Food retailers and manufacturers are increasingly committing to address agricultural sustainability issues in their supply chains. In place of using established eco-certifications, many companies define their own supply chain sustainability standards. Scholars remain divided on whether we should expect such company-led programs to affect change. We use a major food retailer as a critical case to evaluate the effectiveness of a company-led supply chain standard in improving environmental farm management practices. We find that the company-led standard increases the adoption of most environmental best management practices among the company's fruit, vegetable and flower growers in South Africa. This result is robust across two identification strategies: a panel analysis of over 950 farm audits and a cross-sectional matching analysis using original survey data. In-depth interviews suggest that the program's unique focus on capacity building through audit visits by highly trained staff, coupled with a close business relationship between the retailer and their growers help to explain the increased effectiveness of the program as compared to other private environmental standards. Contrary to the argument that company-led initiatives are mere window dressing, this study provides a critical example of the positive role private governance mechanisms can play in improving environmental farm management practices globally.
Food security experts identify government support, policy implementation, private sector engagement and investment in smallholder farmers as keys to Africa’s agricultural future.
Food security experts from the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) gathered to discuss transforming food production in Africa at Stanford on Nov. 29. The symposium, hosted by the Center on Food Security and the Environment (FSE) examined the challenges, strategies, and possible solutions for catalyzing and sustaining an inclusive agriculture transformation in Africa.
Moderator Ertharin Cousin, FSE visiting fellow and previous World Food Programme director with more than 25 years of experience on hunger, food, and resilience strategies, launched the panel by outlining Africa’s plight. “Today some 100 million of the farmers across Sub-Saharan Africa farm less than 2 hectares of land. Some 80 percent of those living in rural areas are poor. More than 30 percent of the rural population is chronically hungry and 35 percent of the under-five-year-olds are stunted. By 2050, the bulk of the world's population growth will take place on the continent. In fact, some project that 1.3 billion will be added to the continent, and Nigeria’s [population] will grow larger than the size of the United States between now and 2050,” Cousin said
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While Africa continues to experience the highest occurrence of food insecurity worldwide, the continent also contains over 60 percent of the worlds uncultivated but fertile land. AGRA formed in 2006 to fulfill the vision that Africa can feed itself and the world. Panelists included Agnes Kalibata, AGRA President and former Minister of Agriculture and Animal Resources of Rwanda; Kanayo F. Nwanze, AGRA board member and immediate past president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development; Usha Barwale Zehr, AGRA board member and Director and Chief Technology Officer of Maharashtra Hybrid Seeds Company Private Limited; and Rajiv Shah, AGRA board member, Rockefeller Foundation President and former Administer of USAID.
Kanayo F. Nwanze stressed the importance of agricultural transformation for Africa’s future. “No country in the world ever transformed itself without going through an agrarian change. No country. Europe, 17th; Japan, 18th century; 19th century was the US, your country; China, 20th century. Why should they be different from Africa? So, first and foremost, we have to have total agricultural transformation,” Nwanze said.
AGRA president, Agnes Kalibata, also spoke to the need for policy implementation and government support in helping drive change. “AGRA as an institution can only do so much. But these governments have the potential and the capacity to reach every corner of their countries. The problem is they are challenged by capacity to do that, by capacity to design proper programs, and by capacity to implement these programs,” Kalibata said.
Expanding on governments' ability to impact and drive change, Usha Barwale Zehr highlighted Asia’s success, specifically with strategic partnerships. “…we've done a lot of talking about public/private partnership. Not so much on the ground on implementing it in a manner, which happened in Asia, for instance, where there was policy, and, most importantly, government will. The government was willing to do whatever it took to make sure that agriculture was transformed at the end of it,” Zehr said.
Beyond government and policy support the panelists also addressed the need for innovation and access to seed technologies. “Why is it that the African farmer and the Indian farmer should not have access to what the American farmer has access to today and reaps benefit from it? …So it's the hybrids, the varieties, the GM technology. Tomorrow it'll be the gene-edited products. And after that we will talk about the satellite-based imaging data that we will use for developing drought-tolerant crops for that very, very small micro environment that existed in the one district in Nigeria,” Zehr said.
