National Research Council. This "demonstrably downward" trend could damage dozens of commercially important crops, scientists warned, since three-quarters of all flowering plants depend on pollinators for fertilization.
American honeybees, which pollinate more than 90 commercial crops in the United States, have declined by 30% in the last 20 years. This poses a challenge to agricultural interests such as California almond farmers, who need about 1.4 million colonies of honeybees to pollinate 550,000 acres of their trees. By 2012, the state's almond farmers are expected to need bees to pollinate 800,000 acres.
Rene E. Robinson, an entomologist at the University of Illinois and one of the 15 researchers who produced the report, said U.S. farmers had to import honeybees last year for the first time since 1922, underscoring the extent of the problem.
"The honeybee industry is at a critical juncture," Robinson said. "The time for action is now."
Introduced parasites have hurt the honeybee population, and pesticides have also taken a toll. Bats, which have declined as vandalism and development have destroyed some of their key cave roosts.
The declines have been gradual and in some instances are hard to quantify. A decline in pollinator populations is one form of global change that has potential to alter the shape and structure of ecosystems.
Animals carry pollen and transfer it from one flowering plant to another, sometimes over significant distances.
Animal pollinators fertilize more than 187,500 flowering plants worldwide. Other pollinators include hummingbirds and butterflies, as well as wild bees.
Many ordinary citizens fail to grasp how important pollinators are to food production.
The diversity of bee species has declined by 40% in Britain and 60% in Holland since 1980. North American farmers have imported bees but they could bring new pests, parasites and diseases with them.
October 18, 2006
Orange County Register
Can Industrial Agriculture Withstand Climate Change?.
If current warming trends continue, farmers will face conditions that change rapidly and unpredictably. It's worth asking whether modern U.S. agriculture techniques, are up to the challenge.
One weak point is our reliance on fossil-fuels.
Farmers look mainly to fertilizers derived in part from natural gas. Worldwide use of fertilizers increased more than tenfold overall. Moreover, U.S. agricultural production tends to be highly concentrated in a few areas and leans on long-haul travel.
The popularity of frozen "convenience" food puts more distance between consumers and their sustenance. Globalization means we haul in lots of food and ship out loads of corn and soy. Imports and exports are both expected to top $60 billion this year.
Addiction to cheap fuel isn't the food system's only potential weak point. Another is the loss of biodiversity. Agriculture has relied on biodiversity to adapt to challenges from pests and diseases. To cite an example, potato farmers in Peru have never experienced crop failure, because genetic diversity ensured resistance to pests. In Ireland, though, where the genetic basis for potatoes was severely narrower, disaster struck.
In the U.S. and Europe, plant breeders have for a century sought to rationalize biodiversity. Now their goal has been to replace traditional species, which show broad variability, with "pure" hybridized varieties that produce highly uniform results.
A study shows that 97% of seed varieties that were available in 1903 had vanished by 1983. Today, the world's key genetic storehouses are the places where our staples originally came under cultivation. These "centers of diversity," have been subjected to erosion as hybrid varieties have proliferated. Unlike the robust crops of old hybridized cultivars depend on doses of fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, and irrigation.
History offers many examples of societies that faced rapid climate change and environmental damage. For some, food-production methods proved durable; in other cases, food production faltered and societies collapsed.
India, already parched, seems unready for global warming. And the US seems vulnerable too. Our food system deserves more attention. In the end, its salvation may lie in the hands of small-scale farmers using traditional seed-saving and fertility techniques.
October 04, 2006
Grist Magazine
Need for Water Could Double in 50 Years, U.N. Study Finds.
More than two billion people are facing a scarcity of water and in the next 50 years, the amount of water needed will double.
A water crisis would fuel violent conflicts, dry up rivers and increase groundwater pollution. Rural poor would have to clear more grasslands and forests to grow food.
The authors of this report concluded that countries confronting severe water shortages cannot employ the strategies for increasing food production that have had success over the past half-century.
Since 1950, the acreage of land under irrigation has tripled. But some parts of the world are reaching the limits of their water supplies.
