PERN Cyberseminar: Statement on Climate Change and Food Security in the Sahel by Aly Mbaye

[MUTTARAK Raya]

Dear colleagues,

 

Today’s statement by Ahmadou Aly Mbaye (University Cheikh Anta Diop, Senegal) focuses on the case study of climate change, population dynamics and food security in the Sahel

 

Regardless of climate change, the Sahel has long been hit by chronic poverty, high population growth and conflict which are major drivers of food insecurity in the region. Since natural resources are the main source of livelihoods,  the Sahel is particularly vulnerable to climate change. Climate change can exacerbate the already existing food insecurity issues by disrupting agricultural production and food price.

 

In his statement, Aly has highlighted the key areas where climate change impact on food security is evident. First, salt-water intrusion, increased salinity levels in agricultural land and increasing flood hazards due to sea level rise in the coastal areas can threathen food security. Second, climate change has contributed to the reduction in arable land due to reduced humidity and increased aridity. Third, production of staple crops is subject to high volatility due to climate change and other factors. Fourth, changing weather patterns can affect crop yields which in turn contribute to rising food price. Fifth, there is some evidence showing that food price is positively correlated with conflict events. Climate change thus may contribute to increasing conflict through influencing food price.

 

Aly concludes by pointing out about high population growth in the region, especially in the urban and coastal areas which put an extra pressure on food security. Poor governance also impedes the capacity to adapt to climate change.

 

Please join us on the discussions about the Sahel case study or other regions and context which are facing multiple drivers of food insecurity. The COVID-19 pandemic has also exacerbated the already existing challenges in such region.

Which area of interventions is urgently needed is also worth thinking about.

 

Please send cyberseminar contributions to the email discussion list at pernse...@ciesin.columbia.edu

 

 

-- Raya Muttarak, Moderator, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Austria

-- Andres Ignacio, Moderator, Director for Planning and Geomatics, Environmental Science for Social Change, Philippines

-- Susana Adamo & Alex de Sherbinin, PERN Co-Coordinators, CIESIN, Columbia University, USA

 

 

 

 

Raya Muttarak,  DPhil
Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Global Human Capital (Univ. Vienna, IIASA, VID/ÖAW)
Deputy Program Director, World Population Program
International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
Schlossplatz 1, A-2361 Laxenburg, Austria
Phone : +43 2236 807 329
Fax: +43 2236 71 313
Email: mutt...@iiasa.ac.at, raya.m...@oeaw.ac.at

---

 

[Simon Batterbury]

This echoes a PERN seminar we had in 2007 on similar issues.

Here is a presentation I did –

‘Comments on P-D-E, livelihoods, and agrarian change in the Sahel’ Panel contribution to the Population-Environment Research Network Cyberseminar on Population-Development-Environment Linkages in the Sudano-Sahelian Zone of West Africa (September 2007) Simon Batterbury

https://www.populationenvironmentresearch.org/pern_files/papers/Batterbury_SahelCyberseminar.pdf

I think the key points [listed as research questions at the end] are that back then at least, migration and urbanisation were already becoming the prevalent adaptive responses to drought, land pressures, and food shortage.  Regional-level investigations tend to miss the nuances of local adaptive strategies, conflicts, and so-on which are too readily blamed on population increase or region-wide climatic change. I missed the prevalence of land grabbing, now much worse, and violent movements were not so prevalent.  

 

One question was “- If agriculture suffers in many parts of the Sahel over the next 50 years, does this really _matter_ given the stronger monetization and stronger international linkages and to neighbouring regions and beyond? If it does not really matter, will we be following the views of the agrarian political economists, rather than the P-D-E experts, and seeing an increasingly ‘globalised’ Sahel producing less of its own food and importing more? (Toulmin and Guèye 2005)”  Demographic variables mean far less if Sahelian localities have ‘globalised’ through successful [and unsuccessful or temporary] migration and remittances, and if lack of access to productive land is determined by large and corrupt land grabbing.

 

 

A/Prof. Simon Batterbury | School of Geography |1.17,  221 Bouverie St, University of Melbourne | 3010 VIC | Australia | simonpjb @unimelb.edu.au  +61 383449319 

& Visiting Professor, LEC, Lancaster University, UK, Europe

University of Melbourne Outstanding PhD Supervisor 2019

http://www.simonbatterbury.net

Journal of Political Ecology  https://journals.uair.arizona.edu/index.php/JPE/index

Socially just publishing outlets https://simonbatterbury.wordpress.com/2015/10/25/list-of-decent-open-access-journals/

 

 

 

[MUTTARAK Raya]

Thanks Simon for sharing your paper back in 2007. It is indeed important for us to revisit the same case study used back in 2007.