"By 2050, who is going to feed Africa? … It's the youth of today. But they're not going to be using the same technologies that exist today. Just think of what IT can do, aggregation, organization of farmer's groups. So, the elements are there. I see the agriculture of tomorrow meeting the challenge – for Africa meeting that challenge is Africa being at the forefront of feeding the world. Africa has to be able to feed itself first. And we have all the opportunities there,” Nwanze said.
This is the first installment of the Global Food Security Symposium series hosted by Stanford University's Center on Food Security and the Environment and generously supported by Zach Nelson and Elizabeth Horn. FSE is a joint initiative of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.
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Panel members at the Global Food Security Symposium, Nov. 29 2017.
Stanford’s Center on Food Security and the Environment launches new symposium series focused on global food security with panel exploring Africa’s agricultural potential.
Organized by the Center on Food Security and the Environment (FSE), the Nov. 29 symposium is the first in the center’s new Global Food Security Symposium series. Panel members include visiting AGRA board members, who will examine the challenges, strategies, and possible solutions for catalyzing and sustaining an inclusive agriculture transformation in Africa. This symposium marks the third series established by FSE convening thought leaders addressing global food security issues.
Afflicted by conflict, political upheaval, and extreme weather patterns Africa continues to experience the highest occurrence of food insecurity. However, with over 60 percent of the worlds uncultivated but fertile land, there is significant room for improvement. AGRA formed in 2006 to fulfill the vision that Africa can feed itself and the world. As an alliance led by Africans with roots in farming communities across the continent, they work to understand the unique needs of farmers and offer sustainable solutions designed to boost production.
In a region with 27.4 percent of the population currently experiencing food insecurity, creating a sustainable agricultural revolution remains a key solution to improving food security across the area. Moderated by Ertharin Cousin, previous World Food Programme director, with 25 years of experience on hunger, food, and resilience strategies, the panel will explore how an agricultural transformation in Africa can sustain a growing population, relieve hunger, generate jobs, improve social cohesion, and create global exports.
Panel members include: Ertharin Cousin (moderator), Payne Distinguished Lecturer at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Visiting Fellow at the Center on Food Security and the Environment, former US Ambassador to the UN Agencies for Food and Agriculture in Rome.
Agnes Kalibata, the President of AGRA and former Minister of Agriculture and Animal Resources of Rwanda.
Kanayo F. Nwanze, the immediate past president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), winner of the Africa Food Prize in 2016, AGRA board member.
Rajiv Shah, Rockefeller Foundation President, former Administer of USAID (2010-15) where he led bipartisan reform and expansion of US efforts combating global food insecurity. During his previous work at the Gates Foundation he helped launched AGRA.
Usha Barwale Zehr, Director and Chief Technology Officer at Maharashtra – one of India’s largest and most successful multinational seed companies – and AGRA board member.
This is the first installment of the Global Food Security Symposium series hosted by Stanford University's Center on Food Security and the Environment and generously supported by Zach Nelson and Elizabeth Horn. FSE is a joint initiative of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.
Food security will be increasingly challenged by climate change, natural resource degradation, and population growth. Wheat yields, in particular, have already stagnated in many regions and will be further affected by warming temperatures. Despite these challenges, wheat yields can be increased by improving management practices in regions with existing yield gaps. To identify the magnitude and causes of current yield gaps in India, one of the largest wheat producers globally, we produced 30 meter resolution yield maps from 2001 to 2015 across the Indo-Gangetic Plains (IGP), the nation's main wheat belt. Yield maps were derived using a new method that translates satellite vegetation indices to yield estimates using crop model simulations, bypassing the need for ground calibration data. This is one of the first attempts to apply this method to a smallholder agriculture system, where ground calibration data are rarely available. We find that yields can be increased by 11% on average and up to 32% in the eastern IGP by improving management to current best practices within a given district. Additionally, if current best practices from the highest-yielding state of Punjab are implemented in the eastern IGP, yields could increase by almost 110%. Considering the factors that most influence yields, later sow dates and warmer temperatures are most associated with low yields across the IGP. This suggests that strategies to reduce the negative effects of heat stress, like earlier sowing and planting heat-tolerant wheat varieties, are critical to increasing wheat yields in this globally-important agricultural region.