Sub-Saharan Africa has lacked the financial wherewithal to build dams and irrigation systems to get water to farms and homes where most people live.
We have to grow more food with less water, and we can't keep expanding the land used.
In Africa, governments and donors should focus on inexpensive, small-scale methods for irrigating often widely scattered plots of land.
Farmers could use tanks to store rainwater and use simple drip irrigation during dry spells. They could operate treadle pumps to tap into groundwater.
While these technologies may be simple, installing them on a national scale and maintaining their use would be no easy matter.
Farmers need credit, crop insurance and roads to get their products to market. They need AIDS treatment, and they need fertilizers to nourish their land.
The report raised the specter of global climate change, and its potential to alter patterns of rainfall, especially in the poor countries near the Equator.
The more rapid glacial melt in the Himalayas means increasing the water flowing into India, Nepal, Pakistan and China, but it may mean much less water in future years.
August 22, 2006
Global Policy Forum
Ull Professor Works to Save Soil.
The movement toward soil sustainability means finding ways to increase the standard of living while diminishing the negative impacts on the environment. This concept has gained support over the past few years.
Coupled with the expansion of the global population a majority of our environmental dilemmas are the result of traditional agricultural practices. Experts are pushing the political and scientific communities to investigate such problems as topsoil depletion, groundwater contamination and pollution from agricultural runoff and they are addressing the farming industry’s heavy dependency on herbicides, pesticides and non-renewable resources. Crop production, however, cannot stop while researchers search for more innovative and economically viable options.
Sustainability practices at the University of Louisiana range from intensive grazing management, aquaculture studies with crawfish, wildflower cultivation and collection, nutria studies, water quality monitoring, wetlands conservation and the development of alternative energy sources.
The “Solar House” includes passive solar collectors and photovoltaic panels, designed to demonstrate less reliance on non-renewable resources.
A lagoon system processes waste water before it is released. The crawfish center examines the economic and environmental impact of crawfish production in Louisiana.
Another concept is permaculture, which involves the practices of hybrid and organic farming.
Louisiana’s climate is challenging th because of its combination of high humidity and temperature that attracts pests and weeds.
The University of Louisiana was awarded a $1.7 million grant for the cultivation, collection and storage of Louisiana wildflower seeds that will be held in storage for planting at welcome centers throughout the state.
The flowers will minimize the need for grass mowing, reduce soil erosion and beautify the area.
The group’s objective is to enhance global capacity to improve agricultural methods and sustain natural resources.
At the university’s facilities, studies interact from a range of disciplines including, but not limited to, agribusiness, agronomy, environmental restoration, soil science, horticulture, biology, chemistry and resource conservation.
July 14, 2006
The Advocate
US Biotech Companies Urge Africa to Catch Up.
Dow AgroSciences specializes in the provision of "innovative crop protection, seeds, and biotechnology solutions." The reluctance of African countries to establish regulatory frameworks to guide the use of biotechnology will be one of the continent's undoings. The continent faced the risk of isolation because of its reluctance to embrace biotechnology. Biotechnology has the potential to improve biodiversity, reduce insecticide use, advance food security and transform agriculture in the next 10 years.
Africa's solution to drought and crop diseases may be in growing genetically engineered crops specifically tuned to resist weather conditions and mature quickly. This could result in saving crops from losses of harvests, which are followed by hunger and starvation. Nearly 200 million people in Africa are undernourished. The consequences are manifest in the prevalence of hunger and malnutrition. The FAO stated that 27 countries in sub-Saharan Africa were in need of urgent food assistance. They included Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Malawi, Swaziland, Somalia and Zimbabwe.
Sub-Saharan Africa is home to almost one-quarter of the developing world's food-deprived people. Surveys revealed that 33% of African children are stunted, underweight, or emaciated. The majority of African countries still do not favor GMO crops or foods due to the lack of systems to safeguard biodiversity.
This is so despite the fact that more than 35 countries have signed the Cartagena Protocol, that seeks to protect biological diversity from the potential risks posed by biotechnology. Agricultural science and technology must work with local governments and scientists to make biotech available starting with capacity building and infrastructure for the approval of regulatory frameworks and adoption of the technology.
