I am co-author of a new paper – What next for agriculture after Durban? – published in the journal Science. Here are some thoughts from the article and the conference itself.

The 17th conference of the parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) ended two days late on 11 December 2011. The extra time was used by governments to agree the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action (PDF).

The ’Durban Platform’ is simply an agreement to reach a new agreement by 2015 that would reduce emissions and put the world on track to limit global warming by two degrees and come into effect in 2020.

While this is welcome, as was progress in the Green Climate Fund (see footnote 1) and REDD+ initiative to reduce deforestation, much remains to be done to agree who cuts by how much and when, and then for 190-plus countries to agree this including the two largest global emitters – the United States and China.

Unfortunately, decisions on the specifics for agriculture and global food security did not live up to expectations.

Why was progress on agriculture and food security limited?

An agreement was reached on agriculture (see footnote 2) but this used vague, non-committal terms like ’exchange of views‘, ’to consider‘, ’with a view to‘, and ’to look at‘. This means that while agriculture is on the UNFCCC agenda there is no commitment to do anything about it.

Why wasn’t there more progress on agriculture and food security? It wasn’t because there hadn’t been a focus on agriculture and climate change in 2011. There had in fact been numerous meetings and reports. For example the Commission on Sustainable Agriculture and Climate Change, chaired by Professor Sir John Beddington, released a summary of its findings calling for urgent action. African agriculture ministers also issued a unified call for action (PDF) ahead of Durban. Scientists called for action at Wageningen conference on Climate-Smart Agriculture. UN agencies sent a common letter to UNFCCC asking the inclusion of agriculture.

In Durban, Kofi Anan (former UN Secretary-General), Mary Robertson (former President of Ireland), Jacob Zuma (President of South Africa), Meles Zenawi (Prime Minister of Ethiopia) and many other senior figures called for action on agriculture. Caroline Spelman, the Defra Secretary of State highlighted the importance of ‘climate smart agriculture‘ for all countries, including the UK, and again called for a work program on agriculture. (Robin Sanders also wrote about the need for climate smart agriculture in Africa on this blog.)

There’s a way – where’s the will?

Five hundred and ninety people attended the third Agriculture and Rural Development Day on 3 December. This looked at how to scale up successful examples of climate smart agriculture that:

• Delivers sufficient food, fibre, fuel and incomes
• Sustains the health of the land and increases productivity
• Does not degrade forests or biodiversity
• Sequesters carbon
• Reduces net agriculture and food greenhouse-gas emissions

So in Durban there was political support, compelling evidence on the need for action, and successful examples of investment in agriculture achieving multiple wins.

But progress was slow due to the political economy of UNFCCC negotiations. This is complex but in brief there are five issues:

• For some countries agriculture is more important in their economies than others, and it becomes a bargaining chip in the negotiations for those where it is less important or those that want a concession in another area
• Others are concerned that including agriculture may lead to trade barriers to agriculture exports, and/or trading in agriculture carbon which will only benefit rich farmers and not the millions of smallholder farmer
• Agriculture is seen as  too complex with limited awareness of  existing solutions that can be scaled up under UNFCCC  to achieve adaptation, mitigation, livelihood and economic benefits
• Forestry stakeholders worry that funding for forestry may be diverted to agriculture
• A bureaucratic hurdle – agriculture cuts across the two negotiating streams, one on adaptation and the other on mitigation, but it doesn’t work as it needs to do both causing.

I also believe there is sixth issue closer to home.

This is our failure as scientists that, while we have compelling evidence for urgent action on agriculture to achieve global food security, we need to do better at communicate this evidence to policy makers and the public.

We need a better understanding of the political economy surrounding policy decisions at the global, regional and national levels, and to do better at translating and communicating our research to influence policy.

If we don’t then many of the 1Bn people who will join us by 2025, 500M of them in Africa, will end up poor, hungry, and at greater risk from climate change.

Footnotes

1. Green Climate Fund – report of the Transitional Committee. FCCC/CP/2011/L.9. http://unfccc.int/2860.php
2. Paras 68 to 71 in Outcome of the work of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention to be presented to the Conference of the Parties for adoption at its seventeenth session. FCCC/AWGLCA/2011/L.4 – http://unfccc.int/2860.php

About David Howlett

At the time of writing, David Howlett was the Executive Director of Africa College and a visiting senior research fellow in climate change and agriculture at the University of Leeds. He has now returned to the UK Government’s Department for International Development (DFID) where he is working on climate change adaptation. At Leeds he worked with research scientists across different faculties and with African research partners to increase the impact of their research including using their results to produce evidence to inform agriculture and climate change policies.

It’s been more than two years now since the Global Food Security (GFS) website, and this blog, was launched.

This short post I hope will serve as a big ‘thank you’ to everyone involved, highlight some of the content we have published during this time, and most importantly flag some recent improvements, such as the new blog post ‘notification by email’ box to the right, and our Twitter feed: @FoodSecurityUK.

This website covers a broad range of views, opinions and information from across the GFS programme, its Strategic Plan, as well as from partners and wider, global agricultural and food security-related disciplines.

Resource central

We’re pleased that since December 2009 this blog has published exclusive and original articles every fortnight written by a broad and talented community of people with an interest or professional stake in the issues – my hearty thanks from a grateful editor. (I’ve highlighted the wide range of our blog posts below).

There are, of course, other blogs about food security besides this one. Can you help us by letting us know of any that we could link to?

We already have a Resource Centre on this site that has a Bibliography of links to international and UK organisations, reports, as well as magazine special issues and statistics databases. If you publish or encounter similar material, please do let us know.

We’re particularly interested in highlighting other blogs, so if you enjoy other food security and agriculture-related blogs, let us know at web@foodsecurity.ac.uk and we’ll add them to the list of more than 20 we already have. (And if you also manage a similar resource, don’t forget to add us too.)