 

I’m not an expert of the Sahel region myself, but I think it’s highly relevant to revisit your remark on whether  the Sahel would import more food and produce less on its own. If this is currently the case, the climate impact on food security can be indirectly through food supply chain and food price.

 

Tomorrow’s statement on technological solutions to food security challenges is relevant to the Sahel case as well.

 

Best wishes,

 

Raya

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[Andres Ignacio]

Thanks to the contributions to the discussion. I feel that there are indeed complex interplays among the various drivers that push food insecurity as we deal with compounding issues brought about by climate change dynamics globally.

If you may allow me to contribute to the discussion more from a local experience here in the Philippines. One major factor that I am not seeing highlighted in the discussion is how the commercialization of agriculture has become a major driver of poverty and food insecurity particularly affecting smallholder farmers from where we are. Looking at corn cultivation in particular, we are now producing high yield variety corn (hybrids and GMO) to feed a growing animal feed industry. A major problem is that the technological advances in agriculture in this field is, although quite impressive in terms of potential yields, rather expensive and unaffordable for smallholder farmers in our context. The industry is now driving production by promoting the technology through highly abusive financing schemes care of unscrupulous financiers who normally charge up to 10% interest rates on financing per month. And given the other factors that may affect production, whether climate or market driven, the risks are just too high and many farmers end up in debt and even lose land to the financiers.

I wrote a paper recently on this which can be accessed here for those who would like to learn more about how this situation that is a growing concern in our context. I think that from where we are, there is a great need to look at how this kind of dynamic can falsely portray economic development that mainly feeds the middle class (through the livestock market) while significantly driving small farmers into poverty and hunger. I don't even mention the environmental effects of the system at this stage which is another issue altogether.

I hope that we can also put some focus on how the agriculture industry's dominance in the South is not really helping our situation, but rather contributing to a systematic oppression of one of the most vulnerable sectors in our society.

Wishing everyone something to think about this coming weekend. 

Andres

__________________________________

J. Andres F. Ignacio, PhD

Director for Planning and Geomatics Manager

Environmental Science for Social Change

Mindanao Office:

PO Box 57

Paz dela Cerna David St. (beside Shepherd's Meadow)

Barangay Sumpong

8700 Malaybalay City

Philippines

Telefax: (+63 88) 813-2840

Manila Head Office:

1/F Manila Observatory Bldg.
Ateneo de Manila University
Loyola Heights, Q.C., Philippines
Tel:  (+63 2) 926-0452
Fax: (+63 2) 426-0554

Email:              andres...@essc.org.ph

Website:          http://www.essc.org.ph/

Please send cyberseminar contributions to the email discussion list at pernseminars@ciesin.columbia.edu

 

 

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[Jane O'Sullivan]

Thanks for this story, Andres,

Why do farmers choose to grow the feed grain, if it is so risky to finance the inputs? Are they not free to grow food crops for local communities if they wish? Is it not more the case that other changes have driven them to poverty (perhaps too little access to land?) to the point where their best option is this risky cash crop? Or are they coerced in some way by the agro-industry?

Jane

---

From: Andres Ignacio <andres....@gmail.com>
Sent: 22 May 2020 19:51
To: PERNSeminars - List <pernse...@ciesin.columbia.edu>
Cc: simo...@unimelb.edu.au <simo...@unimelb.edu.au>; mutt...@iiasa.ac.at <mutt...@iiasa.ac.at>
Subject: [PERN Cyberseminar] Re: PERN Cyberseminar: Statement on Climate Change and Food Security in the Sahel by Aly Mbaye

 

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[Cascade Tuholske]

I want start by clearly stating that I have limited expertise in smallholder agriculture systems. But I have a question inspired by Andres' comment re the commercialization of smallholder agricultural: 

Many national governments, NGOs and UN programs focus on providing technologies and increased commercialization (e.g. how I read inclusive rural transformation) to increase productivity and output among smallholders and thus keep more people engaged in farming. This strategies are sometimes cited as a means to combat the damage climate change places on smallholders in regions like the Sahel (eg here and here). 

Yet, at the same time, won't improved technologies/commercialization decrease rural agriculture labor demands and thus result in more people moving out of agriculture? If the goal is to use technologies and commercialization to improve smallholder livelihoods and keep folks in agriculture, how do we address this paradox? Or, am I missing something key here? 

Again, I may be ignorant here and this is not my domain expertise. But I have long wanted to pose this question to people who have deeper knowledge. Thank you for your addition to the discussion Andres! 

