AGRICULTURE

1. AGRICULTURE

2. Outline • Preliminaries • Landmarks in development of agriculture: 3. Forms of agriculture. 4. State of global food prospect 5. Context of current state of agriculture: Trapped in non-improvement mode? 6. Environmental sources of agricultural stress? 7. Agricultural sources of environmental degradation 8. Towards an Agricultural-Environmental Realignment 9. Conclusion.

3. 1. preliminaries Issues in agriculture: -food security [scarcity and shortage; deprivation and famine]-Agriculture-environment interface. - Puzzle - Challenge - Way out?- Is the Green/biotech Revolution good for the Environment?

4. 2. Landmarks in development of agriculture: • a) Domestication of seeds • - Soyabean domesticated in China about 5,000 years ago; • introduced to U.S. 1804. • b) Irrigated agric. • - Euphrates and Tigris, over 6000 years ago. • - Other variants known all over the world. • c) Genetic manipulation • 1847 Chemical fertilizer, discovered [Germany] that • nutrients removed from soil by plants could be replaced in • chemical form. • - 1935 Japanese Norin wheat released in Japan, and brought to the • US in 1946 and cross bred with American seeds. • - 1940s US govt, & Foundations set up a plant • breeding program in Mexico.

5. Landmarks cont. - 1944 the program thro’ Norman Borlaugh bred dwarf varieties of wheat (1954). 1970, Borlaugh awared Nobel Peace Prize for developing “Miracle Seeds’ - 1956 International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, set up by Rockefeller and Mexican Govt was diffusing seeds to developing countries - 1960 [Impact of Mexico] Rockefeller and Ford Foundations set up in Philippines International Rice Research Institute [IRRI]. -1966 IRRI was producing dwarf rice. [Era of Green Revolution in [some] developing countries

6. 3. Forms of agriculture 1) Traditional -Shifting cultivation - Labor-intensive agric. 2) Modern - Mechanized agriculture Characteristics of modern agriculture [cf. to traditional agriculture] - intensive use of artificial fertilizers - extensive practice of monocultures - intensive and extensive mechanization • Biotechnology - Focus: develop seeds tolerant to herbicide; resistance to insect and disease. - dogged by controversy

7. 4. State of global food prospect Grain harvesting previously rising, now falling - World production nearly tripled from 1950 to mid 1990s. • By 2003, world grain stocks dropped to lowest level in 30 yrs.[downtrend be norm?] • E.gs. - China’s massive decline in grain production between 1998 and 2004, leading to import of 8 million tons. - 1960s, African, unlike India, had no food deficit; today, food scarcity reins [cf. Zimbabwe]

8. 5. Context of current state of agriculture: Trapped in non-improvement mode?. • Where are we? Shrinking opportunities [assuming this is a fair interpretation of grain production decline] a) Land: Quality and acreage under crop i) quality Past: solved through opening new frontiers Today: This option is limited; Brazil? - but environmental concerns loom large. ii) acreage under crop Past: increased through irrigation Today, aquifers used up, and any further demand will only deplete, meaning more drop in food production.

9. 5. Context of current state of agriculture cont. b) Crop yields Past: mitigated through increased use of fertilizer. 1950-1989: 14m tons -146m. Today: use of more fertilizer has little effect. - Also fertilizer use declining. c) Science and Technology Past: spurred grain production, both acreage and yields/acre. Today: biotech may do it, but it is under attack Convergence of dual attacks: i) Environmental and Ideological. - Environmentally counter-productive [human health and biodiversity] - Ideologically - political-economy questions [future of seeds monopolized by a few corporations]. ii) Combined forces in developed and developing countries [Before, it was developed vs. developing]

10. 6. Environmental sources of agricultural stress? 1) Temp. rises undermining food productivity -1 degree Celsius rise in temp. leads to 10% decline in wheat, rice, and corn yields. e.g.- 2003 European heat : Eastern Europe harvested smallest wheat crop in 30 yrs.; Imports. - Sahel is an over-told story - But, new frontiers? Russia & Canada. - How do temp. affect food production? i) World’s fresh water stored in ice and snow in mountainous regions. E.g. smelting snowfields reported in Himalayas, Kilimanjaro and Mt. Kenya ii) worsen or create new crop disease and insect problems.

11. 6. Environmental sources of agricultural stress? Cont. 2) Falling water tables - Impact of irrigation -many countries affected, including a combination of those accounting for about half of global grain harvest [China, India, US]. Eg. Saudi Arabia: used aquifer for irrigation and wheat production rose from 140,000 tons (1980) to 4.1 million tons (1992). - By 2004, aquifer had depleted and production dropped to 1.6 million tons. - Irrigated wheat production threatened.

12. 6. Environmental sources of agricultural stress? Cont. 3) Soil erosion and desertification [effect on land productivity over time] - Wind and water erosion [mismanaged agricultural activities?] reduces fertility of cropland, hence less yields. - Desertification in Africa and Asia. Eg. In China, some deserts about to merge - parts of northern and western regions. 4) Second order Impacts of Environmental degradation i) Collapsing fisheries vs. implication on livestock production. ii) Shrinking forests – implications for both wind and water erosion, hence unsustainable agricultural and grazing opportunities, leading to more erosion; global warming. iii) Disappearing species –biodiversity

13. 7. Agricultural sources of environmental degradation 1) Loss of vegetation cover - Soil erosion -overgrazing or cultivation in marginal lands. Plowing steep sloping land [if not protected by terraces, or perennial crops, etc.] - Heavy rains or too dry conditions . - vulnerability to both water and wind erosion. Egs - Problem of Africa’s rangelands –ASALS - 1930s Dust Bowl in U.S.; • Russia’s Virgin Lands Project, 1954 and 1960. - a short success, then dust bowl.