Evolution, not revolution

A minor revamp of the homepage and new content streams are in the pipeline.

With a few modifications we’ll be able to better highlight some of the content we’re adding to the site. A good example is the videos that are tucked away in some of the features that go up in the Current Research section, which is the place to go for more in-depth features and is one of the most regularly updated parts of the site.

We’ve added a video archive so you can see videos on everything from new world-class laboratories for animal virus research to field work on pollinating insects to targeting the next virus to eradicate after the successful eradication of rinderpest. But the new front page will highlight our latest videos, as well as further highlight our newest blog posts.

Partnerships

As mentioned, the Current Research section is home to articles about ongoing food security-related research. In each case, the research is funded by one or more of the GFS partners.

Hence, this section highlights research funded by all partners, such as NERC supporting examination of the damage caused by fish farms; DFID have been involved with helping farmers in Africa use insurance to safeguard their food security; EPSRC have pioneered e-Science digital technologies for remote farming communities; and there is also the ESRC-sponsored Food Climate Research Network, which is a great resource for investigating all matters related to climate change and food security.

Blogtastic

GFS partners have also contributed to the blog and we’d love to hear from new bloggers, not only from among our partners, but from within the academic community, and far beyond to farmers, food specialists and consumers. And of course, if you’ve already written for the GFS blog then we’d love to hear from you again.

If you have an idea for a blog post please send ideas to arran.frood@bbsrc.ac.uk and I’ll be more than happy to assist you if you’re new to blog posts – just think of it as an article in which you can use your personal opinions and experience a little more. The best posts often weave the author’s personal expertise with thoughts and feelings on a given topic, and backed up by a killer statistic or two.

Many food security blogs repost all sorts of articles, from features to press releases and interviews. There’s nothing wrong with that, but we want to make this blog one of the go-to websites for original, incisive articles that have more editorial vigour than perhaps some would expect on a corporate or academic platform.

We’ve had great posts on subjects as diverse as the need for alternatives to nitrogen fertilisers, the prospects of enhancing photosynthesis, the aquaculture debate, the potential of organic food, and the effects of commodity trading on food prices.

We’ve run reportage-style posts too, such as on the food crisis in West Africa, the Durban Climate Change Conference, G20 meetings, working for BBC Countryfile on ‘megafarms’, and research collaboration in Brazil by John Lucas.

I’m sure there aren’t that many sites that carry posts with a such a diversity of views from advocating GM technology alongside promoting organic systems, followed by a post by GFS Champion Tim Benton that argue that there is much more to the conventional vs organic debate.

And do bear in mind that we love comments on our blog posts. Don’t be shy! Have your say and let’s make this blog a fine forum for mature debate.

About Arran Frood

Arran Frood manages content for the Global Food Security website and is commission editor this blog in his role as Web Content Writer for BBSRC. The External Relations Unit of BBSRC delivers communications and public engagement for the Global Food Security programme on behalf of all the programme partners.

Frood has been working in science media since 2000. Prior to joining BBSRC, he was a full-time freelance science journalist and editor and has written for a variety of specialist and popular websites, books and magazines, including New Scientist, Nature and BBC Online, as well as newspapers such as The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Independent.

From 2005-2007 he worked for the science journal Nature, first as Web Editor and then as Web Projects Editor; during the later position he created the History of the Journal Nature website.

Before working for Nature, he worked at the Science Photo Library which was his first science media job after graduating from Imperial College in 1996 with a BSc in Biology and in 1997 an MSc in Pest Management (applied entomology) from where his interest in all things agricultural stems.

Follow him on Twitter: @arranfrood

It is now more than one month since I arrived in Brazil to spend a period working in Embrapa (the Brazilian Government agricultural research organisation) as part of the Labex (Laboratorio no Exterior) programme. 

For more than 10 years Embrapa have been sending scientists abroad to work in labs and organisations that they regard as of scientific and strategic importance, and a UK Labex base was established at Rothamsted Research in 2010. 

My placement is a reciprocal arrangement, sponsored by BBSRC and Rothamsted, to reinforce the partnership and further explore opportunities for collaboration between UK and Brazilian scientists working in areas relevant to sustainable agriculture, biotechnology, bioenergy and food security. For me it´s an exciting development and timely as negotiations are well advanced to put in place joint funding arrangements for UK-Brazil projects. BBSRC and CNPq (the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development) have just announced their pump-prime partnering awards and a full funding initiative is expected early in 2012, and a BBSRC-FAPESP funding agreement, specific to Sao Paulo state, is already in place.

Research in action

My excitement at this opportunity is tempered by some realism about the size of the task. Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world; Embrapa has 47 centres distributed throughout, and then there are the numerous Federal and State universities and institutes engaged in biological research. Networking on this scale is a daunting thought, but there are already well-established links between UK and Brazilian research groups, and now an increased momentum to build on this.

I am based in Brasilia at Embrapa Genetic Resources and Biotechnology (Cenargen), a strategically good place to be, as it is central and close to Embrapa headquarters and several other sites. I have a research project working in conjunction with Patricia Messenberg and colleagues on host-pathogen interactions in Arachis (peanut) and related wild species. The disease in question is late leaf spot, caused by the fungus Cercosporidium personatum, a serious constraint on production of the crop in many countries. I am looking at the time course and extent of infection on cultivated peanut genotypes, as well as some wild relatives with resistance to the disease, together with transcriptome analysis to identify host genes expressed in response to infection.

It’s a new system for me, but relevant to my UK interests in diseases of wheat, as we are also using genetic and genomic approaches to study infection and host defense. It is good to be back in a lab coat again, although I have some catching up to do in terms of hands-on molecular biology. There is a healthy buzz around the place, with a large population of research students from the local University of Brasilia (UnB) and Catholic University. I already gave a seminar at UnB based on recent work in the pathogenomics group at Rothamsted and further talks, workshops and discussions are planned.