Issues that need to be addressed,include the availability of seeds to farmers at affordable prices and providing safety procedures to protect human beings and the environment during field trials. This may not be possible if the governments do not understand people's needs and how technology can solve them. We cannot underestimate the importance of establishing strong regulatory frameworks to protect the environment and the food chain. Proponents of GMO argue that Africa has serious food gaps and should embrace biotechnology farming for enhanced food production and nutrients. Since 1996 , the global planted area of biotech crops has soared 4.2 million acres in six countries to 222 million acres in 21 countries in 2005.
At present, most African countries cannot advance GM crop research because national policies or regulatory systems are not prepared to deal with safety requirements. Only South Africa and Nigeria have a specific policy for biotechnology.
South Africa began growing its first genetically modified commercial crops in 2003, with cotton farmers reporting yields improved up to 89%. It was also among the 11 developing countries where biotech crops have increased income of 7 million poor farmers.
Research is ongoing that is focusing on staple crops in many developing countries. These include rice, cassava, sweet potatoes, cowpea, banana and maize. Researches are focusing on problems such as disease resistance, drought tolerance, and pest resistance.
Farming is the most important economic activity in Africa, occupying 60% to 80% of the population and contributing 30% to 50% of the GDP in African countries. Eighty percent of farming is in the hands of small-scale farmers and remains an unattractive occupation and those involved are members of the lowest rungs in the poverty index.
Lands in developing countries, especially in Asia, are degraded due to exploitation and they must be helped to restore their soil fertility if they are to grow commercially attractive crops and compete in the global food economy.
June 17, 2006
Islam Online
Global Warming Screwing Up Wine Country.
Wine grapes are temperature-sensitive, and if the globe gets hotter, wine-producing regions may lose optimum climate for their grape varieties. Already, warmer temperatures in southern Spain are driving grape growers to shade vineyards, develop heat-resistant grapes, and move to the mountains. Climate change could reduce the world's grape-growing regions by nearly 80% by the end of the century. Other regions may warm up enough to become prime wine country, in the U.S., those could include upstate New York, coastal Michigan, the Puget Sound area and Virginia. Meanwhile, dozens of vineyards in California are doing their bit by running irrigation systems on solar power.
June 01, 2006
Santa Cruz Sentinel
Tanzania: Ruaha Basin: Ecology on Verge of Destruction.
The Ruaha River Basin is crucial to the national economy being among the national grain baskets. The catchment zones drain into the Mtera, Kihanzi and Kidatu rivers whose hydro-electric power generation dams provide the national grid with over 60% of electric power.
But poor farming methods, population explosion, destruction of the environment within the hundreds of smaller catchment basins, water diversion and other activities have caused the drop of water levels downstream at alarming pace.
The World Wild Fund-UK (WWF) began an environmental conservation project to save the basin and its water catchment areas. The project has saved various water catchment areas that were already under threat of extinction. Despite initial resentments, the involvement of everybody give the initiative a sense of ownership. Farming water user associations have been formed and work in liaison with the local government.
The object of the programme is to ensure that by 2010 there would be a multidisciplinary river basin management team.
At the same time it was hoped that the survey conducted in the course of the project implementation would establish the cause of the alarming drop in the water levels in the entire River Ruaha system.
As the project progresses it is important to consider the importance of the Ruaha River Basin, to the entire nation.
The basin controls the nation’s economy as an agriculturally productive zone and the entire economy relys on the power generated.
The shortfall in power generation from the drop in water levels has impacted the economy with the growth falling by 17%, according to the Central Bank of Tanzania.
The government and community must strive to save this ecosystem. fe are in an exclusive but growing club rare species getting costly protection even as the world faces what may be the worst wave of extinctions since the dinosaurs.
But in the region, where rare species are found nothing is being done to save them.
Experts say it is impossible to set a ceiling on the value of a species and that willingness to pay may be widening, posing risks for businesses like mining, industry or logging that affect the habitats of rare animals or plants.
Indeed, the unabated destruction of the environment means destruction of man himself.
