Its high time to move to agro-ecological farming systems.
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At a time when global temperatures are soaring, a latest study by a French think tank – Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI) – has shown that agro-ecological farming alone has the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Europe by 47 per cent and thereby keep global temperature rise below 2 degrees.
This study comes at a time when the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) is already talking of green direct payments to organic farmers who opt for sustainable farming practices. At the Regional Symposium on Agro-ecology for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems for Europe and Central Asia, 2016, one of the policy recommendations was to shift 30 per cent of the European budget on agriculture to green direct payments. The IDDRI study in addition shows that a transition from intensive farming to agro-ecological farming will bring down the pesticides consumption by 380,000 tonnes per year in European farming.
And yet I find that most climate mitigation studies point to more crop intensification, which will expectedly lead to freeing up larger proportion of cultivable lands and thereby claim to ensuring there is no drop in food production. In other words, it is push for a hyper-intensive farming system that leads to more toxic soils, more water mining sucking the remaining aquifers dry, and leading to more contamination of the food chain. This flawed assumption was essentially behind the launch of the New Vision for Agriculture at the World Economic Forum 2009 aiming at increasing food production by 20 percent, decreasing greenhouse gas emissions per ton by 20 percent, and reducing rural poverty by 20 percent every decade.
The 17 agribusiness giants that would spur the launch of New Vision for Agriculture includes Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), BASF, Bunge Limited, Cargill, Coca-Cola, DuPont, General Mills, Kraft Foods, Metro AG, Monsanto Company, Nestlé, PepsiCo, SABMiller, Syngenta, Unilever, Wal-Mart, and Yara International. In other words, it is more of the same leading to more catastrophic outcomes in the future.
The IDDRI study provides a lot of hope at a time when the UN-sponsored TEEB initiative – The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity – for agriculture and food, has in its latest study warned of a significant contribution to greenhouse gas emissions emanating from farming practices. Accordingly, the entire farming production systems, stretching from cutting down of forests for making land available for cultivation to food waste dumped in landfills, account from 47 to 51 per cent of the global gas emissions. This factor alone plays a prominent role in world’s climate going topsy-turvy, and which returns to haunt farming community reeling under the terrible impact of climate change. The challenge therefore is how to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture, which becomes a surer form of mitigation for farmers from the chaotic implications from climate aberrations haunting them in the years to come.
What is therefore of paramount importance is to bring in policies that help farmers to transit to a more climate resilient agriculture. Before apologists for Green Revolution kind of farming systems raise on uproar over declining food production from a shift to organic farming, it is important to know that in its earlier study along with the UK-based Soil Association, the IDDRI has in a report entitled ‘Ten Years of Agro-ecology in Europe’ clearly showed that it is possible to feed Europe a healthy and sustainable diet by transiting to natural farming systems. Earlier, an International Assessment for Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) report, which was ratified (India included) during an intergovernmental plenary in Johannesburg, April 7-12, 2008, had warned that ‘business as usual’ is not the way forward.
Over the years, an emerging consensus has developed around agro-ecology, which alone has the potential for an inclusive approach, and has immense ability to reduce the damage being done to the planet. In India, a major initiative was launched when village elders in Punnukula village in Khamam district in Andhra Pradesh came together to stop the use of chemical pesticides. This was way back, more than 15 years ago. This local initiative, and exemplary testimony to the richness of available local knowledge, led to the introduction on Non-Pesticides Management (NPM) under the Community Managed Sustainable Agriculture (CMSA) expanding to 3.6 million acres without the use of pesticides. After the State’s bifurcation, and driven by the enthusiasm shown in adopting NPM practices, Andhra Pradesh launched Zero Budget Natural Farming aiming to bring its nearly 60-lakh farmers under the fold of non-chemical agriculture by the end of the year 2024.
Surprisingly, there is no drop in crop productivity. Just a year after the introduction of ZBNF, a study by Rythu Sadhikara Samstha (RySS) based on crop cutting experiments showed that crop yields in fact had gone up from 10 to 69 per cent – 10 per cent in irrigated paddy and the highest 69 per cent in brinjal. Since wheat is not grown in south India, it is not possible to know the impact on wheat yield when grown without chemicals but I am sure suitable farming practices can be evolved that keeps productivity at par. More so in a state like Punjab, which ironically being the country’s food bowl still imports a significant proportion of its wheat atta requirement. Much of the attathat is imported is from Madhya Pradesh considered to be free of chemicals. I fail to understand why can’t instead Punjab focus on organic wheat production within the state if the domestic demand is so heavy.
This will require a paradigm shift in the way agricultural research is being conducted. All these years for instance crop varieties have been evolved based on its response to chemical fertilizers and pesticides. It’s time to move to organic breeding, developing future crop varieties responding to organic manure, less water and needing no chemical pesticides. This has to be followed by adequate reforms in agricultural markets, providing a higher price for organics and also providing for exclusive procurement of organic produce coupled with policies that encourage farmers to make the transition. With soaring demand for safe and healthy food, mainline agriculture research has no option but to keep pace with the changing times.
According to Friends of Earth, in Europe alone, climate change has taken the lives of more than 115,000 people since 1980, causing an economic loss of Euro 453 billion. In the global south, floods, drought, heatwaves and other extreme climate related events/disasters results in hundreds of thousands of people dying every year. Instead of just blaming the weather gods, the time has come to urgently reform the prevalent farming systems so as to move away from intensive cultivation that has denuded soils, mined groundwater and is increasingly leading to desertification. #
Towards an Organic Future. The Tribune. May 1, 2019
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