Last week Cenargen marked its 37th anniversary with a celebration and special award for two of its staff, Francisco Aragão and Josias Faria for their achievement in producing transgenic (GM) beans resistant to golden mosaic virus, a severe disease throughout the tropical region of the Americas, that impacts in particular on small-holder farmers. The GM beans, that utilize RNAi technology to control the virus, were cleared for field use in September. The refreshments included a stew made from the transgenic beans; I wondered how this might go down back home in my local branch of Waitrose?

Heading down to Rio

Two weeks ago I travelled south and east on a scoping trip to five other Embrapa centres. This was a whirlwind tour through Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina, and Rio do Janeiro. The centres visited covered wheat research, swine and poultry, grapes and other fruit, soils, and agrobiology; one being where much of the work on nitrogen fixation by rhizosphere bacteria was pioneered by Johanna Dobereiner and colleagues in the 50s and 60s.

Fortunately I was accompanied by Alexandre Amaral, the UK Labex representative who has the contacts, as well as the language skills, to smooth such an expedition.

What struck us most about these centres was not just the range of research being done, but also the high proportion of new, young researchers starting programmes, and the investment in infrastructure, new buildings, and kit. But seeing as agriculture now accounts for up to 30% of Brazil’s GDP it’s not surprisingly an area high on the government agenda.

Space does not permit me here to comment on my daily life in this fascinating country, although I did wonder about the attractions of working at Embrapa Soils, sited in the luxuriant Botanic Gardens in Rio, at the foot of the spectacular Corcovado, and close to the famous Copacabana and Ipanema beaches.

One is almost tempted to write a song about it.

About John Lucas

Professor John Lucas is Head of the Department of Plant Pathology and Microbiology at Rothamsted Research. He works on plant pathogenic fungi and infection processes on host plants. He is also interested in mechanisms of pathogen variation and evolution in response to changes in host populations and use of fungicides. He is currently working in Brazil as part of the Embrapa Labex programme with the UK, supported by BBSRC and Rothamsted.

Who should run the countryside? This was the banner of an event was hosted by Relu (the Rural Economy and Land Use programme) on Nov 16 this year in Gateshead, UK. It was a day-long opportunity for people from all walks of life to take part in activities coordinated by Relu researchers and debate major questions about the future of the UK countryside.

For one of the debates, I  argued that, although food security and maintaining a healthy environment are both important, food security – or more accurately the competitiveness of UK agriculture – is at this time more important in policy terms. This is not an either-or question, but I think we need to achieve a sustainable balance between food production and maintaining a healthy environment.

Levelling the land

Nationally, I question if we have lost track of the importance of the agricultural competitiveness of our rural environment in favour of environmental protection.

Policy steps in the 2000s reduced spending on competitive agriculture and made the environment a priority, directing resources there through the  two major environmental organisations  Environment Agency and Natural England. And the majority of Rural Development Programme for England funding, which aims to connect agricultural and economic development and promotes environmental stewardship and community sustainability, is also channeled into the environment

What’s more, of the three supposedly equal elements of profit, the environment and social outcomes emanating from the Policy Commission on the Future of Farming and Food (the Curry Commission) it was the environmental element that was predominantly picked up. I was a member of the Commission

We also have a plethora of environmental NGOs competing with each other for income, in part, I think, by painting a very black and sometimes inaccurate picture of efficient farming.

Moreover, we have a generation of students who have chosen careers in environmental studies, which is welcome as part of the wider life sciences, but we have seen, until recently, a decrease in interest in crop science and the applied skills to grow food and protect it against attack. (The recent increase in courses, especially at Master’s degree level, in food security-related areas, one of which has been described on this blog, is heartening.)

As a result, we have seen a significant reduction (PDF) in our self sufficiency of indigenous food production and, as illustrated in the Total Factors of Productivity that Defra have produced in the past, since the 1980s UK farming has become relatively less competitive than most of its major competitors in terms of  the national efficiency of  productivity factors compared to the majority of Western EU states and the US.

Finally, the present EU Commission proposals for CAP Reform from 2013 again illustrate how powerful the environmental lobby is across Europe; the existing Greening suggestion for Pillar 1 would involve 7% of subsidised EU land being taken out for environmental enhancement. Not only is this ill thought out, but it would potentially undo much of the good work completed or underway in the UK under our existing environmental schemes.

England my home

Why should we worry about food security? A succession of governments did not, arguing that we were a relatively wealthy nation and could afford to buy food in.

And by food security I am not referring to 100% self sufficiency, we are not even suggesting we should produce 100% of indigenous food (the current total in 2011 was 74% (PDF)). What we should be doing is providing a significantly higher percentage of food that we can produce reasonably competitively.

What has changed?  From 2007-2008 a combination of food shortages and resultant political turmoil, higher and more volatile food prices, a greater awareness of climate change, rising global population, dietary change and water scarcity has created political unease and a change in rhetoric. The media and consumers have also changed their perception because food, particularly the price of it, is now front page news.

The question remains to be answered – does it matter in economic terms if we put more resources into becoming more competitive, efficient and secure with our home produced food and energy? Well, yes it does.

Let us accept that we are thinking in terms of sustainable competitiveness as opposed to short term exhaustion of resources and that we do need to reduce our carbon footprint. More home production of food gives us greater control. More home production will reduce food price volatility, improve our trade balance, create employment opportunities and a more competitive industry will be less dependent on subsidies that may be cut in the future.

Finally, in most cases well managed land adjacent to well managed conservation is better for the environment than letting land revert to scrub or the prevalent dominant species.

Zeitgeist

So we need a policy that balances efficient sustainable food production with well managed intelligent environmental care. But we need to be quite clear what our objectives are.

As it goes, at the Gateshead event, the food security team that I was on not surprisingly lost the debate; the abstainers were in the majority which is illustrative of the present status quo!

But I still maintain that in production terms we need to become world leaders again, and fellow food producer Jim Godfrey has spelt out some ideas on how to do this on a previous blog post here.

