can sustainable intensification feed the world? stanford university, feb 10th 2015

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Sir Gordon Conway Professor of International

Development Agriculture for Impact

Imperial College

Can Sustainable Intensifica0on Feed the World?

Stanford University Palo Alto, California

Feb 10, 2015

The Global Crises

Financial

Food security

Water

Civil Strife

Climate Change

Energy Supply

Ecosystem Functions

‘A Perfect Storm’

The Global Crises

Imperial College, London

Increasing food prices and recurring food price spikes

About 1 billion people

(1 in 6 of the world’s population) are chronically hungry

We have to increase food production by

60-100% by 2050

We Face 3 Interconnected Challenges


IMF Food Prices

75

100

125

150

175

200

225

250

275

2005 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 Feb.13

Source: IMF, Primary Commodity Price System.1A weighted average of wheat, corn, rice, and barley. 2A weighted average of beef, lamb, pork, and poultry.

Figure 1.SF.8. IMF Food Price Indices(2005 = 100)

Food

Cereal1

Meat2


Child Malnourishment

They are under height for their age and suffer from stunted development and possible blindness and death


Demand

•  Popula0on Growth

•  Changing Diets

•  Biofuel Demand

Supply •  Rising fuel and fer0liser prices

•  Climate change

•  Land and water scarcity

Feeding the World by 2050


Popula0on Growth to 2050

World Africa

Source: UN Popula=on Division, 2012

Roughly half of the extra people will be in Sub-‐Saharan Africa

Popula0on Growth to 2050


Meat consump0on rises with per capita income

Source: FAO, 2009

World Bank, 2010. World Development Indicators

Rise in meat consump0on


Faux meats

SOPHIESKITCHEN.NET

Seriouseats.com

Faux meats


We have to Intensify


A single mother farming a hillside in western Kenya

Mrs Namarunda


Survival line

Months

Pote

ntia

l har

vest

(ton

s/ha

)

1

2

3

2 3 1 4

Weeds Pests

Drought

An Insecure Farm


Survival line

Months

Poten0

al harvest (ton

s/ha

)

1

2

3

2 3 1 4

Weeds Pests & diseases

Drought Soil Fer=lity

>2 t/ha

Resilient Crops

A Secure Farm


We have to intensify

¡  There is not much more new arable land available and water is scarce

More produc0on on same or less land with same or less water

—-1—0—+1

1. acute and chronic crises

15

Yet these seem to be overestimates. The results have been trenchantly criticized by Anthony Young, who has a long and extensive experience of soil and land sur-veys.58 He believes the estimates suffer from the following fl aws:

• Overestimation of cultivable land (not accounting for features such as hills and rock outcrops when the maps are reduced in scale).

• Underestimation of presently cultivated land (illegal land occupation; e.g., forest incursions, not recorded).

• Failure to take suffi cient account of land required for purposes other than cultivation (underestimates of human settlements and industrial use).

A more recent FAO analysis in 2000 accepts these criticisms as possibly valid and acknowledges that much of the cultivable but uncultivated land is under rainforest or needed for purposes such as grazing land and ecosystem ser vices.59 Probably the most telling data is the area harvested over time. Total global cropland has increased by only 10 percent over the past fi fty years, while population has grown by 110 percent.60 Given the pressures to increase food production, we would expect to see much greater land expansion if it were readily available. The only exceptions are for oil crops (Figure 1.7).Soybeans and oil palms have each increased by over 300 percent in area and by over 700 percent and over 1,400 percent, respectively, in pro-duction over the past fi fty years. Presumably this is a result of clearing the Cerrado in Brazil and rainforests in the Amazon, Africa, and Southeast Asia. Permanent meadows and pastures (the land used to grow herbaceous forage crops) have also increased somewhat, by nearly 9 percent in area from 1961 to 2008.61

0

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Mill

ion h

ecta

res

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1950 1960 1970 1980 1990Year

2000 2010 2020

Cereals

Roots and Tubers

Pulses

Sugar Crops

Oil Crops

Figure 1.7 Trends in harvested area for selected food crops, million hectares.62

552-50326_ch01_1P.indd 15552-50326_ch01_1P.indd 15 5/23/12 3:09 AM5/23/12 3:09 AM

Uncorrected page proof © Cornell University Press

We have to intensify


But it has to be sustainable

•  With efficient and prudent use of inputs •  Pes0cides, herbicides, fer0lisers

•  Minimising emissions of Greenhouse Gases •  Methane, nitrous oxide, CO2

•  While increasing natural capital and environmental services •  Soil moisture, natural enemies of pests

