agricultural futures in the humid tropics: a multi-scale approach
TRANSCRIPT
Agricultural futures in the humid tropics: A multi-scale approach
International Conference on Integrated Systems – Systems Research for Sustainable Intensification in Smallholder Agriculture
IITA Headquarters in Ibadan, Nigeria, 3-6 March 2015
Randall Ritzema (on behalf of Tim Robinson)
Contributors
• Timothy Robinson (ILRI)• Nils Teufel (ILRI)• Ingrid Öborn (ICRAF)• Mark van Wijk (ILRI)• Randall Ritzema (ILRI)• Robin Bourgeois (GFAR)• Keith Wiebe (IFPRI)• Mark Lundy (CIAT)• Cees Leeuwis (WUR)• Iddo Dror (ILRI)
Overview
• The global agricultural sector• Three ways to consider the
future• Projections • Systems analysis• Community foresight
• Proposed project• Some challenges
The global agricultural sector
Health and
nutrition
Equity and growth
Climate and natural
resource use
Agriculturalproduction
The global agricultural sector
Population
growth
Policie
s a
nd
in
sti
tuti
on
al
ch
an
ge
Economic
growth
Urb
anis
atio
n
Trade &
marke
ting
Changing diets
Globalisatio
n Climate
change
Feed prices
Energy prices
Transport
Agriculturalproduction Health
and nutrition
Equity and growth
Climate and natural
resource use
World population projection (UN 2012)
Source: Gerland et al. 2014Year
Tota
l pop
ulati
on (b
illio
ns)
7 Billion
9.5 Billion
11 Billion
Urbanisation
Projections
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
2020
2030
2040
2050
-
10,000
20,000
30,000
40,000
50,000
60,000
70,000
80,000
90,000
Urban
Rural
Hu
ma
n p
op
ula
tio
n in
th
ou
sa
nd
s
Population growth and urbanisation in Kenya
A Multi-Scale Issue
• These global/regional drivers influence the constraints and opportunities at the farm household level, both now and in the future
• Drivers across scales produce complex effects• A multi-scale and multi-disciplinary, and multi-
perspective approach is needed to address the complexity, and to move understanding toward action.
• Proposed Humidtropics project
Project aims
•Focus on two contrasting action sites in the humid tropics
•Assess potential futures in these sites from 3 perspectives
•Work with R4D platforms to propose interventions to steer those communities and systems along a plausible and sustainable development pathways
Contemplating the future: 3 perspectives
•Projections- exploring the ‘context of change’• Global/regional drivers• Based on standard future ‘scenarios’• Typically 20-80 years into the future• e.g. IMPACT, GLOBIUM, FAO projections
• Systems analysis- using household survey data to explore the impact of different scenarios on livelihoods• e.g. IMPACT-lite surveys• Typically to 10-15 years into the future
•Community foresight- discussing with communities what aspirations, expectations, and concerns they have of the future• Typically to 5-10 years into the future• e.g. GFAR approach
Projections
•Based on different pathways of economic development
•Changing climates• surface temperatures• rainfall•extreme weather events
•Changing demographics•population•urbanisation•migration
•Provides long-term context
Emissions Scenarios
RCP2.6: Mitigation scenario leading to a very low forcing level
CO2 reaches 421 ppm by 2100
RCP4.5: Stabilization scenario (forcing stabilized by 2100)
CO2 reaches 538 ppm by 2100
RCP6: Stabilization scenario (forcing does not stabilize by 2100)
CO2 reaches 670 ppm by 2100
RCP8.5: Very high GHG emissions scenario
CO2 reaches 936 ppm by 2100
Will growing periods be suitable in 30 years for certain crops?
Projections
•East Africa Strategic Futures - Food Security, the Environment and Livelihoods
•Exploring the future(s) of South East Asia: Four scenarios for agriculture and food security, livelihoods and environments
Regional, as well as global, projections to inform local
conditions:
Systems analysis
• Various model types- incorporating time• Trade-off Analysis• Optimisation• Systems Dynamics
• Some key contributions of systems analysis:• Clearer understanding of the ‘solution
space’ for action site populations• What are estimates of best-bet options?• What’s plausible?
• Enables linkages and comparisons between scales, sites, and systems• Parameterization based on
global/regional drivers
Systems analysis
• Quantitative, allows for• consideration of magnitudes, relevance and
priorities• specified goals and objectives
• Ex-ante scenarios provide• testing of change mechanisms and
magnitude• sensitivity analysis of context constraints• comparison of effects on households and
household types• longer-term perspective through dynamic
formulation
• Based on primary household data• enables understanding of variation within
action site population
e.g. will land availability constrain agricultural
production in 20 years?
Types of output
•Illustrates diversity between households• possible development pathways of
population groups• targeting of interventions
• Assesses interventions• estimating household effects
(over a number of years)• determining sensitivity to context
(considering general development trends)
• prioritising interventions (in view of changing contexts)
Source: Herrero et al. (2014)
Projections of land size and labour price for three case studies (2005-2025)
Land
size
(ha)
Labo
ur p
rice
(€ p
er h
a)
Year
Sources: Van Wijk et al. (in prep); Ritzema et al. (in prep); Frelat et al. (in prep)
Tanzania: Food Security ratio
Types of output
For whole farm populations, how these potential changes together with potential interventions can lead to changes in the importance of different on and off farm activities
Crop Boost
Livestock Boost
Off-farm Boost
Chan
ge in
Foo
d Se
curit
y Ra
tioFood Security Ratio categories
Community foresight
Explore people’s short-term (5-10 years) aspirations and concerns – community visioning
What constraints are affecting the achievement of desirable outcomes?
Which are the opportunities to build on?What actions does the community need to take
to reach aspirations? What are the externally-driven changes that
the community need to adapt to (e.g. climate change)?
How can the interventions address the aspirations, constraints and opportunities?
Visioning and scenario development with the R4D platforms
• Start from the global and regional scenarios and major change factors
• Scenario development workshop for the action site (2030 and 2050)
• Use systems analysis results to enhance projections of the effects of innovations, including the identified and implemented interventions
• ‘Half-way’ feed-back to the R4D platform, continue analysis, ‘final’ feed back to R4D platform
• Organize a larger action site stakeholder workshop including policy makers, different public and private sectors, etc.
Some challenges
How will the three approaches come together…
• Projections will set the broad scene: How are markets changing? How are growing conditions changing? etc.
• Systems analysis will set the boundaries for change and model plausible futures
• Community foresight will explore the hopes, concerns and expectations of the communities themselves
… to be maximally effectively in informing the R4D platform, to produce (through facilitated discussions) a set of recommendations that will lead to desirable outcomes, within the bounds of plausibility, in the context of broader, on-going drivers and changes