Important political support for sustainable agriculture: World Commission on Environment and Development urges `ACTION NOW'

ILEIA Newsletter • 3.3 • October 1987

Important political support for sustainable agriculture: World Commission on Environment and Development urges ‘ACTION NOW’

The editors

In 1983, the General Assembly of the United Nations appointed a Commission on Environment and Development to formulate a global agenda for change, to propose long term environmental strategies for achieving sustainable development. The Commission was chaired by the Norwegian Prime Minister, Mrs. Harlem Brundtland. Mansour Khalid, former Deputy Prime Minister of Sudan, was vice-chairman. Representatives from more than 20 different countries were members. A few months ago, the Commission produced its report under the title: \'OUR COMMON FUTURE\'. The report is commonly referred to as \'The Brundtland Report\'. It gives a comprehensive analysis of the \'Common Concerns\', describes the \'Common Challenges\' and recommends \'Common Endeavours\'. In this article ILEIA reviews the part on food production.

Common concerns

In the view of the commission, the world\'s crises, such as the environmental crisis, the development crisis, the food crisis and energy crisis are not separate crises. They are all one. Present economic and technological developments have locked the global economy and global ecology together in new ways. In the past we have been concerned about the impacts of economic growths upon the environment. We are now forced to consider the impact of ecological stress. Ecology and economy are becoming ever more interwoven, locally, regionally, nationally and globally, into a seamless net of causes and effects. Impoverishing the local resource base, can impoverish wider areas: Deforestation by highland farmers causes flooding of lowlands; Dryland degradation sends environmental refugees in millions across national borders; Internationally traded hazardous chemicals enter internationally traded food. The countryside is coming under pressure from increasing numbers of farmers and landless people. Cities are filling up with people, cars and factories. Yet, at the same time, developing countries must operate in a world in which the resource gap between the developing nations and industrial nations Is widening, in which the industrial world dominates some key international bodies and in which the industrial world has already used much of the planet\'s ecological capital. This inequality is the planet\'s main ‘environmental’ problem; it is also its main ‘developmental’ problem.

Common challenges

The Commission is optimistic about the future. Provided the political will is available, humanity has the ability to make development sustainable. Sustainable development will ensure the needs of the existing population without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. A world in which poverty is endemic will always be prone to ecological and other catastrophes. Therefore, the Commission believes that sustainable development requires meeting the basic needs of all people. The Commission reviewed the problems and potential related to population and human resources, food production, species and ecosystems, energy, industry and urbanization.

Common endeavours

When countries, with untapped agricultural resources, provide food by importing it, they are effectively importing unemployment. By the same token, countries that are subsidizing food exports are increasing unemployment in food importing countries. This marginalizes people, and marginalized people are forced to destroy the resource base to survive. According to the Commission, global food security depends not only on raising global production, but on reducing the distortions of the world food market and on shifting the focus of food production to food-deficit countries, regions and households. Yet if this shift in location of agricultural production as such will only be sustainable if the resource base is secure. As this is far from secure today, the resource base for food production must be sustained, enhanced, and, where it has been diminished or destroyed, restored. Conserving the agricultural resource base and livelihood security of the poor is mutually supportive in three ways. First, secure resources and adequate livelihoods lead to good husbandry and sustainable management. Second, they ease rural-to-urban migration and stimulate agricultural production from under-utilised resources thus reducing the need for food to be produced elsewhere. Third, by combating poverty, they help to slow population growth.

STRATEGIES FOR SUSTAINABLE FOOD SECURITY

Government agricultural policies

* Government interventions, rather than being dominated by short term considerations, should include ecological criteria discouraging environmentally unsound farming practices, but rather encourage farmers to maintain and improve their soils, forests and waters.
* Agricultural policies should, much more than presently, differentiate crop production according to ecological variation.
* Agricultural policies should take into account the need for a proper incentive system. Stable, high prices and access to\' markets are essentials for agricultural growth. This will require a major shift in international trading patterns by reducing protectionist barriers. Trade, tax and incentive systems should be based on criteria that include ecological and economic sustainability.

