July 3, 2012: Panel 5D - Sustainable Food Production and Food Security

Sustainable Food Production and Food Security Video

Tue, 03 Jul 2012 14:40:00 PDT

Applying the Law to Advance Sustainability: Making the Case for a Mechanism on Payment for Ecosystem Services for Sustainable Agriculture in Kenya

Robert Kibugi — Tue, 03 Jul 2012 14:40:00 PDT

According to official literature, agriculture production, although a significant contributor the Kenyan economy, has been on the decline due to unsustainable land use practices, leading to land degradation and loss of fertility. This has far-reaching implications because agriculture is mainly small-scale, and practised by the dominantly rural population. As a consequence, food insecurity and rural poverty have been on the increase in recent decades. This outcome results in non-fulfilment of certain socio-economic rights to food or water, and undermines the constitutional right to a clean and healthy environment. This right to a clean and healthy environment whether sets a basis for legal measures that will protect and conserve natural ecosystems, including agricultural lands.

In Kenya, this right now encompasses a constitutional duty on every person, to collaborate with other persons, and with the state, to conserve the environment and ensure ecologically sustainable use and development. Although this duty may dominantly be implemented through regulatory legal provisions, this paper explores a hybrid legal approach involving a statutory duty of stewardship on land owners/farmers and an entitlement to payment for ecosystems service, when the minimum obligations set by the duty are exceed. In this context, payment for ecosystem services provides a mechanism to conserve the environment, and provide economic benefits to land owners or local communities. With the antecedent on fulfilment of the statutory stewardship duty, the benefits are ecological (stewardship + ecosystem services), and economic (sustainable agricultural production + payments for qualifying ecosystem services).

The normative challenges of such proposal are numerous: What is the scale of ecosystem benefits in context of small-scale farming and numerous small parcels of land; How does the law protect the rights of persons holding secondary interests in land such as spouses and children; What is the scope of qualifying ecosystem services? What are the safeguards for monitoring, certification and verification? It is necessary to ensure that rules on valuation of ecosystem services are not subject to instrumental (anthropocentric) notions which could exclude certain ecological functions – cultural; spiritual; aesthetic. The research comparatively examines existing explicit mechanisms on payment for ecosystem services, and other legal approaches to land uses that could further environmental conservation. We seek to propose a mechanism that goes beyond legislatively mandated stewardship to promote sustainable small-scale agriculture, conserve the environment and bring economic benefits to land owners/farmers.

Land Grabbing and Food Security in Ethiopia: The Dilemmas of Sustainable Development

Mekete Bekele Tekle — Tue, 03 Jul 2012 14:40:00 PDT

This paper will discuss the issues of large agricultural land lease agreements of Ethipin government with investors and the dilemmas it is facing in tackling the problems of food security in the country. Many African countries, including those with severe food insecurity problems would like to pretend that they can feed their people and far beyond as per their agricultural resources potential figures that appear in the national statistical data - particularly their vast farmlands. But the facts on the ground are quite different for many of them are importing food items and agricultural inputs, while a good number of them are prone to recurring famine and drought. In an ambitious effort to meet their respective Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), some African countries have adopted very impressive national plans and programs. Ethiopia is one of such countries that adopted a national MDGs implementation program with components such as eradication of poverty, ensuring food security and environmental sustainability in its endeavors to achieve a track record sustainable development by the year 2015. Despite its remarkable dedication and concerted efforts to meet the MDGs, Ethiopia is still suffering from a chronic food insecurity problem. The country’s environmental resources are exploited for many centuries and had become susceptible to a looming disaster to be triggered by a slight change in the climatic conditions. The problems of food insecurity in the country is aggravating as a result of the current scramble over its farmlands by foreign investors whose objectives are to ensure their own food and energy security and making of profit. The foreign investors are engaded in the production of crops for their home consumption and the growing of plants for their biofuel projects.

