http://riel.cdu.edu.au

The converging insecurities of food, water, energy and climate, and opportunities for deeper collaboration between UNDANA and CDU

ANDREW CAMPBELLUNDANA Kupang 26 May 2015

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• Food, water, land and energy are intricately interconnected

• Long-term security concerns, amplified by climate change, affect all

• These ‘converging insecurities’ interact and compound each other

• The world needs to improve food production, distribution & consumption, but not by enlarging the agricultural footprint

• Farming systems will be key determinants of human quality of life

• Farming systems must be nested within much better integrated approaches to food, water, energy and nature than ever before

• This poses major challenges for policy, research, extension, education and human resources in agriculture, fisheries, forestry & conservation

Key Points

The climate is changing……

http://ipcc-wg2.gov/AR5/report/

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Global warming is here, and we are causing it

The Mary River, Northern Australiafloodplains affected by rising sea levels

Extensive melaleuca dieback as the system gets saltier18cm sea level rise over last 20 years

Sea level rise (8mm/year last 20 years) & saltwater intrusion

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• Each calorie takes one litre of water to produce, on average

• In terms of water resources, all the world’s major irrigated food producing basins are effectively ‘closed’ or already over-committed

Water availability per capita is declining

IWMI Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management In Agriculturehttp://www.iwmi.cgiar.org/assessment/

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• FAO assessed trends in land condition (measured by Net Primary Productivity) from 1981-2004

• Land degradation is increasing in severity and extent:− >20 percent of all cultivated areas

>30 percent of forests>10 percent of grasslands

• 1.5 billion people depend directly on land that is degrading

• Land degradation is cumulative.

− Limited overlap between 24% of the land surface identified as degraded now and the 15% classified in 1991, because NPP has flatlined near zero in degraded areas

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Land & soil

http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2008/1000874/index.html

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The world needs more food

• The world needs to increase food production by up to 70% by 2050, & improve distribution — diet is the key driver

• We have done this in the past, mainly through clearing, cultivating and irrigating more land, + intensification and better varieties

• Climate change and oil depletion is narrowing those options, with limits to water, land, energy & nutrients. We need to grow food:– Using less land, water & energy and emitting less carbon– Using nutrients more efficiently– Improving nutrition, distribution, animal welfare– Looking after rural landscapes, biodiversity, amenity & communities

• We also need to look at demand-side solutions

Converging Insecurities

• Climate change• Direct impacts• Impacts of climate change policies – e.g. carbon markets

• Energy• the era of cheap, easily extracted fossil fuels is ending

• Water• Every calorie we consume uses one litre in its production• Every litre weighs one kilogram• Per capita freshwater availability declining steeply

• Food — increase world production up to 70% by 2050• Using less land, water, fossil energy and nutrients 12

Climate change and biodiversity

• Natural biodiversity– Climate change amplifies existing pressures on nature– It increases threats and risks, underlining the need for

conservation of natural areas– Species basically have 3 options: move, adapt, or die

• Cultivated biodiversity- Genetic diversity within species becomes even more important as

climates are changing and becoming more difficult for agriculture-Farming systems need diversity among and within crops-Farming communities need diverse sources of income & livelihood

Profound technical challenges1. To decouple economic growth from carbon emissions

2. To adapt to an increasingly difficult climate

3. To increase water productivity— decoupling the 1 litre per calorie relationship

4. To increase energy productivity– more food energy out per unit of energy in– while shifting from fossil fuels to renewable energy

5. To develop more sustainable food systems– in competition for land and water with the resources & energy sectors– while conserving biodiversity and– improving landscape amenity, soil health, animal welfare & human health

6. TO DO ALL OF THE ABOVE SIMULTANEOUSLY!— improving sustainability and resilience

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• Complementary concepts• Sustainability remains relevant and desirable

− Living within our means− Thinking long term (inter-generational equity)− Distinguishing between depletable and renewable resources− Avoiding or limiting actions that degrade, pollute, over-use or

compromise ecosystem function

• BUT: Sustainability is less instructive around:− Social and cultural dimensions

− Operating in contexts with inherent variability

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Sustainability and Resilience

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• The capacity of a system to absorb shocks, reorganise and retain the same functions− As resilience declines, it takes a smaller shock to push a

system across a threshold

• Adds value in explicitly embracing change and variability

• Introduces the useful concept of thresholds or tipping points

• Explicitly embraces scale − Resilience at a given scale

requires an understanding of at least one scale up & one scale down

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Resilience

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Factors affecting resilience*

• Diversity: biological, economic (e.g. energy sources), social

• Modularity (connectedness, engagement)

• Tightness of feedbacks• Openness – immigration, inflows, outflows• Reserves and other reservoirs (e.g. seedbanks,

nutrient pools, soil moisture, memory, knowledge, young people)

• Overlapping institutions

• Polycentric governance & leadership

• Useful diagnostics for farming systems analysis?

17 * Source: Brian Walker http://www.australia21.org.au/buildingAustraliasResilience-papers.htm

Building resilience

9.9.14| Slide 18

Multidisciplinary environmental research institute focused on conservation & sustainability in north Australia & south-east AsiaPeople• 50 academics, 6 admin staff, 14 technical/field staff • 75 Postgraduate students, mostly PhDs: 40% internationalPerformance• Research grant income of around $10 million per year• Around 200 publications/year, mostly refereed journal articles• Ranked 4th in Australia for research impact in environment and ecology by

Thompson Reuters (measured by citations/publication over 11 years 2000-2010)

Research Institute for the Environment and Livelihoods (RIEL)

