More connections: Sustainable livestock opportunities and new food system realities

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Shirley Tarawali, assistant director general of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and chair of the Global Agenda for Sustainable Livestock, made a keynote presentation at an Agri4D online conference, Food Systems for New Realities, held 28–30 Sep 2021. The conference was organized by SLU Global and the Swedish International Agriculture Network Initiative (SIANI), with support from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida). This blog post was first published by ILRI 4 Oct 2021. 

Tarawali’s remarks, ‘More connections: Sustainable livestock opportunities and new food system realities’, pulled examples from the livestock sector to illustrate the importance of existing, new and diverse connections to deliver on the future sustainable, inclusive, resilient and inclusive food systems we all aspire to.

A transcript of her remarks follows.

As I considered the theme of this conference, Food systems for new realities, and the core question it addresses, as I brainstormed with colleagues—and I particularly want to acknowledge ILRI’s Susan MacMillan and David Aronson in this regard—I found myself circling back again and again to the new connections that have arisen recently, and more connections that are needed to address—and to influence—the new realities.

Of course, food connects us all! We all need to eat. We all have preferences. We all like to make choices—especially about food!

But when it comes to food—especially milk, meat and eggs—let’s be careful that the wealthier ones of us don’t allow our choices or the voices about our choices to impact on those who have little or no choice and for whom these foods would make an immense difference to their wellbeing.

There are some connections that relate to this overall theme and which are part of those new realities—new connections that influence and deliver.

Food system connections

  • With ‘more food’ needed to feed ‘more people’, we need to better connect how food is produced, transported, processed, marketed and consumed
  • We need to understand the connections among the many ways that foods are produced and their impacts on the environment
  • We need to understand and address the multiple trade-offs as well as connections involved in making our food systems truly sustainable

For small- and medium-sized livestock enterprises in low- and middle-income countries, where the people–livestock connections are still very close and where demand for milk, meat and eggs is growing fastest, the oft-cited connections now are between livestock and the environment and livestock and human health.

But let’s not forget other connections:

  • Livestock provide livelihoods, jobs and incomes for more than a billion people
  • Women, who in lower-income countries make up two-thirds of all mixed crop-and-livestock farmers, have a unique intersection with livestock
  • Household stock are often the only asset that women can own
  • Farm animals may be the only means for a girl to go to school
  • Cattle, buffaloes, camels, sheep, goats, pigs and poultry and their many products provide women with nutritious food, or, if they sell those foods, with the income needed to buy other foods, to feed their families
  • And germane to today’s topics is livestock’s role in ‘agroecology’ and the ‘circular bioeconomy’ (‘closing the loop’). Because small and medium production enterprises often take the form of integrated crop-livestock systems, they are already operating as a circular bioeconomy, albeit one that needs improved efficiency and productivity. Or these enterprises take the form of pastoral herding systems, which play essential roles in, and present new opportunities for, environmental stewardship of the world’s vast rangelands.

Globally, we have the UNFSS (United Nations Food Systems Summit), COP26 (United Nations Climate Change Conference), N4G (Nutrition for Growth global pledge drive) and CBD (United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity) all being held in just in the last quarter of 2021. These meetings are connecting people, conversations, ideas, commitments and investments.

Pandemic lessons about connections

  • The pandemic has painfully but usefully reminded us just how globally connected we all are. Perhaps Dr Tedros’ pandemic mantra—‘No one is safe until we are all safe’—needs to be expanded to global food systems—‘No one is fed or nourished until we are all fed and nourished’
  • We’ve seen how ‘connected science’ delivered (spectacular) vaccine solutions
  • And we’ve seen how vaccines alone will not suffice; we need similarly focused connections within and among institutions, policymakers, government officials and socio-economists
  • And, of course, the pandemic has underscored the need to understand the connections between people, animals and environments within a ‘One Health’ paradigm

Let me now turn to three connections that still must be established, developed and strengthened—three connections that are themselves interconnected!

Three new food system connections needed

Connections to diversity

  • Reality for each of us depends very much on our local context, which very much differs depending on where and how we live. This is particularly true of livestock, which globally play multiple and very different roles, involve very different species, and are raised to produce a range of commodities in very different environments and under very different circumstances.
  • Because these different realities are often overlooked, debates about the roles of livestock, for example, can get polarized, with contrasting views about whether livestock are part of the solution, or part of the problem, in addressing the new food system realities.