•  Strengthening Resilience •  Reducing environmental impact


hQp://www.willingtoncropservices.co.uk/ Phosphorus Deficiency

Harper Adams University

Precision Farming


Precision Farming Microdosing in Niger


Targeted Fer0liser Ethiopia


Mul0ple Approaches

•  Ecology

•  Gene0cs

•  Socio-‐economics

•  plus Integrated Imperial College, London

•  Use ecological principles to design agricultural prac0ces

•  e.g. – Agroforestry –  Integrated Pest

Management – Organic farming

Sustainable Ecological Intensifica0on


hQp://www.taa.org.uk/assets/pubs/Tony%20Reynolds%20v2%20Landwards%20Paper.pdf

Benefits •  8.75 to 10 ton/ha wheat •  Crop establishment cost £245-‐ £36/ ha

•  Fuel use 96 to 43 l/ha •  No wind erosion •  No moisture stress •  Elimina0on of black grass

Conserva0on Agriculture, UK


Conserva0on Farming Zambia


Javanese Home Garden Indonesia


Agroforestry

Imperial College, London Faidherbia

The New Rices for Africa (NERICAs)

Sustainable Gene0c Intensifica0on

Developing plants with a combina0on of traits promo0ng sustainable produc0on


Golden Rice

Orange-‐Fleshed Sweet Potato

Golden Bananas

Sustainable Gene0c Intensifica0on


•  $500 million losses a year in Uganda

•  Academia Sinica provided sweet potato gene

•  Successfully transferred to bananas

•  In Ugandan field trials

•  En0rely government funded

Bananas Resistant to Wilt Uganda


Sustainably Intensifying the links between farmers

Farmer Associa0ons Coopera0ves Cereal Banks Contract Farms Outgrowers

Sustainable Socio-‐Economic Intensifica0on


Sustainably Intensifying the links between farmers and markets

Kenya Sussex

Sustainable Socio-‐economic Intensifica0on

Tanzania Imperial College, London

Input Markets Input Markets


Ethiopian Commodity Exchange


URBAN LIVELIHOODS

RURAL DEVELOPMENT

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT

NATIONAL MARKETS

ASSUMED RISK NUTRITION

WASTE

ADDED VALUE

RURAL LIVELIHOODS

REGIONAL MARKETS

INTERNATIONAL MARKETS

FOOD PRODUCTION

VALU

E CH

AINS

LAND TENURE

BUILD RESILIENCE


Waste Developing Countries


Africa’s Soils are Degrading Rapidly

For SSA land degrada0on hotspots affect 26% of the land area The economic loss is about $68 billion a year affec0ng 180 million people Imperial College,

London

Integrated Soil Management

The Solu0on lies in combining the best of organic and conven0onal approaches in a way that is appropriately sustainable


Combining Conserva0on Agriculture with Microdosing

Microdosing

Conserva0on Agriculture


Emissions con0nue to rise over next century, leading to about 40C above preindustrial

IPPC, 2014. Summary for Policy Makers

If Greenhouse Gas Emissions remain High


Emission Pathways


More than 5% reduc0on in length of growing period

Average Annual Max Temp > 300C

Source: Ericksen et al Mapping hotspots of climate change and food insecurity in the global tropics

The Climate is Changing – Africa The Climate is Changing In Africa


The Climate is Changing -‐ UK

Varia0on in farm income induced by climate change under high emissions

And in the UK


Winter of 2010/11 But Weather Extremes


Extreme Events Russia •  Severe heatwave in 2010 •  Doubled Moscow’s death rate

•  30% of grain crops lost to burning •  $15bn total loss Pakistan •  Worst floods in 80 years •  Killed over 1600 people •  Submerged 1/5th of the country, including 14% of Pakistan’s

cul0vated land

Weather Extremes 10/11


Risk and The Dynamics of Resilience The Dynamics of Resilience


Farmer Innova0on in the Sunderbans India

How do we build Resilient Livelihoods?


28/08/2012 09:06Saving Lives In Africa With The Humble Sweet Potato : The Salt : NPR

Page 1 of 4http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2012/08/15/158783117/saving-lives-in-africa-with-the-humble-sweet-potato

Saving Lives In Africa With The Humble Sweet Potato

03:32 pmAugust 15, 2012

by DAN CHARLES

A regular old orange-colored sweet potato might not seem too exciting to many of us.

But in parts of Africa, that sweet potato is very exciting to public health experts whosee it as a living vitamin A supplement. A campaign to promote orange varieties ofsweet potatoes in Mozambique and Uganda (instead of the white or yellow ones thatare more commonly grown there) now seems to be succeeding. (Check out this coolinfographic on the campaign.) It's a sign that a new approach to improving nutritionamong the world's poor might actually work.