RIEL Research Themes & Groups

• Natural resources-based Livelihoods

• Coastal and marine ecology and management

• Freshwater ecology and management

• Savanna management and wildlife conservation

• Research Groups & Centres:• Centre for Renewable Energy

• Darwin Centre for Bushfire Research

• Environmental Chemistry and Microbiology Unit

• North Australian Biodiversity NERP Hub

• North Australian Marine Research Alliance

RIEL International Research & Training

• We welcome international partnerships in areas of research interest

• Including postgraduate research training at CDU• We have a long track record of research in this region• We have excellent teaching & research links with UNDANA, now

we can build on them with more research together, joint supervision and exchanges of staff and students

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CDU research & teaching in eastern Indonesia

with UNDANA & others

• Catchment management, water security• Increased irrigated rice productivity• Regional planning and governance

Blue Carbon

• RIEL is currently developing a significant research program called Rehabilitating Blue Carbon Habitats

• Initial focus is disused tambak shrimp farms in East Kalimantan and North Sulawesi

• Ecological mangrove reforestation in partnership with Mangrove Action Project (MAP) Indonesia & Japesda– Plus Ministries of Forests and Marine Affairs & Fisheries– Plus Wageningen University, CIFOR, UNHAS and NUS

• Developing integrated project with three benefit streams: carbon, livelihoods and biodiversity

• Looking for research and funding partners!

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Food Security in Timor Leste

• Food security is obviously a very high priority for TL– ~40% of people malnourished (WFP VAM 2005)

– many people hungry for some months each year

– food production varies widely with seasonal conditions, but rarely exceeds consumption, so imports are crucial

– many key elements of a productive and sustainable system are not yet in place — economic scarcity

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Food Security in Timor Leste

• Longer term progress will depend on:– Agricultural education and extension to develop a skilled workforce

(professionals and practitioners [farmers & food processors])

– Investment in the regions: roads, water, energy, cool chain

– Agricultural and environmental research to develop & refine locally useful knowledge and to develop new solutions

– Landcare model with farmer field schools very prospective

– Catchment management to identify and look after the most valuable soils and to protect water resources — especially aquifers

– Water management to improve water productivity and protect water quality (surface water and groundwater)

– Renewable energy to become independent from imported oil

– Good governance for agriculture, fisheries and forestry to build a sound framework that meets social goals

“How society shares power, benefit and risk”• Vertical and horizontal distribution of benefits, costs and risks, in space and time

• Need to honour the past and respect local values, without being tied by them

• Lowest common denominator consensus rarely makes big advances

• Local institutions are essential, but not sufficient

• As everything becomes more interconnected, better governance becomes more vital, and more difficult

Governance

Campbell: Mekong Water Forum| March 2011 | Slide 26

“In order to discover new lands, one must be prepared to lose

sight of the shore for a very long time”*

• Leadership at all levels• Networks and communities of practice across sectors,

scales, disciplines, basins, nations• New technologies, to share information, at all levels• Building social capital that dilutes rigid divisions• Hard-wiring involvement of schools, civic society (clubs etc)

• Good governance is a great investment

Ideas for distributed governance

* André Gide 1925 Les Faux Monnaieurs

Campbell: Mekong Water Forum| March 2011 | Slide 27

• Contested, crowded, contextual

• Stakes high, decisions urgent, facts uncertain or disputed

• Science thrives on a contest of ideas• This can be problematic in public debate (e.g. climate change)

• Public officials are just one of many sources of advice

• Ministers/governments prefer wins, credit, initiatives• over problems, conflict, confusion• they don’t have time to read much, and their perspective is short-term

• Durable relationships are critical• based on mutual respect and trust

The Science-Policy Interface

Three lenses of knowledge & evidence

PoliticalJudgement: diffuse, fluid and

adversarial

ScientificResearch:

systematic approaches, quantitative and

qualitative.experimental and action-

oriented

ProfessionalPractices:organisational

knowledge,implementation,

practical experience

Policyproblem

Inform and influence policy

response

Source: Brian Head AJPA 2008, 67(1) 1:11

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• Policy issues are suited to applied research

• Key questions revolve around “What should we do?”• What policy settings or interventions will have what

impact?

• Who will be affected? How? How much? When? and Where?

• How good does the knowledge need to be?

• GOOD ENOUGH (process as important as content)

The nature of policy questions

Scales for response to climate change

• Many of the main drivers of biodiversity loss operate at the landscape-scale e.g. habitat fragmentation, invasive species and changed fire regimes.

• It is the scale which lends itsel

CSIRO 2010

A south-east Asian Supergrid?

Sunlight in Australia

Supply all of Australia’s and the world’s electricity

A Snowy Scheme for the 21st Century?

Lake Argyle

Pumped hydro

Tumut 3 1500 MW

CDU (RIEL) & UNDANA opportunities

• Obvious potential to grow our teaching links and student and staff exchanges

• And for PhD students, joint publications and networking

• Very exciting possibilities to plan long-term joint research programs incorporating postgraduate training– E.g. watershed and irrigation systems management– Forest conservation and agroforestry options– Food security in a changing climate– Fire management and disaster resilience– Remote sensing, GIS and SMS tools for catchment planning– Sustainable livelihoods, governance, policy and institutions– New Energy options

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“The future is not some place we are going to, but one we are creating.

The paths to it are made, not found.”

• This is the greatest challenge of our age

• Climate, biodiversity, water, energy, food, biodiversity and health are interconnected

• We must deal with them holistically, as parts of the same problem

• Eastern Indonesia and Northern Australia have shared interests, and UNDANA and CDU have much to gain from working together

• Now is the time to show leadership at all levels

LET’S TAKE THE OPPORTUNITY

the future is in our hands

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Including:

Paddock to Plate

Managing Australian Soils

Managing Australian Landscapes in a Changing Climate

Powerful Choices

The Getting of Knowledge

Designing environmental research for impact

www.riel.cdu.edu.au

Twitter: @AndrewCampbell2

For more information