We need common cause and understanding between farmers and conservationists, and in relation to the environment we should concentrate on healthy soils and beneficial insects, but above all the area that needs our attention at the moment is the commercial side of the balance.

About Mark Tinsley

Mark Tinsley is a farmer and produced arable crops, potatoes and vegetables on 600ha in South Lincolnshire. He is Chairman of the Commercial Farmers Group, a non-executive Director of NFU Mutual, Chairman of the potato cooperative Nene Potatoes Ltd., a member of Lincolnshire Local Enterprise Partnership Advisory Board and was a member of The Policy Commission on the Future of Farming and Food (the Curry Commission).

The recent Durban Climate Change Conference is a follow on from Cancun which did not move a lot of things forward on key environmental issues ranging from CO₂ emissions, carbon sequestration and credits), to land and water resource management.

The important fact that the conference is taking place on the African continent for the first time should not just boil down to its mere presence in Durban. But just like key sub-Saharan African economies are emerging, Africa’s emerging voice on climate change policy is vital to a number of future developmental areas, not least of which is food security – including all of its pillars from food production to improving the continent’s ability to feed itself and using renewables to spur better agricultural energy use.

However, do Africa’s agriculture, environment and energy ministers talk to each other? And why aren’t more agricultural ministers included in the climate change discussion and vice versa? This needs to happen, but it is not – at least not regularly or in a comprehensive manner.

Smart solutions

Most experts recognize that both food security and climate change are affecting the continent more than any other region of the world. The food security-climate change linkage for Africa hopefully will be heavily on the table in Durban as these symbiotic impact indicators need to be addressed together.

Food security specialists from development organizations and civil society organisations (CSOs) to policy makers need to build climate change solutions into their programmes. Africa climate change leaders and activists need not forget that the lack of progress on key environmental issues will continue to affect Africa’s progress to resolve its food security challenges.

What are some of links between food and energy production and innovative ways to address these links? There are a number of positives noted below, which need to be more broadly implemented with country-specific adaptation on top of the need to create more new solutions. Some of the smart linkages connecting the symbiotic relationship between food security and climate change include:

• Renewable energy options for water use, such as wind or solar-powered drip irrigation, including storage of power gained through battery innovative techniques like those being used by companies like AES in West Virginia
• Hybrid seeds that help crops withstand climate stresses such as drought, which can also lead to new usages for traditional crops such as protein-enhanced cassava (I have visited donor-supported agribusinesses in Kano, Nigeria, that adds cow peas to enhance protein in cassava flour)
• Localize agribusiness supply chains by using small farm holders or cooperative crops, reducing transport energy, and manufacturing costs
• Climate change-smart agricultural production, such as bio-char – the process of burning plant-based remnants and making charcoal that is then used as renewable fertilizer in places like Congo, and Benin’s Songhai Integrative Farms. The Congo project also obtains carbon credits on CO₂ emissions which also further helps overall energy challenges – not just in the country but over the long term for our global community.

These global impact indicators – food security and climate change – should be addressed together to assist the people of Africa to have a better enabling environment for overall development, a subject I’ve highlighted on this blog before.  

It’s critically important because people are angry: African women smallholder farmers from 10 countries calling themselves the ‘Rural Women Assembly‘ demonstrated in Durban on December 3, 2011, on just this point – linking the affects of climate change on their ability to feed their families.

What to do?

The UN General Assembly this year called for improvement in sustainable energy by making 2012 the International Year of Sustainable Energy, with the goal of providing access to modern forms of energy, particularly for emerging markets and the developing world by 2030. But, if we do not improve our current efforts not only will this sustainability goal not be meet for Africa, but the food security-climate change symbiotic link will continue to be exacerbated as Africa’s population is estimated to reach 1.5Bn by 2030, and 2Bn by 2050.

Thus, we need to be more food security-climate change smart through innovation. We need more Africa-focused research and development like Ghana’s new bio tech facility, and by expanding the discussion circle so that both agriculture and environment policy makers, CSOs and development entities begin to come together and share in the same international, regional, community, and village fora to address these two global impact indicators.

This blog post is adapted and edited from an article that also featured in the Huffington Post.

About Robin Sanders

Dr Robin Renée Sanders, a career member of the senior US Foreign Service, is currently serving as the International Affairs Advisor for a non-governmental organization. She previously served as the US Ambassador to Nigeria from 2007-2010. Prior to that she served as International Advisor and Deputy Commandant at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces in Washington, DC. Prior to this position, she served as the US Ambassador to the Republic of Congo (2002-2005) and as Director for Public Diplomacy for Africa for the State Department (2000-2002). She served twice as the Director for Africa at the National Security Council at the White House; and was the Special Assistant for Latin America, Africa, and International Crime for the Undersecretary for Political Affairs at the State Department (1996-1997). Ms Sanders holds a Doctor of Science Degree in Information Systems and Communication from Robert Morris University, Master of Art degree in International Relations and Africa Studies, and a Master of Science degree in Communications and Journalism from Ohio University. She also holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications from Hampton University.

To provide more crop yield on less land with fewer inputs undoubtedly requires alteration to the fundamental physiological attributes of plants. Included in these is the increase in efficiency of photosynthesis, recently identified by BBRSC as a focus of special interest and subject of a previous post on this blog.

The relationship between photosynthesis and crop yield is controversial. On the one hand, the interception and conversion efficiency of solar radiation by plants is directly proportional to biomass accumulation. On the other, linking photosynthetic activity at the leaf level (the pre-occupation of the plant scientist) to crop yield per unit land area (the concern of the farmer) has proven very difficult.

The reasons for this difficulty are numerous and at least in part result from the complexity of the system.