I’m as guilty as anyone of having this kind of polarized (unconnected) viewpoint. Working in the developing world, I have thought that the ‘livelihoods’ livestock provide are more important in poor than in rich countries. I was wrong of course. People in wealthier countries employed in livestock production, processing, trading, retailing, etc. are just as dependent on livestock as the millions raising farm animals in poorer countries. That to me just emphasizes the need for very different pathways to reach a united goal to improve our food systems.

Or think, for example, of the pathways needed in the developing world for a smallholder mixed farmer, or a medium‑sized dairy cooperative member, or a pastoral herder, or a female head of household, or a traditional village elder or a young urban entrepreneur, and think of the many traders and processors of livestock foods and the many people providing feed and veterinary and other inputs and services to livestock farmers. Think of the variety of animal husbandry practices: from massive dairies in China to medium‑sized enterprises raising a few hundred pigs in the emerging economies of Asia, to family farms raising one or two cows and a handful of goats and chickens in Africa. What this huge diversity tells me is that a sustainable development trajectory—and the actions and science needed to drive it—will differ greatly depending on where one starts from, and with what resources.

Connections to science

While global food trends right now are heading in the wrong direction—with increasing numbers of people descending into poverty and hunger—our globalized world has, paradoxically, more new knowledge, more science and innovation, more enabling technologies than ever before.

As the pandemic has shown us, ‘connected science’ can deliver miracles such as rapidly developed vaccines against a new pathogen. But to make a bigger, and more equitable, difference in a diverse world, that science must be connected to, and contextualized within, a broad and diverse set of institutional, policy and social environments.

Connections to investments

We heard last week at the UNFSS of several large financial commitments to realizing the better food systems we aspire to. We must make those financial connections also work for these ‘new realities’, even when those realities are challenging, conflicting, confusing or paradoxical. By connecting people from different worlds, donors from different countries, ideas from different disciplines, innovations from different communities with a wealth of new science and knowledge, we can make the difference that makes the difference.

Let’s connect!

Let’s deliver!

Watch a video of Tarawali’s short (7-minute) talk here: https://youtu.be/QOJlSeY0kxE

DevRes 2021: Takeaways that may help us in reaching SDGs in low-income countries

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This blog post is written by Adan Martinez Cruz, Senior Lecturer at the Department of Forest Economics and SLU Global coordinator.

From 14 June to 16 June 2021, DevRes 2021 allowed us to exchange insights on challenges and opportunities to accomplish the 2030 Agenda –with a focus on low-income countries. Originally scheduled for June 2020 to take place at UmeĂ„ University campus, DevRes went digital. The success of this adaptation strategy can be illustrated by the 500 registered participants from all over the world, the 125 speakers in 51 sessions, and the variety of topics covered.

I was fortunate to chair two sessions and I will tell you my takeaways from these sessions.

During the “Gender and inclusion in agriculture” session, we learnt about the relevance of empowering women to fight poverty among smallholder farmers in Nigeria, and about the role of ethnicity and gender in adopting agroforestry strategies in Vietnam. In particular, Mai Phuong Nguyen, who works at World Agroforestry, reported her findings from semi-structured interviews to 60 farmers (30 men and 30 females) across three provinces of northwestern Vietnam. These interviews explore preferences, constraints, and opportunities to adopt agroforestry practices among Thai and H’mong people. These two ethnic minorities rely on farming sloped land, which results on high levels of soil erosion –hence the need to explore the opportunities for adoption of agroforestry. The finding I wish to highlight here is the difference across gender in interest and perceptions about benefits from agroforestry –women are less certain about what agroforestry entails, and therefore are less interested in adopting agroforestry practices. This difference seems to be originated in the different channels of information that men and women have access to –while men have formal and informal learning channels, women rely mostly on informal channels. The implication is that formal agricultural extension services, which are not currently reaching out to women, must be tailored to inform women or otherwise agroforestry practices may spread at a slower pace than desired.

During the “Climate change –resilience, mitigation, and adaptation” session, we discussed how climate impacts efficiency of subsistence farming in Ethiopia, the effect of the Sloping Land Conversion Program on Chinese farmers’ vulnerability to climate change, and how capital assets enable resilience to water scarcity among small farmers in Indonesia. Francisco X. Aguilar, who is Professor at the Department of Forest Economics in SLU, and co-authors have explored the association between rural livelihood capitals (natural, human, social, financial, and physical) and the avoidance of, adaptation to, and inability to withstand water scarcity among 200 small farmers in South Sulawasi, Indonesia. Their findings illustrate not only heterogeneity in the association but also the relevance of social and human capitals as assets to enable resilience. In particular, physical and natural assets in the form of irrigation infrastructure and direct access to water sources were saliently associated with resilience to water scarcity; factors associated with capacity to adapt were more nuanced with social capital being closely linked. Years of farming experience as a form of human capital asset was strongly associated with resiliency.