That approach is called biofortification: adding crucial nutrients to food biologically,by breeding better varieties of crops that poor people already eat.

Howarth Bouis is one of the people who came up with this idea, and he's beenpromoting it for the past two decades. He's an economist at the International Food

The Salt

Dan Charles/NPRSweet potato evangelist Maria Isabel Andrade from the International Potato Center drivesaround Mozambique in her orange Toyota Land Cruiser.


It is about People

Poli0cal Leadership


Summary

leading cocoa producer. The country had one of the best education systems in Africa and, well before independence in 1957, was largely self-governing. The promise vanished as the economy declined, and then all but collapsed in the 1970s amid turbulent politics. Annual cocoa production, once at more than 500,000 tonnes, was down to less than 170,000 tonnes by 1983.

At that point, however, the country’s fortunes turned around, in the overall economy in general and in the agriculture sector in particular. Over the past 25 years,

world in terms of agricultural growth. Cocoa has recovered, surpassing its previous production levels. Staple food output has risen much faster than the population has grown: by 2005/07, production per person was more than 80% higher than it was in 1981/83. And growth in higher-value vegetables and fruit for domestic and export markets has been encouraging.

Overall sustained economic and agricultural growth has

has created a vibrant market for local farmers, and higher incomes have reduced poverty and greatly improved the demand side of food security.

The share of the population living in poverty fell from 52% in 1991/92 to 28.5% in 2004/06, with rural poverty falling from 64% to 40% over the same period. Child malnutrition

should soon become the first country in Africa to achieve

of halving its poverty and hunger.

primarily because of the country’s economic reforms, which began in 1983. The government’s determination

and sustained effort, combined with consistent support from the donor community, have been remarkable and have ensured that the reforms have been deep and sustainable. Better technology for cassava and other food crops has helped as well.

What has been achieved?

After 1983, agriculture grew at an average annual rate of 5.1% (Figure 1), one of the five fastest growth rates anywhere in the world. The sector grew on most fronts. The most striking trajectory, especially since 2000, has been in cocoa, where production now exceeds levels seen before the 1970s recession. Staple crop production has also increased – cassava, yam, cocoyam and sweet potato in particular. With rising yields and a more than doubled harvested area since 1983, cassava production has grown by over 7.2% a year during the past 25 years.

Although involving fewer farmers, non-traditional exports have also taken off, with pineapple the most prominent of these. Higher-value produce for the domestic market has risen rapidly as well: tomatoes are a prime example. Expansion of cultivated area has been important too, although productivity per hectare has increased more quickly than the size of land under cultivation.

Figure 1: Gross agricultural production since 19621

“Ghana will achieve

MDG 1 before 2015”

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1 FAOSTAT dataset: http://faostat.fao.org/.

Ghana


Poverty, most of it rural, has declined commensurately. Farm incomes, albeit lower than the national average, have been rising, especially in the 2000s (Figure 2a). Cocoa farmers exemplify the link between agricultural growth and poverty reduction: poverty among cocoa farmers has fallen faster than both the national and the rural rates (Figure 2b).

Figure 2: Agricultural incomes and impact on poverty2

Figure 2a: Annual income of rural households

Figure 2b: Poverty incidence among cocoa farmers

Food supply has grown faster than the population has,

At the same time, the real price of food has fallen. More accessible food meant that undernourishment went down to 8% by 2003, from 34% in 1991 (Figure 3). Child malnutrition has also declined, with the proportion of infants underweight falling from 30% in 1988 to 17% in 2008.

Figure 3: Improved food security3

What has driven change?

A better investment climate: economic reforms and infrastructure

The single most important driver of change has been the economic reforms undertaken since 1983, implemented by a government determined to break with the past and supported by donors.

Agriculture was hard hit by the economic distortions of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Cocoa producers in particular were implicitly taxed more than 80% by a combination of an overvalued cedi and an inefficient state marketing system.

Development Progress stories

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Rural National

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Cocoa producers

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1991/92 1998/99 2005/2006

USD

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Agriculture Rural

34

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30.3

24.9

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Undernourishment (FAOSTAT) (left axis) Under-5 underweight (DHS) (left axis)

Food supply (FAOSTAT) (right axis)

%

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Country Economic Memorandum. Washington, DC: World Bank.3 FAOSTAT dataset: http://faostat.fao.org/ (food supply and undernourishment); Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) (underweight). FAOSTAT dataset: http://faostat.fao.org/.

Ghana


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Twitter:@Ag4Impact Facebook: One Billion Hungry

can sustainable intensification feed the world? stanford university, feb 10th 2015

Science

death imperial college

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faux meats imperial

global crises imperial

insecure farm imperial

london popula0on growth

london imf food prices

london faux meats