25 years ago researchers, including myself, first tried to set out some elements of this complexity, describing the various sub-stages of photosynthesis, from light capture by the chlorophyll-protein complexes in plant thylakoid membranes, to the electron transport processes, carbon assimilation, carbohydrate synthesis and partitioning, and product accumulation in the grain – the part that we most often eat.

The key idea was that each of these was connected not only by the fluxes between them, but by the presence of various feed-back and feed-forward regulatory processes, which tuned photosynthesis to external environmental factors, developmental processes and metabolic constraints. This network of interactions buffered the effects of internal and external change, providing balance and homeostasis, a universal feature of all biological systems. Such a model provides a means to analyse processes including stress tolerance and exemplifies the challenges presented to the plant breeder when wishing to ‘improve photosynthesis’ – where to intervene, what to change, what will be the consequences to name a few considerations.

Light the way

This formulation was redefined to provide a context for the work done by my group at the University of Sheffield on rice photosynthesis in collaboration with the International Rice Research Institute. This work revealed some striking insights, mainly how poor photosynthesis was in the field, even under conditions widely regarded as optimum.

In general, in many leaves, for significant periods of the day, photosynthetic activity was far below capacity. Causative factors included: closure of the stomata shutting off the supply of carbon dioxide to the leaves; reduction in the efficiency of light collection by the chloroplasts; and feedback from the accumulation of carbohydrate products of photosynthesis.

The conclusion from this study is important but so far widely ignored: There is enough photosynthetic activity in the existing cellular machinery to sustain a much larger yield if only plants could be induced to perform at their full potential.

So why don’t plants perform at their full potential?

Optimal operation

One reason why photosynthetic activity is not maximally expressed is inappropriate optimisation. Put simply, stability and survival (a low risk strategy) in the natural environment are driving forces of evolution, not necessarily high growth rate and photosynthetic rate (a high risk strategy) or high grain yield. Photosynthesis is held back below its potential because growth is optimised in the face of the particular properties of the plant’s habitat. Therefore, we have to consider the evolution and basic biology of each crop species.

Particularly important is that the environment is never constant- there are fluctuations in levels of sunlight, temperature and rainfall. Plants record, memorise and (try to) predict their environments to ensure that they always have enough energy storage from photosynthesis to power their growth and development. For example, plants have to determine the size of their reproductive sinks (i.e. grain capacity) in advance, predicting what the photosynthetic rate will be to give maximum grain filling. Over-estimation of future photosynthesis results in poor grain filling and/or poor quality grain; under-estimation of future photosynthesis results in a decrease in the efficiency of solar energy use and losses of potential productivity. Trade-offs inevitably result from optimisation of the internal regulatory mechanisms involved (dynamic range, kinetics, precision), and this readily explains the apparent under-performance of photosynthesis.

A particularly clear example of how optimisation points may differ in different plant genotypes is our observation that stress tolerant varieties of bean have a low growth rate under favourable conditions, whereas others have high yield under favourable conditions but suffer badly when grown under stress. Consequently, there may be opportunities for the breeding of higher yielding crops by tailoring regulatory responses to specific agricultural scenarios, where man’s intervention has moderated some of the environmental constraints on productivity, by irrigation, provision of fertilisers and elimination of weeds.

A key point is that optimisation will vary according to plant species or variety, the climate and season, the agronomic practice, the locality and so on. Thus, significant benefits will come from understanding at the molecular and genetic levels how to alter the optimisation of the biochemistry and physiology of individual leaves, their performance in the whole plant, and the way individual plants interact in the crop canopy.

Indeed, such knowledge may also be necessary to offset the inherent conservatism of plants that could thwart current attempts to increase photosynthetic efficiency, and hence yield, by manipulation of with the basic biochemical processes of carbon assimilation.

About Peter Horton

Peter Horton FRS is Emeritus Professor of Biochemistry in the Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology at the University of Sheffield. He holds a D.Phil. and D.Sc. from the University of York, received postdoctoral training at Purdue University and has worked at Sheffield since1978. In 2010 he was elected Fellow of the Royal Society. His principal research interest is in photosynthesis and related aspects of plant biology. He has made wide ranging contributions to photosynthesis research across the boundaries between biophysics, biochemistry and structural biology into physiology, ecophysiology and agriculture. This multidisciplinary approach increased our understanding not only the molecular mechanisms of photosynthesis but also how these are integrated into the growth and development of the whole plant. Currently he serves as adviser to several projects, including Sheffield’s overarching research programme in food and energy sustainability Project Sunshine.

The November 2011 G20 meeting in Cannes last week, perhaps understandably, focused on addressing the eurozone crisis. However, behind the financial headlines lies a bigger crisis of global hunger and malnutrition.

The Horn of Africa famine has drawn heightened attention to the issues of food security and hunger, with many tens of thousands of people suffering from losses of food supplies and an inability to purchase food in parts of Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia.

However, this situation represents only the tip of the iceberg of a wider food crisis that affects almost a billion people.

Hunger levels have remained stubbornly high and have indeed increased during (PDF) and just after the 2008 food price spike. The Global Hunger Index (GHI) notes that the world produces enough calories per person to feed the world, but that hunger levels remain at ‘serious’ levels globally. Twenty-six countries in the world have hunger levels that are described as ‘serious’ or ‘alarming’.

The French government promised to place food security and agriculture at the forefront of its agenda when it took the mantle as President of the G20 in 2011.

So what happened, and what should we expect from the G20 in 2012?

Steps forward on global food security

French President Nicholas Sarkozy’s announcement that he will be taking forward a proposal on a financial transaction tax caused a flurry of excitement from some NGOs. There were incremental moves from G20 governments to close down secrecy of tax havens, as well as the need to invest in national social protection floors – important for improving the access to food for vulnerable people.

Regarding agriculture and food security, the French Presidency of the G20 acknowledged the need to regulate and improve transparency in commodity markets, through ex-ante position limits, a tool which ‘can cap the amount of the market that can be held by an individual trader’ and the creation of an Agriculture Market Information System, also known as AMIS.  These measures, if fully implemented, represent a step forward in attempts to intervene in opaque agricultural markets that many, such as Julian Oram on this blog, believe have amplified or directly contributed to food price volatility.