DevRes aims to explore the challenges that require societal transformation in order to accomplish the 2030 Agenda with its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). As illustrated by the couple of findings I have highlighted here, DevRes 2021 delivered insights that we have taken with us in our pursue to design policies that empower citizens of low-income countries to accomplish by their own means the 2030 Agenda and its SDGs.

Survival of indigenous communities and forests amidst the pandemic

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This blog post is written by Anudini Wijayarathna, Master’s student in Rural Development & Natural Resource Management at SLU.

Image by cultur668 from Pixabay

‘Impacts of the pandemic on forest communities and forest resource use – what do we know, what do we need to know and how to find out?’ have been one of the most enlightening discussions that I have participated in. It was a dialogue co-arranged by Focali (Forest, Climate and Livelihood research network) and SIANI (Swedish International Agricultural Network Initiative).

It’s been around a year since the COVID-19 pandemic emerged worldwide. Yet, the impacts of it will extend over many years. Currently, there are various entities that are deeply impacted by the pandemic globally as well as nationally.  Forest resources and forest communities can be considered as one of them. Most importantly, the world is still in the process of identifying the extent of these implications. This dialogue has been an instrumental platform in creating awareness on that. However, my attention was grabbed particularly by the discussion on the disruptions that occurred in the livelihoods of indigenous people.

Absence of state and regressive actions of the governments

Having forest-based livelihoods, indigenous communities are affected by the pandemic in different ways. To a certain extent, the pandemic has been a positive cause of livelihoods for some of the indigenous communities. They got the chance to depend more on the forest resources as there are fewer external activities functioning within the forests due to lockdowns. Nevertheless, for some indigenous communities, the pandemic has been a cause of destruction.

In this event, Ricardo Camilo Niño Izquierdo, Technical Secretary of the Indigenous Secretariat of the National Commission for Indigenous Territories, Colombia and Keyla Barrero, Anthropologist, National University of San Marcos, Peru, shared their views on how the pandemic has affected the indigenous communities. According to their experience, the indigenous people are subjected to negligence with insufficient health care and sanitation by the state during the nationwide lockdowns.

The absence of state governing authorities in the forest territories during the lockdowns allowed powerful actors to expand their illicit activities. Those are illegal logging, use of land for illegal plantations, presence of armed groups, drug trafficking etc. These activities aggravated deforestation in 2020 in comparison to the previous years. Moreover, there has been a significant increase in human rights violations of indigenous communities, which sometimes ends up in murdering them.

The situation becomes worse when the governments are trying to overcome the ongoing financial crisis through detrimental policies and actions towards the forest resources. Renewal of mining and excessive extraction of resources by the authorities is such an instance that threatens the sustainability of the livelihoods. In addition to that, indigenous people who are not yet given proper land titles or tenures, get further suppressed when the local governments endorse illegal invaders to occupy the forests. Lack of effective policies and excluding indigenous community representation in the government consultation procedures has also been a stimulating factor for this vulnerable situation.

Ultimately, all these activities cause not only the deterioration of indigenous people’s livelihoods but also many other destructive consequences such as degradation of natural resources and climate and increase of global hunger and poverty. Thus, reaching UN Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 has become an immense challenge to the whole world.

For a brighter future

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

Under such circumstances, it is a dire need to put forward remedial measures to decrease these vulnerabilities. Yet, identifying the needful actions to overcome these issues is the toughest among all. I believe, primarily it is important at this stage to lay a legal framework to ensure indigenous communities’ land tenure and to include them in the government consultation in policy making.

As discussed in the dialogue, it is also crucial to strengthen the local capacity building on merging the voice of indigenous and local communities. I consider this kind of effort will be essential to involve indigenous people and their lay-knowledge in local sustainable development efforts such as smallholder farming and plantations. It will be beneficial to upgrade the livelihoods as well as to promote sustainable use of ecosystems. In order to make the procedure more effective, the researchers and practitioners also need to collaborate in building knowledge and applying it in implementation.

Apart from that, creating public awareness continuously through global partnerships on the challenges and opportunities for indigenous communities is also needful for the long-term survival of indigenous communities as well as the forests. Accordingly, strengthening indigenous communities will not be merely an effort of uplifting indigenous livelihoods but also a part of green recovery. However, in order to see a brighter future, the implementation strategies of these remedial measures might have to be shaped according to the situation while aiming towards sustainable development.