May 29, 2006
Guardian (London)
Population Hearings Open in UK Parliament.
Parliamentary Hearings have opened in London into how population growth is effecting the UN Millennium Development Goals. Population has been an almost taboo subject in international discussions. The seven MGD goals relate to poverty and hunger, univeral primary education, gender equality and empowerment of women, child mortality, maternal health, HIV/Aids, malaria and other diseases and environmental sustainabilty.
The UN defines environmental sustainability as "using natural resources wisely and protecting the ecosystems on which our survival depends."
The question is how far has population growth made that aim more difficult, and how far will slowing future growth make it easier to achieve? The UN says: "sustainability will not be achieved with current patterns of resource consumption. Land is becoming degraded. Plant and animal species are being lost. The climate is changing. Marine resources are being overexploited."
But few references are made to how population growth is responsible for driving these disastrous changes. There are no references to population policies as such.
It states that "close to 2.4 billion people worldwide will still be without improved sanitation in 2015." 100 million people are added to the urban communities of each year, which are growing three times faster than rural areas - or by three per cent a year. Almost 1 billion people live in conditions of overcrowding, little employment or security of tenure, poor water, sanitation and health services, and widespread insecurity.
There has been a reluctance to grapple with such population factors in a systematic way. The important question of migration was left to be dealt with at a future conference. What counts is not the number of people alone, but their impact on the environment. The important factor is the increase in the human impact as living standards rise around the world, and migrants adopt high consumption life styles.
If China were to achieve a First World living standard the impact on the planet’s environmental resources would double.
The Earth Policy Institute highlighted the environmental impact of industrial development in India and China, whose combined ecological footprint exceeds that of the US or Europe.
Some question whether the UN projection of world population rising to 9.1 billion by 2050 can be possible. We face two urgent major challenges: restructuring the global economy and stabilising world population.
In the last four decades, an area half the size of the US was cleared of tropical forest. Population growth is a primary cause of forest decline, interacting with poverty, corruption, inequitable access to land, and wasteful consumption alongside growing demands for wood products. The dominant force is probably the demand for farmland for subsistence farming. Social investments linking education, health, micro-credit and family planning with conservation programmes show promise and could help sustain the forests, while slowing population pressures.
Global freshwater consumption grew six-fold in the last century and demand continues to grow while climate change threatens to increase areas of low rainfall in Africa and elsewhere. Agriculture accounts for more than 70% of water use, and demand is bound to grow as population increases. Demand for industrial and household use is expected to double by 2025, and to increase up to five-fold in China. There is a danger of collision between rising world population and shrinking water resources, that make the emergence of conflict more rather than less likely. The lack of water and agricultural land is a significant factor to the conflict in Darfur. Stabilising population will help conserve water as a finite resource, and ease the danger that wars over water will spread around the world. Human activities have severely degraded 11% of the world’s arable land: an area the size of India and China combined. As a result, every year the world’s farmers must feed 77 million more people with 27 million fewer tons of topsoil.
In Africa farm holdings have shrunk as the population has grown, and per capita yields have fallen by as much as 30% over the last three decades. Some 65% of the region’s agricultural land has been degraded. While Africa’s population grew by 3% a year in the three decades to 1996, its annual food production increased by only 1.9%. Malnourished children in Africa could grow from 29 to 41 million between 1980 and 2020. China has lost arable land equivalent to all the cropland in Denmark, France, Germany and the Netherlands combined.
By 2030, the urban population is projected to reach 5 billion or 60% of the world’s population. But in many of these urban centres, especially in the least developed countries, a high proportion of the residents live in miserable conditions. Urban communities are generally in a better position to take part in self-help schemes to improve their homes. They may also be more motivated to plan smaller families, providing they have the means to do so.
Cities put enormous pressure on resources far beyond their borders and it is imperative to slow their growth, before they become unmanageable.
The developing world is becoming a major contributor to climate change. In China, emissions of carbon grew from 1.5 to 2.8 metric tons per capita between 1980 and 1996, while its population grew from 984 million to 1.22 billion. Increasing human numbers and mounting development pressures are taking a heavy toll on coastal wetlands, mangroves, sea grasses, coral reefs and biodiversity in general.