14. 7. Agricultural sources of environmental degradation 2) collapse [and even commercialization?] of agric. - trigger pressures on forests, wetlands. - Eg. of Brazil? • Fears of soil erosion in areas where large scale vegetation clearing is taking place [cerrado- Soyabean cultivation]. -Forest clearing could jeopardize rainfall patterns - [plus carbon sequestration impaired.] - Loss of species [global centre of biodiversity], some endemic [esp. in cerrado]

15. 7. Agricultural sources of environmental degradation cont. 3) Modernization of Agriculture: Genetic engineering and environment-- bane or boon? [- combine both Green Revolution [GR] and GMOs.] - Question of success of Green Revolution can be conceptualized at two levels a) Was meant to create abundance, did it? b) Unintended consequences – disastrous environmental impacts? • Conceptualized contentious claims - competing epistemologies [could the effects [i.e. b] occur under circumstances absent of modernization of agriculture, and two, what is the trade-off?

16. 7. Agricultural sources of environmental degradation cont. 3 i) Critics • Contribution to pest vulnerability: pesticides enhance evolution of resistant pest strains b) Destruction of diversity Homogenization of marginal lands and croplands destroys genetic diversity. Potential effects on nontarget organisms • Direct effects: adverse effects on nontarget organisms • Indirect effects: biomagnifications - in theory, can mean local extinction of some animals.

17. 7. Agricultural sources of environmental degradation cont. c) Destruction of soil fertility -Soil toxicity: thro’ GR by introducing excess quantities of trace elements in the ecosystems. • Have to always use fertilizers d) Greenhouse effect - Nitrogen-based fertilizers release nitrous oxide to the atmosphere, causing global warming. • cropping patterns lead to erosion and degradation of land. - Croplands are kept under constantly soil depleting crops like wheat and rice; no rotation with soil building crops --legumes.

18. 7. Agricultural sources of environmental degradation cont. 3 ii) Alternative/Competing explanations: a) In 2000, for example, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences committee on Genetically Modified Pest-Protected Plants submitted that “Health and ecological risk assessments of transgenic pest protected plants do not differ in principle from the assessment of other health and ecological risks.” b) On loss of biodiversity, the NAS committee (2000) found that “these potential impacts on nontarget organisms are generally expected to be smaller than the impacts of broad-spectrum synthetic insecticides, and therefore, the use of pest-protected plants could lead to greater biodiversity in agroecosystems where they replace the use of those insecticides”.

19. 8. Towards an Agricultural-Environmental RealignmentMitigation Two considerations: • Question is: how do we minimize additional demands on land and water resources [and avoid damage to natural systems] in responding to the imperatives of agric. production? ii) What/where is the problem? - Given that land is a private asset, why should farmers then fail to control degradation of soil? Is it that they don’t know [information] or they don’t care/mind [incentives]?

20. 8. Towards an Agricultural-Environmental Realignment[Mitigation] • Activities that constrain adverse effects of agriculture. • Conversion of ruminants into animal protein = second harvest effects [milk, fish and beef] -industries built on roughage --- wheat and rice straw, corn stalks, and grass from roadside. Egs. - India’s milk industry - China’s Beef Belt and aquacultural sector

21. 8. Towards an Agricultural-Environmental RealignmentMitigation 1. Activities that constrain adverse effects of agriculture cont. b) Multiple cropping—more than one crop on a field per year. - already declining [Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and China] c) Raise water productivity -build small water-harvesting ponds to capture rainfall runoff and help recharge underground aquifers [Africa]. d) Sustainable agriculture and contain post-harvest loss [contrast Brazil and Machakos] - Africa: due to storage infrastructure. -On new frontiers? Crisis posed by Brazil [Amazon and cerrado] - Organic farming?

22. 8. Towards an Agricultural-Environmental RealignmentMitigation 2) Active use of agriculture to improve the environment • market incentives: Egs. Starbucks, Conservation International and coffee farmers. b) State policies [on both agriculture and environment] i) Intervention in market [question is how to intervene—Starbuck and CI model, or …?] 1) remove subsidies on inputs, while taxing those injuring environment for Green tax? If policies subsidize farm inputs –equipment, fertilizers, or pesticides; - leads to inefficient and unsustainable use of fertilizers.

23. 8. Towards an Agricultural-Environmental RealignmentMitigation i) Intervention in market cont. Egs. - Europe: Denmark and Sweden on chemical reduction targets; input taxes to provide incentives to use fewer agricultural chemicals; • Developing countries: tricky; - To farmers: subsidies = necessities. Maize farmer Francis Kimosop Kimetto complains about the costs of inputs: “ “If fertiliser remains this expensive, farmers will revert to the traditional cow dung, which will reduce the yield,” (and) “We want a minister who will solve our problems,” says Francis Rono, a wheat farmer in Kitale in the North Rift Valley.”

24. Intervention in market cont. 2) On guaranteed prices for outputs - combined with 1 above, increase profitability of agriculture, thus motivating inefficient practices like opening up inappropriate land for cultivation. - liberalize market? c) Make conservation a paying venture? [pay farmers for producing public goods] - subsidize soil erosion control measures [incentives]. Egs. -1985 U.S. Conservation Reserve Program - Agroforestry in Africa? - With respect to conversion of forests and grasslands into farming -erosion: - Forest farms as CPR - management]

25. Conclusion. • Food production imperatives can impact on environment. • Hence, failure to have agricultural regime that guarantees affordable food will imply a declaration of war on the earth’s ecosystem [people eking for a living; speculators]. • However, answer to the agricultural-environmental conundrum lay outside the two sectors. - largely a question of how information interacts with incentives.