Is there a definite value of water?

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This blog post is written by Jennie Barron, Professor at the Department of Soil and Environment; Agricultural water management, SLU

Photo: Jennie Barron, SLU

Water is a multifaceted resource from simply being served our daily glass of water, to the complex flow through the landscapes to produce food, recreation and other ecosystem services. Because of the multiple uses and benefits of water, there are many challenges of valuing and weighting benefits and impacts for the different uses and users.

This becomes evident in times of shocks and in crises. For example such as when the landscape  or society runs out of water, as in the extreme drought of 2018 in Sweden, or when 2 billion of people lack health and sanitation facilities to simply wash hands to cope with COVID-19. The past years global and local crises of COVID-19 has left no one untouched. And the crisis of COVID-19, has really reoriented the issue of conversation of water, and the value of water. 

The projections of water related crises is on the rise, as food security, sustainable development and climate change takes place. The need to find metrics, process and practise to weight the benefit and impacts of water scarcity will therefore be the key. This year’s World Water Development Report is thus a first step to summarise and synthesise the current perspectives on valuing water. It builds on the recent developments such as the High Level Panel of Water  Statement (2018)  “Every drop counts” and  assessments on water security for food and nutrition by FAO (2020)  â€œ Overcoming water challenges in agriculture“.

 Going from high level statements to reality and practise

 Agriculture is such sector that is an intense water appropriator globally, both in using rainfall, and extracting water for irrigation. In addition, agriculture can have a negative impact on water quality, as a source of agro chemical pollution both from crop and livestock production. Valuing water for irrigation is a particular challenge, as the fresh water from surface and groundwater sources is contested for many users, including the environment, aquatic benefits and food. However, in regions where many people are affected water scarcity and hunger, the value water might bring into agriculture can make significant livelihood improvements. For example in the work assessing benefits for smallholder farmers in the dry area of Bundelkhand , India led by Garg et al (2020), evidence-based soil and water innovations introduced, improved landscape water use and the farmer incomes by up to 170%. At the same time downstream water availability reduced with 40% in a normal rainfall year. Here a dialogue on upstream benefits and values, may need to be negotiated with downstream users.  In a case of livestock systems intensification in Tanzania (Noetenbart et al 2020), choosing the most resource saving option of intensification can have negligible impacts on water use. For example a comparison of livestock production accounting for water appropriation into the fodder, showed that extensive dryland grazing could only marginally increased total water appropriation, whilst improving water productivity with 20-50%, when combining animal health, breeding and feed options.  Here the most water demanding livestock scenario was the system with import of high protein (and more water demanding) fodder crops.

Photo: Jennie Barron, SLU

 Investing to secure water for agriculture is an enabler of development. 

Globally, about 40% of food comes from irrigation-dependent crop production systems, helping to support nutritious and all year food supply. Whereas regions and countries are running out of water, we have other regions that could better support irrigation development to adapt to weather extremes and bring both steady supply of food and nutrition and income. In Sub-Saharan Africa, less than 3% of the crop area is under formal irrigation. Yet smallholder farmers are evolving and investing themselves in so-called farmer led irrigation, despite a number of technical , social and financial challenges (Lefore et al 2019).

It is becoming evident that water is a critical enabler in development and Agenda 2030 for human health, incomes, food and nutrition as well as ecosystem services. Water needs to be bothsafeguarded for multiple benefits, as well as negotiated and explored in some cases, for additional uses in anthropogenic landscapes. By opening for reflecting multiple values, we can develop data, tools and weight benefits and trade-offs more just and equal among uses and users. In 2022, it is the +30 years of the Rio Declaration (UN Earth Summit 1992), including the statement of Integrated water resource development (IWRM) Let’s hope that water is back on the agenda for enabling development as, carefully negotiated for its multiple use and value.

Embracing a better future through school feeding

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This blog post is written by Anudini Wijayarathna, intern at SLU Global & Master’s student in Rural Development & Natural Resource Management at SLU. The content is based on her experience in participating in a Committee on World Food Security (CFS) 47 Side Event and thoughts on it.

Image by AkshayaPatra Foundation from Pixabay

Having participated in the CFS 47 Side Event on ‘How COVID-19 affected school feeding programmes and how to strengthen them post-COVID, including through home-grown school meals’, I realised the importance of having a school meal system. Besides, I have been able to contemplate the necessity of prioritising school feeding even amidst a scenario where schools are closed and students are getting adapted to distance learning currently.  