Cascade Tuholske, PhD

WAVES Lab | Department of Geography

The University of California, Santa Barbara

www.tuholske.com

Please send cyberseminar contributions to the email discussion list at pernse...@ciesin.columbia.edu

 

 

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[Andres Ignacio]

Thanks for the questions Jane. Some of the factors affecting this decision to plant feed grain is that it is very easy to dispose of the harvest - for sure there will always be a trader who will buy your product. Having said that, the smallholder corn farmers are normally supposed to sell to the ones that finance them as per agreement. This is part of the "package" as it were of the informal contract that they get into. 

Furthermore, it is so easy to get financing from local private individuals. Formal banks and financing institutions do exist locally and with much lower interest rates, but their requirements are understandably quite tedious and they are situated quite far away from where the farmers are which add transportation costs on top of that. In the end, it is quite simpler for them to approach local individuals for financing even if the rates are high. 

The promise of high returns from a good harvest is quite enticing for the poor farmers and the seed and fertilizer companies highlight this through their extension workers and demo farms. Local government sometimes even promote companies by providing free branded seeds as aid to the framers. 

In terms of land, there is access although much of the ideal areas that are flat to rolling have already been acquired by richer individuals and what is left to till are steeply sloping areas at times exceeding 100% slope. 

The harvest last season yielded a plentiful harvest but what drove some farmers to failure was the extremely low farmgate prices... The gains were just enough to pay for financing costs plus interest with just a meager amount to live on until the next harvest. 

Yes it is quite a complex situation that sadly maintains the poverty and the resulting hunger in upland communities where we are. 

Andres

__________________________________

J. Andres F. Ignacio, PhD

Director for Planning and Geomatics Manager

Environmental Science for Social Change

Mindanao Office:

PO Box 57

Paz dela Cerna David St. (beside Shepherd's Meadow)

Barangay Sumpong

8700 Malaybalay City

Philippines

Telefax: (+63 88) 813-2840

Manila Head Office:

1/F Manila Observatory Bldg.
Ateneo de Manila University
Loyola Heights, Q.C., Philippines
Tel:  (+63 2) 926-0452
Fax: (+63 2) 426-0554

Email:              andres...@essc.org.ph

Website:          http://www.essc.org.ph/

Please send cyberseminar contributions to the email discussion list at pernse...@ciesin.columbia.edu

 

 

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Andres Ignacio

andres....@gmail.com

[Andres Ignacio]

Very valid questions here Cascade. Indeed agricultural technology needs to be adapted to various environmental, geopolitical, and climatic contexts. As mentioned by Ted Scudder through Alex in the other thread, there needs to be a major shirt in large-scale agribusiness functions. From what we are experiencing here in our part of the world, there seems to have been a hybridization of corporate corn agriculture in that they don’t take the form of large plantation-based operations, but rather some kind of informal “contract growing” mechanism that manages to push advanced technology agricultural inputs (GMO varieties using glyphosate, high use of fertilizers) on small farmers. They cannot buy into the expensive technology and are offered highly disadvantageous financing schemes while wagering that they will strike it big on the next harvest. Indeed, the potential of profit is very high (up to three times the initial investment), but taking into account all the risk factors it becomes more of a gamble than anything. In the end, corporate interests dictate what will be planted as they also make it attractive to financiers and traders to push their crops, giving the latter substantial discounts and relaxed terms of payment, which do not get passed on to the small farmers themselves. In fact, if the crops result in failure for whatever reason (market prices, disease, climate factors, etc.), the full brunt of the losses are shouldered solely by the farmers who still have to pay interest for their financing on top of the amount borrowed. In the end, the system favors corporate interests at the expense of the small farmers. If you talk to small farmers where we are, an overwhelming majority wishes that their children get out of agriculture due to the struggles they have been experiencing.

In the end, I feel that corporate agri players need greater accountability and responsibility in responding to the needs of local farmers. The technological advances not only in agricultural production, but also climate and weather forecasting already have great potential in minimizing risks for the small farmers, but I’m afraid that there is still much work to be done in this regard in terms of improving their situation. Government will need to step up as well in terms of providing alternatives to these farmers and to regulate the practices of private financiers. It will take great commitment and resources to change things, but it is possible given decisive leadership. 

Andres

__________________________________

J. Andres F. Ignacio, PhD

Director for Planning and Geomatics Manager

Environmental Science for Social Change

Mindanao Office:

PO Box 57

Paz dela Cerna David St. (beside Shepherd's Meadow)

Barangay Sumpong

8700 Malaybalay City

Philippines

Telefax: (+63 88) 813-2840

Manila Head Office:

1/F Manila Observatory Bldg.
Ateneo de Manila University
Loyola Heights, Q.C., Philippines
Tel:  (+63 2) 926-0452
Fax: (+63 2) 426-0554

Email:              andres...@essc.org.ph

Website:          http://www.essc.org.ph/

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