The outcome text and communiqué also refer towards the need to ‘foster investment in smallholder farmers’ as well as to promote farmers’ access to risk management tools to manage price risks. The members also pushed forward with a plan developed by the World Food Programme to initiate a system of emergency food (PDF) reserves in West Africa.

The world’s poorest people

However, with the political crisis in Greece overshadowing much of the agenda, food security was left as a footnote. The agenda was overambitious, and as a result led to an incoherent set of outcome documents that offered much in rhetoric but delivered little in commitments, particularly on agriculture and food security.

While the communiqué and declaration name-check the importance of investment in agricultural productivity, the text lacks details on the targeting of that support, for example to resource poor smallholder farmers and other marginal livelihood groups. The text also mentions the need to foster investment in agriculture, but there is no specific mention of the members investing in the resource poor farmers themselves.

Similarly, the members fail to mention the G8 L’Aquila Food Security Initiative (PDF) from 2009, where donors promised to invest in the country-owned plans agriculture and food security plans of vulnerable countries. Eighteen of the G20 (PDF) have signed up to this pledge, and it remains off-track, with only 22 percent disbursed so far (PDF), and 26 percent ‘on track’ to be disbursed.

Support for resource-poor smallholder farmers

A number of non-governmental organisations, such as Concern Worldwide, who have many years of experience in working on food security at the field level, believe that investment in smallholder farmers remains an effective method to reduce poverty and food security in rural areas.

Policy think-tank IFPRI suggest that support to agriculture, as well as complementary investments in education, health and social services is vital to meeting Millennium Development Goal target 1 on hunger through increasing the availability of food and improved dietary knowledge. Due to the predominately-rural nature of poverty, analysts suggest that growth in agriculture can be more than twice as effective (PDF) at reducing poverty as growth in other sectors, and that growth can be particularly pro-poor when it is based on small farms.

Investment in smallholder farmers can result in linkages with the non-farm economy, create job opportunities, and boost the local businesses. Agricultural economists in the Montpellier Panel have called this process a ‘virtuous circle’ where support to poor farmers leads to spillover effects in other parts of the economy.

Looking to 2012

G20 members should keep their promises to the world’s poorest people in 2012. Principally, it is imperative that the Mexican Presidency keeps food security on the agenda – in particular support for resource poor smallholder farmers. There are three concrete ways that G20 members can help to achieve this aim.

Firstly, the G20 governments should rigorously monitor the commitments of members that have committed to the L’Aquila Food Security Initiative from 2009. It remains critical that donor countries keep their commitments to support vulnerable countries to invest in smallholder agriculture.

Secondly, investments should be monitored against measurements that move beyond productivity and address poverty reduction and malnutrition indicators. This process would ensure that support is targeted at those people most in need, and can improve the effectiveness of aid delivery.

Lastly, despite an era of austerity, there remains a desperate need for further public sector investment in smallholder agriculture. G20 governments can help with this aim by supporting the country-owned agriculture and food security plans of countries vulnerable to food insecurity – small-scale producers in vulnerable countries expect nothing less.

About Robin Willoughby

Robin Willoughby is Policy Officer at Concern Worldwide (UK). Concern Worldwide is an international humanitarian organisation dedicated to reducing suffering and working towards the elimination of extreme poverty. In an effort to support these aims, Concern Worldwide (UK) has recently launched a campaign action, calling on members of the public to pressure the UK Government and other donors to keep their hunger promises.

Meeting the growing demands for both food and sustainability is a huge interdisciplinary challenge; the answer will not be found in a single discipline. As an interdisciplinary problem, global food security solutions must combine agricultural science (including crop improvement), farming management, understanding trade-offs in land uses (between ecosystem services and agricultural production for example) and a wide range of social issues concerning behaviour, consumption, economics and global trade.

The Champion for the Global Food Security (GFS) programme therefore needs to be someone with a breadth of interest, and understanding, across a wide range of disciplines and able to forge partnerships between people with very different interests and viewpoints.

So why me?

Food security and me

My first, and principal, interest in this role arises because I consider the challenge of ensuring global food security perhaps the most important environmental, biological and societal issue the world has encountered. For many, the impact of anthropogenic climate change will be most noticeable through food and water impacts.

As a result of this realisation, much of my research concerns the relationship between farming and the natural environment and the way we can conserve ecosystem function whilst maintaining or increasing productivity. (See the foot of this post for some of my recent publications.)

Second, I feel I can see outside my own disciplinary perspective for this important interdisciplinary problem. I have taken on a number of strategic roles – I have been Research Dean, responsible for research strategy, and am a member of strategy boards for two UK Research Councils – and am comfortable with taking a broad overview of areas and help set the required direction to achieve goals.  

That food security is a problem that requires solutions from a number of fields, and not just the scientific, cannot be overstated. Hence, my third reason for taking on the role is because as I have developed my academic career, I have seen it increasingly essential to interact across many disciplines and also to engage with external partners and stakeholders.  I have considerable experience in stakeholder engagement. For example, in the last few months I have spoken at the European Parliament, the EU Environment Directorate General, from a panel event on farming and biodiversity in Brussels, to the European Crop Protection Association, to Oxfam in Leeds, and to a local secondary school – all concerning sustainable food security.  

My fourth reason for taking on the champion role is that I am an interdisciplinary researcher and research-leader.  For example, I have helped lead The Africa College Partnership, a 100-strong academic partnership based in Leeds, which spans nutrition, crop science, ecosystem services, climate change and social sciences with two major global agricultural organisations (the CGIAR institute partners IITA and ICIPE). 