Providing school meals has been one of the main prevailing initiatives to ensure food security for children. Thus, I believe school meal programmes can be considered as a vital step taken by several countries to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goal ‘Zero Hunger’.

School meals as a factor beyond food security

In the event, different international professionals with hands-on experience spoke about many positive impacts on the society by school meals, beyond ensuring food security. Ville Skinnari, Minister for Development Cooperation and Global Trade, Finland, said; “Providing nutritious food in schools is among the best investments for the future”. Evidence gathered from Finland indicates that “school meals produce high returns in terms of education results, gender equality, health, social protection and economic and agricultural development”. The minister highlighted that, Finland suffered from poverty after World War II and had low literacy rates. In such a situation, school feeding became a transformative innovation to attract children to schools and to increase their literacy rate.  He also emphasised that, school meals in Finland provide one-third of a person’s daily nutrition requirement.

The discussion among the practitioners further revealed that the school meal is a key factor to initiate especially girls’ education. Indirectly, school feeding programmes have also become significant in reducing female child marriages and teenage pregnancies. Additionally, providing nutritious school meals is also a crucial matter of uplifting the nutrition status among girls.

Furthermore, Samuel Mulinda, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Education, Rwanda stated, “having a meal in the school is a right to every child within the government of Rwanda” and it has been nearly a decade since Rwanda initiated school feeding. Recently, they embraced a new policy to expand the school feeding system in the basic education levels. A new scheme includes a procurement method to give easy access to purchase food from local smallholder farmers. Accordingly, school meals have become a source of stabilising the agricultural market system within the local economy.

Will it still be feasible during the pandemic?

Image by Alexandra_Koch from Pixabay

While countries like Rwanda, Brazil, USA, Finland, India, and many others all over the globe are having different school feeding programmes, the COVID-19 pandemic struck the world in 2020. Many governments had to shut down schools completely or partially for the safety of children. Yet, it wasn’t the end of school meals. Even if the schools shifted to distant learning, some countries modified their systems to maintain school feeding. The event unfolded how Finnish municipalities adopted providing in-kind food or food vouchers for children during the pandemic.

Moreover, Bruno Costa e Silva, National School Feeding Programme Analyst, National Fund for the Development of Education, Brazil, stated that Brazil implemented a programme to distribute school meals during the crisis. The involvement of municipalities and civil society organisations is remarkable in executing this programme. He also highlighted the significance of incorporating smallholder farming into the school feeding system. He described how in the state of Amazonas, food production and food supply for school feeding is continuous under family farming during the pandemic. It is also essential that public policy should be in favour of smallholder farming and home-grown school meals. Besides, Paola Barbieri, Project Analyst, Brazilian Cooperation Agency, drew attention to the important role played by South-South Cooperation in continuing school feeding programme in Brazil.

Furthermore, Lindsay Carter, Director, USDA McGovern-Dole Food for Education Program, USA, spoke about the strategies utilised under the McGovern-Dole Program to stabilise school feeding in the needful countries. The programme is actively engaged in providing commodities and technical and financial assistance to school feeding. During the COVID-19 crisis, the McGovern-Dole Program shifted to distribution of take-home rations to children while monitoring the processes. Additionally, the programme upholds collaborating with national governments, local smallholder farmers and communities to safeguard school feeding.

Start, if there isn’t; Continue, if there is

Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic crisis followed by the pandemic definitely, providing school meals is a critical task especially, in the most fragile countries. Nevertheless, considering the numerous benefits that can be reached through school meals, I believe countries should consider continuing school feeding. In the countries where there were no school feeding programmes, it would be best to lay a stepping stone to start at least now. Specifically, in the countries where children are suffering from stunting, wasting, anemia and many other health issues due to malnutrition, initiating school feeding will be an extremely positive investment for the future.

When implementing the programmes, strategies may differ from country to country. However, as the experts in the event stressed out, school feeding programmes can be reached through national and global collaborations. I also firmly believe in the benefits of prioritising local smallholder farming and incorporate it into the school meal programme. Moreover, well-coordinated collaborations between intranational institutions are also essential to initiate such a scheme.

This way, we still can prepare to embrace the post-pandemic world with a healthy and educated generation. Nonetheless, it is up to us to decide how we are going to embrace the future. Are we going to give the future of the world to a weaker generation or to a stronger generation? I’m sure you’ll find it as food for thought.