The gap between yield potential and average farmers’ yield measures the capacity for yield improvement with current technology. The North China Plain (NCP) is a major maize producing region of China, and improving maize yield of NCP is essential to food security of the country. Some previous studies have found a substantial maize yield gap in this region (∼100% of average yields), whereas others have reported much smaller gaps. This study used remote sensing estimated yield at 30-m resolution to quantify county level yield distributions, and then used these distributions to calculate yield gaps and the persistence level of yield for 76 counties in NCP. The average yield was 8.66 t/ha across county years, and the averaged county-level yield gap, as measured by the difference between the top 10 percentile of yields and the average yield of each county, was 0.76 t/ha, or 8.7% of the average yield. When measured as the difference between maximum and average yields in each county, the estimated gap increased to an average of 31%. We also evaluated the persistence level of farmers’ yield performance, as an indicator of how much gap might be reduced by propagating agronomic practices of the highest yielding farmers. The average of yield gap persistence was 25.9% of the average yield gap, or 2.3% of average yield with a range from 0.4% to 5.3% across counties. The distance to major rivers was identified as one factor with a significant effect on yield. Nevertheless, there was tremendous spatial heterogeneity in yield persistence level across NCP, and further analysis within individual counties is required to better prioritize means to shrink the yield gap.
An interview with authors of the “The Tropical Oil Crop Revolution” predicts the future of soy and palm oil booms by examining the past and present.
Used in everything from food to fuel, soybean and palm oil have seen production rates skyrocket in the past 20 years. Controversy surrounds the planting of oil crops – cultivated primarily in Southeast Asia and South America – as they are often grown on deforested lands and rely on large farmers and agribusiness rather than smallholders. “The Tropical Oil Crop Revolution: Food, Feed, Fuel, and Forests,” a new book co-authored by Stanford University researchers, examines the economic, social and environmental impacts of the oil crop revolution, and explores how to develop a more sustainable future.
Derek Byerlee, visiting fellow at Stanford’s Center on Food Security and the Environment (FSE), FSE Fellow Walter P. Falcon, and FSE Director Rosamond L. Naylor recently discussed some of their book’s key ideas.
Q: What are the key similarities and differences between the rise of oil crops and the 1965-85 green revolution?
A: From 1990 to 2010, world production of soybean grew by 220 percent and production of palm oil by 300 percent. Like the green revolution for cereal crops, this recent revolution involves two crops – oil palm and soybeans – that dramatically expanded shares in their respective crop subsector – oil crops.
The oil crop revolution differs from its predecessor, the green revolution of rice and wheat, in its mode of expansion. The green revolution embraced tens of millions of producers across many countries, especially where irrigation was available. The oil crop revolution was highly concentrated in a few countries and almost entirely in rainfed areas. Unlike the green revolution, which was spurred on by rapid yield gains, the force behind the oil crop revolution was expansion of crop area.
Q: What are some ways to improve oil palm sustainability?
A: A lot of faith has been put on certification and private standards and commitments. However, without effective land and forest governance, it will be very difficult for the private sector to operate. The state at both national and local levels will need greatly improved and more transparent systems starting from land and forest tenure laws, information systems, civil service capacity and judicial and redress systems.
Q:How will the future of oil crops differ from the past?
A: By 2050, we predict demand for oil crops to drop by as much as two-thirds. Demand for biofuel feedstocks cannot maintain the rapid pace of the past decade. Vegetable oils used for food will also grow more slowly. In Asia, population growth will slow and the effects of rising incomes will diminish as consumers in middle-income countries reach high levels of vegetable oil consumption.
The biggest wild card in terms of supply is land availability. Africa has the most land available, however access to clear property rights are often difficult due to “customary rights” to the land. Soybean, a new crop in much of Africa, will increase along with oil palm. We believe the area covered by oil crops does not have to expand greatly; rather, intensification of existing crop land and a modest expansion in area can meet demand. Steady progress is possible through genetic gains in yield. Sufficient degraded land is available for area expansion, provided land governance and incentive systems are developed to steer the expansion onto degraded lands.