The paper will further discuss how the large agricultural land lease contracts with foreign and local investors are likely to affect the livelihood of the poor peasants and pastoralists in Ethiopia. The acquisition of the vast farmlands by the investors has already caused massive displacement of local communities and environmental degradation - including loss of the forest cover, encroachment upon protected areas, depletion of freshwater resources by irrigation and the dwindling of the wildlife stocks. Despite the existence of relevant and fairly good environmental protection laws adopted by the country, the large agricultural land lease agreements are seen as acts of violations of the environmental and economic development policies of the country by the government. Given the facts surounding the terms of lease agreements, the exercise could aptly be described as “land grabbing” oracilitated by the state. Some of the investors have openly stated that the land lease deals were unbelievably cheap and termed as “throw-away price”.

Amidst the prevailing shortage of farmland for the fastgrowing rural population, the current call for more foreign direct investment in the agricultural sector of Ethiopia would seem to be a challenge rather than an opportunity to ensure food security and sustainable agriculture.

Recommendations on Mitigation and Adaptation in Agriculture and Food Security in Central America

Rafael Gonzalez Ballar — Tue, 03 Jul 2012 14:40:00 PDT

Our paper will emphasis that the our ecological and carbon footprint in the region has had important setbacks in Central America. We need to understand that we have to give priority to risk analysis that will help identify our vulnerabilities and work with mitigation and adaptation. In the first part we will understand why the setbacks. The second will recommend on mitigation and adaptation in our public policies and legislation.

Taking as a reference year of 2008 it is true that Central America (CA) has had setbacks on environmental, economic, social, political issues, and there have been gaps in socioeconomic and political domain specifically in Costa Rica and Panama.

We have a number of risks that have not been solved and will cause problems:

Institutional: it has generated a kind of state "hostile to democracy" (State of the Region 2011). They have small institutional structures, key executives, no real balances.

Climate change: Accepting some regional differences problems already present will continue to worsen. Ex. the temperature increases, the intensity of all hydrometeorological problems are further aggravated by possible vulnerabilities without clarity on mitigation and adaptation. Aspects of environmental mismanagement is having and will have problems of infrastructure, production and balance of fragile ecosystems at risk for the people who live or are near them.

Political impasse: There is a difficulty in the system to combat social exclusion.

Taking as reference year 2000, the region showed a clear trend of unsustainable use of natural resources. Our ecological footprint began to be negative (ecological debt). The environment and development relationship by analyzing the priorities states have in all public policies, are not verifiable denoting contradictions in the political discourse and national and regional strategies with concrete and "substantial changes in the patterns of exploitation of nature" (State of the Region 2011).

Specifics:

The countries of the region have serious environmental vulnerability as they are in an area, compared with others, because of its location, is likely to suffer and worsen their situation if we do not reduce risk circumstances. Examples of Honduras and Nicaragua are of the utmost gravity. The availability of water (including for energy), loss of biodiversity and finally food security.

In twenty years, from 1980 to 2005, the region lost 248,400 acres of wetlands, an annual average of 9936 hectares. The cumulative loss in that period represents 34.8% of the total that existed in 1980. The number of endangered species increased by 82% between 2002 and 2010. The fish, followed by amphibians, are the most impacted. 35% of Central American territory is within shared river basins. Between 2005 and 2008 the agricultural area in the region fell by 7.4%. From 2005 to 2010 the forest area decreased by 1,246,000 Isthmus hectares. The rate of this loss, however, has fallen, among 1990y 2000 the rate was -1.6%, and in 2000-2010 was -1.2%. (State of the Region 2011). There are two weaknesses that make the vulnerabilities of the region in an unsolved problem as is evident from the objective reality of each country: a view in which mitigation prevails (for increased access to financial resources) and other policies in which the region tend to define tasks but not responsibilities.

We continue to have "uncontrolled energy use, inefficient and polluting, poorly planned and regulated, risk of new windows for natural integrity of the territory: an expansive urban growth, a limited control of water pollution sources and solid and liquid waste, the land affected by agricultural activities technologically backward, and the commitment to high environmental impact activities and great social unrest. " (State of the Region 2011).

It is urgent that we can work with the adaptation, necessarily integrated to risk management. We need a good management of protected areas and forests that can play a role in helping climate change. Land use is a priority including land tools and citizen participation. This has to be accompanied by environmental indicators that allow us to have information for decision-making.

We will make emphasis on mitigation and adaptation in agriculture and food security in Central America.