Rapidly expanding populations and the growth of cities along coastlines has also contributed to a rising tide of pollution in nearly all of the world’s seas.
The population of the 50 least developed countries is projected to pass from 0.8 billion in 2005 to 1.7 billion in 2050. These are also the countries that are most affected by HIV/AIDS and the half million women who die each year from childbirth-related causes. Many are suffering from environmental stress and a shortage of land.
In Pakistan fertility rates remain high, much irrigated land is stressed by salinization and the population is projected to grow from 159 million to 228 by 2025 and 295 by 2050. For these and many other poor countries it is quite wrong to assume that the population bomb has been defused.
Unfortunately, no country like the U.S. can absorb the large numbers of excess people in India, China, or Pakistan (or any other countries) without serious impact to its own environment and sustainability.
May 21, 2006
People & the Planet
Global Food Supply Near the Breaking Point.
The world is eating more food than farmers grow, and grain stocks are at their lowest level in 30 years.
Rising population, water shortages, climate change, and the costs of fossil fuel-based fertilisers point to a calamitous shortfall in the world's grain supplies. Today more people rely on farmers to produce their food but in five of the last six years, global population ate more grains than farmers produced.
There isn't much land left for new food-producing areas, and what is left is of poor quality or likely to turn into dust bowls if exploited. There are no technological magic bullets waiting in the wings.
Biotechnology has made little difference so far. Even if the biotech advances come about in the next decade, they will boost yields little more than 5% globally.
Hunger is a stark reality for more than 850 million people, including 300 million children. How can the number of hungry not explode when one, two and possibly three billion more people are added to the global population?
Many Canadian and U.S. farmers are going out of business because crop prices are at their lowest. Farmers are told overproduction is to blame for the low prices. However, most North American agribusiness corporations posted record profits in 2004. With only five companies controlling the global grain market, there is an imbalance of power.
There are enormous amounts of food stored in central Canada but thousands of people there are forced to rely on food banks.
Inequity and poverty are at the heart of the hunger problem.
Economic inequity is becoming more widespread and the present situation is likely to worsen with climate change.
An estimated 184 million people in Africa alone could die from floods, famine, drought and conflict resulting from climate change. Millions more in other parts of the world will also perish. One group envisions poor regions using renewable energy to power a new, and clean, era of prosperity.
Another vision is already making a difference. With some money to buy better seeds, fertiliser, a share in a water source, and a bed net to fend off malaria hundreds of thousands of villagers in the Millennium Villages project are now able to grow enough food and sell the surplus.
Making a difference in Africa's food security and poverty issues means development assistance to spread the project to the more than 100,000 villages in Africa. Shifting from a global food production system to local food for local people would go a long way towards addressing inequity.
The whole fabric of the food production system needs to change, or hunger and malnutrition will only get much worse.
North America's industrial-style agricultural system is a bad idea and maybe the worst on the planet.
May 17, 2006
Inter Press Service/World Watch
Food, Sustainability, and the Environmentalists.
by Tom Philpott It's important to wonder how we'd get around in an era of super-high oil prices but we should worry about what we'd eat. The old-school farming relies on animals and farm wastes that are recycled into the soil. The industrial-organic farmer is likely shipping in composted manure from far-flung places, while the conventional grower is hauling in a processed petroleum product. Most small vegetable farms don't have enough animals to produce the nitrogen we need. Could organic farming feed the world?" In essence, can sustainable farming feed the world?" To which the only wise response is, "can unsustainable farming feed the world?" The amount Americans pay for food as a percentage of income has leveled off about at 10% while growth in real wages has stagnated. It is a vicious cycle: We need our food supply as cheap as possible to feed low-wage people; we need lots of low-wage people to sustain our cheap-food system. This cycle consumes resources and damages the environment. How have we kept our food so cheap? One way is by opening our market to foreign-grown food. Another way is subsidies but the payments urge overproduction, which pushes prices down and eats into farm incomes. In a culture where food production takes place in such abstraction, food becomes banalized into minimal rituals of ingestion, digestion, and expulsion. I seriously doubt that industrial agriculture -- or its bastard child, industrial-organic -- can last much longer.