It is important that GFS is firmly evidence-based in terms of setting the research agenda, or influencing strategy and policy. So, my fifth reason is that I am experienced at synthesising data and assessing science quality, as evidenced by my experience as a journal editor-in-chief, grant panel member, external examiner at undergraduate and postgraduate level, and long-term teacher of statistics and analysis. I therefore have the skill to assess the evidence base (and evidence gaps) in food security-related topics.

So, in conclusion to the “why me?” question, let me just say that I have always been committed to engagement with non-academic audiences and that even as a research leader in agriculture-environment interactions, I’m confident that I’m able to take a broad view, think strategically, and build lasting productive partnerships.

I will never be an expert in all the core disciplines that contribute to GFS, but my interests are very broad, and my willingness to learn is unbounded. The joy of being a ‘systems’ person is that the system of interest can always be expanded: my initial interest in ecology expanded to agri-environmental systems, then global land use patterns…  I bring a real enthusiasm for thinking about the whole, not just a small part.

Why global?

I am often asked “we’re OK in the UK, so why worry about global issues?”  The answer is that we depend on the rest of the world for much of our food, and that local choices have important implications elsewhere in the world.

Global food security necessarily involves consideration of global issues of supply and demand.  Many people interested, like me, in the natural world suggest that reducing the intensity of farming, even at the expense of yield, is the route to a sustainable farming future – because they believe that the shortfall in yield can always be made up through imports or changes in our consumption patterns. Reducing the production of food in Europe will almost certainly mean that production elsewhere needs to increase to supply our demands, leading to the potential of exporting environmental impacts. Furthermore, whilst increasing imports of food may be available at the present time, they may not always be as other countries’ production systems adapt to the challenge of increasing their own food supply. Therefore, choices made in the developed, global north clearly influence the global south, and we need to understand this linkage more in developing both national and EU approaches.

There is often a tension between farming and environmental sustainability, exemplified by the ‘intensive or sustainable’ viewpoints (or the “organic vs conventional” farming). My own view is that sustainable intensification is possible: i.e. maintaining or increasing production whilst increasing sustainability.  One route to removing the tension is with the concept of sustainable farming landscapes, instead of sustainable fields or farms. Some of my own work has shown that you potentially get more production and more ecosystem services out of a landscape with a mix of intensive farms and land managed for ecology, rather than from a landscape entirely managed extensively. I wrote a previous post for this website outlining my thoughts on this.

Finding ways to remove the ‘intensive or sustainable’ tension will help the debate, as well as moving policy and strategy forwards. We need agriculture to be both high yielding and sustainable; the good news is that routes to this destination do exist.

About Tim Benton

Tim Benton is Research Dean in the Faculty of Biological Sciences, University of Leeds, and is Chair of the Africa College Partnership, an interdisciplinary virtual research institute concerned with sustainable agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa. He has worked on the links between farming and biodiversity (and ecosystem services) for many years.

Selected Tim Benton publications

• TG Benton, DM Bryant, L Cole and HPQ Crick (2002)  Linking agricultural practice to insect and bird populations: a historical study over 3 decades. Journal of Applied Ecology. 39(4), 673-687
• Benton, TG, Vickery, JA, Wilson, JD (2003) Farmland biodiversity: is habitat heterogeneity the key? Trends in Ecology & Evolution 18: 182-188
• Gabriel, D., S J. Carver, H Durham, W E. Kunin, R C. Palmer, S M. Sait, S Stagl, T G. Benton (2009). The spatial aggregation of organic farming in England and its underlying environmental correlates.  Journal of applied Ecology 46: 323-333
• D. Gabriel, S.M. Sait, J.A. Hodgson, U. Schmutz, W.E. Kunin, T.G. Benton (2010) Scale matters: the impact of organic farming on biodiversity at different spatial scales.  Ecology letters. 13: 858-869
• Hodgson, J; Kunin, W E.; Thomas, CD; Benton, TG; Gabriel, D (2010) Comparing organic farming and land sparing: optimising yield and butterfly populations at a landscape scale. Ecology letters13: 1358-1367
• Elisabeth Simelton, et al (2010) Climate Change and the Socioeconomics of Global Food Production: A Quantitative Analysis of how Socio-Economic Factors Influence the Vulnerability of Grain Crops to Drought CCEP Working Paper 29 (PDF)
• TG Benton, AJ Dougill, EDG Fraser & DJB Howlett (2011) How to use the global land bank to both produce food and conserve nature: examining extensive vs intensive agriculture.  World Agriculture 2:14-21
• Lee-Ann Sutherland, Doreen Gabriel, Laura Hathaway-Jenkins, Unai Pascual, Ulrich Schmutz, Dan Rigby, Richard Godwin, Steven M. Sait, Ruben Sakrabani, Bill Kunin, Tim G. Benton and Sigrid Stagl.  (in press) The ‘Neighbourhood Effect’:A multidisciplinary assessment of the case for farmer co-ordination in agri-environmental programmes. Land Use Policy

In the 21st century, one of the potential consequences of climate change and free global trade is that animal and plant disease may pose increasing threats to our food supplies.

It’s important to understand the biology of the pathogens and pests involved, but it’s equally important to fully consider the human dimension, and the part that people and their behaviour play. That has been the basis of the Rural Economy and Land Use (Relu) Programme’s research on animal and plant disease, culminating in their latest briefing paper “Growing concerns: animal and plant disease policy for the 21st century (PDF)” .

Past policies

Even a cursory examination of government policy on disease reveals how unsystematic our present approach seems to be. Its origins are rooted in a different historical landscape and policy has grown up in a way that often seems illogical today.

One obvious example is the way in which animal disease is categorised as ‘exotic’ or ‘endemic’ and how this determines the political response. Public money and effort go into addressing -exotic- diseases such foot-and-mouth disease, while persistent infections such as Johne’s disease and infectious bovine rhinotracheitis are regarded as industry problems, attracting no compensation for farmers and no particular efforts to eliminate them.

