Climate change and land use

September 2019: Several land mark reports are calling for profound changes in the current ways we use land and produce food. Within the next decade, agricultural and food systems will have to transition to agro-ecological systems, requiring policy and financial incentives to accelerate the changes needed to combat climate change and alleviate the public health crisis.

Information

Several landmark reports such as the UN’s IPCC report on land use and the UK’s Food, Farming and Countryside Commission report identify cheap food as a primary driver for the public health crisis and environmental destruction. Both commissions link diet-related illnesses such as type 2 diabetes, food poverty, and wildlife habitat destruction to cheap and unhealthy food trends. The reports recommend that the farming systems need to transform within the next decade to recover and regenerate natural resources; thereby restoring health and wellbeing to people and planet alike. Particularly, cheap and unhealthy food incentivises monoculture agriculture, resulting in increased land used, decreased habitats for pollinators, eroded soils, increased food waste, and increased CO₂ emission. Despite the global agricultural industry producing more food than required by the global population, the number of people affected by malnutrition has risen for the third year in a row, undermining efforts of the SDG’s “Zero Hunger” by 2030 target.

Implications & Opportunities

The reports highlight that there are several ways of overcoming shortcomings in the current food and agricultural systems. For example, degraded land could be restored by means of offering volunteering opportunities to people committed to planting trees or restoring peatlands. Farmers and agri-businesses could be incentivised to shift from current intensive farming methods to organic and wildlife friendly methods, e.g. raising livestock on grass and growing more nuts and pulses. Further, farmers and local communities can be forces for change and should be directly consulted when implementing new policies and designing incentives for transitioning to agro-ecology systems, such as combining trees with crops and livestock; hence, focusing on rural communities as powerhouses of green economies. The reports indicate that such transitions could be accelerated by initiating new non-profit banks providing farmers with the financial resources to invest in new practices.

Limitations

Each report recommends policy interventions and systems changes either at the global or national level, highlighting that each recommendation should be seen within its context; hence, may have limited applicability at the regional level or requires appropriate tailoring to existing systems.

Sources

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. (2019). Climate Change and Land. Retrieved from https://www.ipcc.ch/report/srccl/.

Der Spiegel. (2019). Weltklimarat mahnt zur Kertwende beim Fleischkonsum. Retrieved from https://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/mensch/bericht-des-weltklimarats-nahrungsmittelpreise-steigen-infolge-der-klimakrise-a-1280977.html

Le Monde. (2019). Pour la troisième année d’affilée, la faim progresse dans le monde. Retrieved from https://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2019/07/15/pour-la-troisieme-annee-consecutive-la-faim-progresse-dans-le-monde_5489687_3244.html