March 21, 2006
Grist Magazine
Environmental Sustainability: Population, Poverty and the Environment.
Changes in population size, rate of growth and distribution have a far-reaching impact on the environment. The largest population increases and the most fragile environmental conditions are found in poor countries. This threatens sustainable development and produces further deterioration in living standards and quality of life. Integrating population into economic and development strategies will speed up sustainable development and poverty alleviation. The two most serious deficiencies are contaminated water and polluted air. Land fragmentation, eroded slopes and degraded soils are contributing together with unplanned growth of cities, fed partly by migrants from rural areas. Millions have settled in slums and shantytowns without basic services. The majority of the rural poor have clustered on low-potential land. Because they have been pushed or squeezed out of high-potential land, the rural poor often have no choice but to overexploit the marginal resources available to them. Food and water security are becoming critical issues in many developing countries. Population growth is creating a demand for stepped-up food sufficiency and while world food production is projected to meet consumption for the next two decades, long-term forecasts indicate persistent and worsening food insecurity in many countries. The FAO of the UN estimates that to meet the needs of the world’s population in 2020, food production will have to double.
Ralph says: 'Food production will have to double' - That is a frightening statistic!!!!!!!
February 08, 2006
UNFPA
Africa's Hunger - a Systemic Crisis.
The UN's FAO is warning that 27 sub-Saharan countries now need help. But what appear as isolated disasters are systemic problems. It is African agriculture that is in crisis, and according to the International Food Policy Research Institute, has left 200 million people malnourished. The FAO highlights civil strife, refugee movements and returnees in 15 countries, and it declares in need of urgent assistance. Drought is only sited in 12 countries. Africa's wars, coups and civil strife are responsible for more hunger than the natural problems. Four issues are critical: underinvestment in rural areas as Africa's elites respond to political pressure, mainly from cities. This is compounded by corruption and mismanagement. Wars and political conflict result ın refugees and instability. The continent has suffered from 186 coups and 26 major wars in the past 50 years. There are 4.8 million refugees in Africa. Farmers need stability before they can produce the food societies need. HIV/Aids depriving families of their most productive labour, in southern Africa, over 30% of sexually active adults are HIV positive. Sub-Saharan Africa's population has grown faster than any region over the past 30 years, despite the millions of deaths from the AIDS pandemic. Between 1975 and 2005, the population more than doubled, rising from 335 to 751 million, and is currently growing at a rate of 2.2% a year. In some parts of Africa land is plentiful, but in others it has forced farming families to subdivide their land time and again, leading to tiny plots or families moving onto overworked land. In the highlands of Ethiopia and Eritrea some land is so degraded that it may never produce a descent harvest. In addition to natural nutrient deficiencies in the soil, soil fertility is declining by the year through "nutrient mining", whereby nutrients are removed over the harvest period and lost through leaching, erosion or other means. A continent that was more than self sufficient in food 50 years ago, is now a massive food importer. In 1966-1970, net exports averaged 1.3 million tons of food a year, by the late 1970s Africa imported 4.4 million tonnes of staple foods a year, a figure that had risen to 10 million tonnes by the mid 1980s.
January 31, 2006
BBC News
Bionic Growth For Biotech Crops; Gene-Altered Agriculture Trending Global.
Since genetically modified crops were planted a decade ago, the acreage worldwide has been growing, last year jumping 11% to 222 million acres. The crops are gaining in countries such as China, India and Brazil, with small cotton farmers embracing a technology that allows them to grow more cotton while reducing the use of pesticides. Rice could be on the verge of a transformation. Iran has commercialized gene-altered rice and China is ready to do so. Widespread acceptance could put crop biotechnology into the hands of the millions of small rice farmers who grow nearly half the calories eaten by the human race. Commercialization of rice that has been genetically altered to resist insects has implications for alleving poverty, hunger and malnutrition for all biotech crops and their acceptance on a glo