Q: How has development of the biodiesel industry affected tropical vegetable oils in the past 25 years, and how will it shape the sector going forward?
A: Before the turn of the 21st century, few analysts predicted that biodiesel would play a major role in boosting global vegetable oil demand and prices. As it turns out, the expansion of biodiesel markets has been responsible for roughly half of the increase in vegetable oil consumption since 2013. Global biodiesel production more than doubled between 2007 and 2013. By some estimates, it could grow another 50 percent by 2025.
National energy policies continue to play a dominant role in the profitability of the biodiesel industry. The growing response of biofuel policies to low agricultural commodity prices is an important factor that is bound to keep biodiesel in the transportation fuel mix. This is true at least in countries that have strong interests oil crops, such as Indonesia, Malaysia, and Colombia in the case of oil palm, and the U.S., Brazil, and Argentina in the case of soybeans. Without policies mandating the use of biodiesel in fuel mixes, or incentivizing its use, the industry might fade away.
Q: What do you believe is the biggest takeaway from your research?
A: We are cautiously optimistic that the future expansion of the oil crop sector can be managed more sustainably. The predicted slowing of demand and land requirements will reduce pressure on native ecosystems. Several signs point to convergence among global consumers, private business, civil society, and local governments in finding ways to minimize the trade-offs between economic benefits and social and environmental costs.
Derek Byerlee, is an Adjunct Professor in the Global Human Development Program at Georgetown University and Editor-in-Chief of the Global Food Security journal. Walter P. Falcon is the Farnsworth Professor of International Agricultural Policy (Emeritus) at Stanford, senior fellow with the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment. Rosamond L. Naylor is the William Wrigley Professor in Earth Science and Professor of Economics (by courtesy) and Gloria and Richard Kushel Director, at the Center on Food Security and the Environment Stanford.
In a shack that now sits below sea level, a mother in Bangladesh struggles to grow vegetables in soil inundated by salt water. In Malawi, a toddler joins thousands of other children perishing from drought-induced malnutrition. And in China, more than one million people died from air pollution in 2012 alone.
Around the world, climate change is already having an effect on human health.
In a recent paper, Katherine Burke and Michele Barry from the Stanford Center for Innovation in Global Health, along with former Wellesley College President Diana Walsh, described climate change as “the ultimate global health crisis.” They offered recommendations to the new United States president to address the urgently arising health risks associated with climate change.
Bangladeshi children make their way through flood waters.
The authors, along with Stanford researchers Marshall Burke, Eran Bendavid and Amy Pickering who also study climate change, are concerned by how little has been done to mitigate its effects on health.
There is still time to ease — though not eliminate — the worst effects on health, but as the average global temperature continues to creep upward, time appears to be running short.
“I think we are at a critical point right now in terms of mitigating the effects of climate change on health,” said Amy Pickering, a research engineer at the Woods Institute for the Environment. “And I don’t think that’s a priority of the new administration at all.”
Health effects of climate change
Even in countries like the United States that are well-equipped to adapt to climate change, health impacts will be significant.
“Extremes of temperature have a very observable direct effect,” said Eran Bendavid, an assistant professor of medicine and Stanford Health Policy core faculty member.
“We see mortality rates increase when temperatures are very low, and especially when they are very high.”
Bendavid also has seen air pollutants cause respiratory problems in people from Beijing to Los Angeles to villages in Sub-Saharan Africa.
“Hotter temperatures make it such that particulate matter and dust and pollutants stick around longer,” he said.
In addition to respiratory issues, air pollution can have long-term cognitive effects. A study in Chile found that children who are exposed to high amounts of air pollution in utero score lower on math tests by the fourth grade.
“I think we’re only starting to understand the true costs of dirty air,” said Marshall Burke. “Even short-term exposure to low levels can have life-long effects.”
Low-income countries like Bangladesh already suffer widespread, direct health effects from rising sea levels. Salt water flooding has crept through homes and crops, threatening food sources and drinking water for millions of people.
“I think that flooding is one of the most pressing issues in low-income and densely populated countries,” said Pickering. “There’s no infrastructure there to handle it.”
Standing water left over from flooding is also a breeding ground for diseases like cholera, diarrhea and mosquito-borne illnesses, all of which are likely to become more prevalent as the planet warms.