Yet these endemic diseases are impacting significantly on food production, farmers’ profits and animal welfare. Research carried out by a Relu team at Warwick (PDF) has concluded that making more information on disease status and history available to livestock buyers could help to address this. For example, knowledge of the disease risks within the herd would have an effect on prices, giving the low-risk animal a higher value, and providing more incentive for farmers to eliminate disease.

The new Animal and Health Welfare Board for England needs to apply a systematic framework for risk and cost sharing that has the backing of stakeholders. At the moment, anomalies persist not only within the categorisation of animal disease, but between animal and plant disease.  These two factors still seem to be addressed within self-contained silos and carry very different consequences for farmers. There are surely many lessons, not only on cost and responsibility, but on other aspects such as disease risk management, that could be applied more widely between the animal and plant sciences.

All the right friends

One of the major findings of the Relu programme is how involvement of stakeholders can strengthen research and it can also make implementation of policy more effective.

The UK Government’s approach to the appearance of bluetongue in Britain in 2007 provides a good example of this. By working closely with the farming community they developed a control strategy, and a communications campaign implemented with help from veterinary and industry bodies raised awareness of the disease and the actions that needed to be taken.

But we really need an even wider engagement with society on these issues, even if it may sometimes make us feel uneasy. The 38 Degrees organisation for example, has an approach that some might regard as provocative on arguments such as bovine TB and the culling of badgers, but it does encourage involvement beyond the obvious groups.

There are new disease threats to our food all the time and the Relu report calls for a fresh approach from Government. Food is a concern for everyone and we should all be taking an interest in UK and world food security as price rise and supply become less secure.

About Wyn Grant

Wyn Grant is a graduate of the universities of Leicester, Strathclyde and Exeter. He joined Warwick University in 1971 and was chair of the Department of Politics and International Studies from 1990 to 1997.  In recent years he has been actively involved in research projects with members of the Department of Life Sciences at Warwick where he also teaches.  He is vice-president for Europe and Africa of the International Political Science Association.

During the launch of the Montpellier Panel Report last year I was inspired by the talk on women in agriculture presented by Vicki Wilde. She is the Director of the CGIAR’s Gender and Diversity Programme and the African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD) project – a professional development program that strengthens the research and leadership skills of African women in agricultural science.

After Vicki’s speech, something inside me seemed to click and I decided from this point that I really wanted to help make a difference for women in African agriculture. 

My first point of research was to read the Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) report, The State of Food and Agriculture 2010-11, which states that women comprise, on average, 43 per cent of the agricultural labour force in developing countries, yet they consistently have less access to helpful resources and opportunities for growth.  They operate smaller farms, keep fewer livestock, have a greater workload and are usually left with the lower status activities such as carrying water and fetching firewood. Women also usually receive lower wages for the same work than men, even when they have the same qualifications and experience.

I was also saddened to learn that most educated women in Africa don’t seem to make it past bachelor’s degree level. It is also very worrying that only one in seven women agricultural scientists are in leadership roles, according to a study conducted with the Agricultural Science and Technology Indicators initiative that collates data on agricultural R&D investments and capacity in developing countries.

The benefits of closing the gap

Wilde stated at a recent Agropolis Foundation event that by closing this huge gender gap we could lift 100-150 million people out of hunger. She believes that with investment, awareness raising and a deeper focus on these issues, we can improve the working lives of African women, thus improving African agricultural development as a whole.

For example, the FAO report also states that plot yields managed by women are lower than those managed by men. Extensive evidence shows that this is not because women are worse farmers than men. They simply do not have access to the same inputs such as fertilisers, seeds and tools. If they did, their yields would be on a par with men’s and agricultural production would increase. Closing the input gap on the agricultural land held by women could result in an increase in production of 20–30 percent on their land, which in turn would contribute towards food security as a whole.

Also, closing the gender gap in agriculture would generate broader social and economic benefits by strengthening women’s direct access to, and control over, resources and incomes. Evidence from Africa (PDF), Asia (PDF) and elsewhere consistently shows that families benefit when women have greater status and power within the household. Increased control over income gives women a stronger bargaining position over economic decisions and when women have more influence over these decisions; their families allocate more income to food, health, education, as well as children’s clothing and nutrition.

Fast-track fellowship

AWARD’s goal is to empower women to contribute more effectively to poverty alleviation and food security in sub-Saharan Africa and offers two-year fellowships focused on establishing mentoring relationships by assigning a mentor to every woman researcher – a senior scientist or other professional who helps them realise their career goals – because young female researchers sometimes struggle to find role models of women who have already succeeded.

AWARD also helps women researchers to develop their leadership skills so they can achieve positions of influence and have a role in determining what research is conducted and how precious research funds are spent.

African women face particular challenges in continuing their science careers once they have a family to raise. To combat this, AWARD invites nursing mothers to bring their babies along to their training courses; they also offer a child-minding service and there is no cut-off age (usually 35) to enrol – allowing older women to fulfil their career aspirations.

Rebuilding the foundations

To me, gender is not just a side issue to a wider agenda, but in fact one of the most important issues to address in improving agricultural development in Africa. It seems to be a fundamental issue in Africa that governments, the private sector and the public are all failing to act on.

How can we build both agricultural and educational systems that work on such a shaky foundation?  How can we improve food security if half the population (and almost half of the farmers in Africa) are being so disempowered?

I believe that by championing initiatives such as AWARD and by further much needed time and investment in agricultural research and development for African women, we can create a paradigm shift which would help gain the support of the men out there and other organisations which might usually be resistant towards a gender revolution.

As Kofi Annan, Chairman of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa and former Secretary-General of the United Nations, once said “a green revolution in Africa will happen only if there is also a gender revolution”, a statement that I am only to eager to agree with.

About Jo Seed

Jo has been the Project Administrator for Ag4Impact since July 2009. She has previously worked for the Universities of Sussex, Central Lancashire, and Manchester.