The resource base

* Land use systems should be developed according to \'best use\' criteria. Three broad land categories should be delineated:
- Enhancement areas, which are capable of sustaining intensive cropping and higher population and consumption levels;
- Prevention areas, which should not be developed for intensive agriculture;
- Restoration areas, which require treatment in order to restore productive capacity.
Classifying land according to \'best use\' will determine variations in infrastructure provision, support services, promotional measures, regulatory provisions, fiscal subsidies, and other incentives and disincentives.
* Improvements in water management are essential. Approaches to drainage, maintenance of irrigation systems and other water systems, as well as cropping practices, should lead to better use of water, less salinization, pollution, alkalisation and waterlogging. Many of these objectives will be easier to realise in small scale irrigation systems where the participation of farmers in the management of the water systems is essential.
* Many countries can and should increase yields by greater use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. But countries can also improve their yields by helping farmers to use organic nutrients more efficiently. Use of organic plant nutrients to complement chemicals and pest control based on natural methods are strategies which should receive more attention and which will require a change in public policies which currently encourage the use of chemical pesticides and fertilizers.
* Agroforestry has been practiced everywhere by traditional farmers. The challenge today is to revive the old methods, improve them, adapt them to the new conditions and develop new ones. Well chosen crops and tree varieties can reinforce each other and yield more food, fodder and wood than when grown separately. Moreover , diverse cropping systems are less susceptible to pests and diseases.
* The production of fish in controlled water bodies, such as paddy fields, abandoned mining excavations, small ponds and lakes, has good potential for developing countries.

The technology base

The major advances in agricultural technology in recent decades are better suited to stable, uniform, resource rich conditions with good soils and ample water supplies. New technologies are most urgently needed in those areas, which have unreliable rainfalls, uneven topography and poorer soils and hence are unsuited to the green revolution technologies. To serve these areas, agricultural research has to be less centralized, and more sensitive to farmer\'s conditions and priorities. Researchers must learn from and develop the innovations of the farmers, and not just the reverse. Research, design, development and extension capacities in the third world should be enhanced in order to cover the gaps in available technology. Research and extension efforts must be greatly expanded, especially in areas where climate, soils, and terrain pose special problems.

Human resources/equity

Development of human resources by educational efforts, aimed not only at farmers but also at researchers and extension workers, should cover the efficient use of land water, and forests. Women should be given more power to take decisions regarding agricultural and agroforestry programmes. Systematic efforts to promote equity in food production and distribution should include programmes on land reform, specific programmes for subsistence farmers and pastoralists, women farmers, integrated rural development programmes, and programmes that reduce dangers of the season to season variability in food supplies.

The need for action

The Commission concludes its report by stating that the present generation of mankind should begin to work now on the recommendations, in order to keep options open for future generations. We should begin now, together, nationally and internationally.

COMMENTS

ILEIA feels encouragement and recognition in the recommendations of the Commission. Since the start of ILEIA, we have worked on the collection and distribution of information on the implementation of low external input agriculture. We have worked on one of the wheels of sustainable development. Our focus on the use of locally available resources, the indigenous farmers\' knowledge, equity and sustainability has generated a large response, not least the active network of contacts through this Newsletter. There are many signs that lead us to conclude that conventional agricultural institutions and professionals are increasingly aware of the importance of sustainability and the need to reduce costs by minimizing the use of external inputs.
Yet ILEIA is less optimistic than the Commission when it states that ‘..we have the knowledge we need to conserve our land and water resources. New technologies provide opportunities for increasing productivity while reducing pressure on resources. A new generation of farmers combine experience with education. With these resources at our command we can meet the needs of the human family. Standing in the way is the narrow focus of agricultural planning and policies...’.
We agree that a major shift in policies is a necessary condition for achieving a sustainable and equitable development. But to assume that we have the technology at our command is underrating the tremendous effort still required to develop technologies that bridge the opportunity gaps that farmers face in resource poor areas.

Gaps in Technology Development

In our opinion the following gaps appear to be important:
* gaps in investment in technology development;
* gaps as result of western biased research and extension orientation;
* technology gaps as result of economic and commercial dependency;
* gaps in the development of ecologically sustainable technologies;
* gaps in research and development for traditional food crops and animals;
* gaps as result of undervaluation of indigenous knowledge, national and local resources;
* technology gaps as result of male orientation and big farmer orientation of technology development and delivery systems.
The present political support and renewed interest of conventional agricultural professionals for sustainable agriculture are positive developments. But this support is not sufficient to bridge the opportunity gaps in the short run in resource poor agriculture. Even more important, are the political, social and economic problems which have to be solved to give resource poor people a real change to build a sustainable and equitable livelihood.
How does the Commission propose to stop people from exploiting each other and the earth?

Seal of credibility

The significance of the Brundtland report is above all political. It is putting a political seal of credibility on much that environmentalists, researchers and non- governmental organizations have been saying. It provides a useful analysis of global problems and an indication of possible solutions. It is optimistic for it is recommending to keep smiling and to accept the \'Challenge\'. Now the task is to the UN General Assembly to transform this report into a UN Programme for Action on Sustainable Development. Translation of the report to the local situation is needed so that local strategies to change policies, research, education, training and implementation emerge.
However, in our opinion, this UN action alone will not be enough to reach a sustainable and equitable \'Common Future\'. Global reflection and action is needed by all members of the human race , to change our attitude towards our common ecosystem, our one and only earth.