On the flip side, many regions of Sub-Saharan Africa — where clean water is already hard to access — are likely to experience severe droughts. The United Nations warned last year that more than 36 million people across southern and eastern Africa face hunger due to drought and record-high temperatures.
Residents may have to walk farther to find water, and local sources could become contaminated more easily. Pickering fears that losing access to nearby, clean water will make maintaining proper hygiene and growing nutritious foods a challenge.
Climate change will affect health in all sectors of society.
All of these effects and more can also damage mental health, said Katherine Burke and her colleagues in their paper. The aftermath of extreme weather events and the hardships of living in long-term drought or flood can cause anxiety, depression, grief and trauma.
Climate change will affect health in every sector of society, but as Katherine Burke and her colleagues said, “….climate disruption is inflicting the greatest suffering on those least responsible for causing it, least equipped to adapt, least able to resist the powerful forces of the status quo.
“If we fail to act now,” they said, “the survival of our species may hang in the balance.”
What can the new administration do to ease health effects?
If the Paris Agreement’s emissions standards are met, scientists predict that the world’s temperature will increase about 2.7 degrees Celsius – still significant but less hazardous than the 4-degree increase projected from current emissions.
The United States plays a critical role in the Paris Agreement. Apart from the significance of cutting its own emissions, failing to live up to its end of the bargain — as the Trump administration has suggested — could have a significant impact on the morale of the other countries involved.
“The reason that Paris is going to work is because we’re in this together,” said Marshall Burke. “If you don’t meet your target, you’re going to be publicly shamed.”
The Trump administration has also discussed repealing the Clean Power Plan, Obama-era legislation to decrease the use of coal, which has been shown to contribute to respiratory disease.
“Withdrawing from either of those will likely have negative short- and long-run health impacts, both in the U.S. and abroad,” said Marshall Burke.
Scott Pruitt, who was confirmed today as the head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), is expected to carry out Trump’s promise to dismantle environment regulations.
Despite the Trump administration’s apparent doubts about climate change, a few prominent Republicans do support addressing its effects.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, the former chairman and CEO of Exxon Mobile, supports a carbon tax, which would create a financial incentive to turn to renewable energy sources. He also has expressed support for the Paris Agreement. It is possible that as secretary of state, Tillerson could help maintain U.S. obligations from the Paris Agreement, though it is far from certain whether he would choose to do so or how Trump would react.
More promising is a recent proposal from the Climate Leadership Council. Authored by eight leading Republicans — including two former secretaries of state, two former secretaries of the treasury and Rob Walton, Walmart’s former chairman of the board — the plan seeks to reduce emissions considerably through a carbon dividends plan.
Already an issue, malnutrition will increase with droughts in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Their proposal would gradually increase taxes on carbon emissions but would return the proceeds directly to the American people. Americans would receive a regular check with their portion of the proceeds, similar to receiving a social security check. According to the authors, 70 percent of Americans would come out ahead financially, keeping the tax from being a burden on low- and middle-income Americans while still incentivizing lower emissions.
“A tax on carbon is exactly what we need to provide the right incentives and induce the sort of technological and infrastructure change needed to reduce long-term emissions,” said Marshall Burke.
Pickering added, “This policy is a ray of hope for meaningful action on climate.”
It remains to be seen whether the new administration and congress would consider such a program.
What can academics do to help?
Meanwhile, academics can promote health by researching the effects of climate change and finding ways to adapt to them.
“I think it’s fascinating that there’s just so little data right now on how climate change is going to impact health,” said Pickering.
Studying the effects of warming on the world challenges traditional methods of research.
“You can’t create any sort of experiment,” said Bendavid. “There’s only one climate and one planet.”
The scholars agree that interdisciplinary study is a critical part of adapting to climate change and that more research is needed.
“If ever there was an issue worthy of a leader’s best effort, this is the moment, this is the issue,” said Katherine Burke and her colleagues. “Time is short, but it may not be too late to make all the difference.”
Bangladeshi children make their way through flood waters.
Climate change will affect health in all sectors of society.
Already an issue, malnutrition will increase with droughts in Sub-Saharan Africa.
