Coloniality in US agricultural policy (#journal)

The coloniality of US agricultural policy: articulating agrarian (in)justice

Drawing on participatory action research with La Via Campesina’s US member groups, this paper traces the coloniality of US agricultural policy. The framework of coloniality conjures history, contextualizing US Department of Agriculture (USDA) racism within long legacies of subjugation, while paying homage to historical resistance. It raises the stakes regarding the neo-imperialism of agribusiness monopolies, while highlighting divide-and-conquer strategies and the colonialist mentalities that linger on despite reform. The discursive impact of coloniality builds upon existing, grassroots articulations of the need to decolonize agricultural policy. Calling out the coloniality of US agricultural policy echoes global revalorizations of peasant agriculture, while overcoming the constraints of the term ‘peasant’ in US-English-speaking contexts.

Permaculture as ecological management tool (#journal)

Incorporating permaculture and strategic management for sustainable ecological resource management

 Conventional sustainable resource management systems are based on neoclassical economics that ignore nature's pattern and therefore are not capable of sustainable management of resources. Environmentalists are lately advocating incorporation of Permaculture as holistic approach based on ethics, equitable interaction with eco-systems to obtain sustainability. The paper uses Permaculture to develop a pragmatic tool for policy development. This tool augments management tasks by integrating recording of natural assets, monitoring of key performance indicators and integration of sectorial policies in real time, bringing out policy as a truly live document. The tool enhances the edifice process, balancing short term viewpoints and long term development to secure renewability of natural resources.

Innovation and research in food and health (Journal, open access until 16th July)

The framing of innovation among European research funding actors: Assessing the potential for ‘responsible research and innovation’ in the food and health domain.

Free access, courtesy of Shumaisa Khan, until 16th July 2016.  

Highlights
• Examines framing of innovation among research funding decision makers.
• Innovation perceived to be focused on biosciences and marketable applications.
• Inadequate consideration of normative issue of who defines the problems.
• Shift in framing is necessary to implement responsible research and innovation.


This paper explores how the concept of innovation is understood and used in policy implementation, with a particular focus upon ‘food and health’ science and research policy and funding. Our analysis is based on 55 interviews of various actors engaged in research funding decision-making across eight European countries. Three themes emerged from the analysis: concept of innovation; conditions for innovation; and drivers of innovation; through these themes, the cognitive framing was drawn out.

The cognitive framing suggests that innovation in the food and health domain is perceived to be focused on biosciences and marketable applications to the neglect of social sciences and broader public interest; that the “innovation network” is primarily viewed as centred around scientific/technical and industrial actors; and that the demand-pull dynamic is relevant to innovation in the area of food and health, despite having been relegated in contemporary thinking and policies around innovation. These findings point to the inadequate consideration of the normative issues—how problems are to be defined and addressed—among national research funders in the food and health domain, and indicate a gap between the ideas of innovation under the terms of RRI and innovation as conceptualised by those involved in its governance.

Khan et al.,  2016. The framing of innovation among European research funding actors: Assessing the potential for ‘responsible research and innovation’ in the food and health domain. Food Policy, 62, 78-87

'The Green Economy'; a smokescreen for destruction (online)

The “Green Economy”: giving immunity to criminals

For over a decade, international policy debate has been re-defining forests as providers of “ecosystem services”. Promotional videos, slogans and attractive brochures promoting a “Green Economy”, repeat how forests and biodiversity are essential for the “services” they provide to humanity. This reinforces the colonial understanding of “nature” as a collection of species, undisturbed by human interaction, denying the role of forest peoples in shaping nature, and putting “nature” at the service of the same economy that continues to destroy it. The result is a re-definition that reduces the underlying causes of the destruction of forests and other territories into an issue of numbers. These discourses silence the crucial issues of power relations, including the underlying causes of forest destruction and violation of forest communities’ rights. People, cultures, traditions, interconnections are not even considered as co-existing and inseparable with forests.

A detailed report that provides a damning analysis of one 'biodiversity offset' project can be found here.

International guidelines on land governance (report)

Strengthening Land Governance: Lessons from implementing the Voluntary Guidelines

The Voluntary Guidelines on Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security (VGGT) are a globally negotiated and agreed framework endorsed in the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) in 2012.

The VGGT represent agreement on the minimum standards for land governance. While voluntary, they constitute a global consensus on a set of norms. They reflect knowledge and lessons learnt from decades of work on land tenure and governance of natural resources. Now, four years on, what has been done to realise these principles? What are the current debates surrounding implementation of the VGGT? What challenges and obstacles have emerged, and how are they being addressed and resolved?

 

Zero Carbon Britian discussions (online)

Zero Carbon Britain discussion papers

The ZCB project has been encouraging contributors to write discussion papers to probe, ponder, reflect and imagine what a zero carbon Britain might be like.
We asked for their help to raise awareness of a more carbon responsible society, by looking at a diverse range of impacts of a zero carbon Britain. From faith groups to farmers, from restaurants to rugby teams, the aim is to get people talking about what it would be like to live in a world where we rise to our 21st century challenges.

Scaling up agro-ecology (online)

Overcoming Obstacles to Agroecology

A half-century of research and practice in agroecology has yielded spectacular results for hundreds of thousands of small scale farmers around the world. Because it opens possibilities for grassroots food systems transformation, peasant movements for food sovereignty have embraced agroecology, as have many urban and organic farmers in the Global North. But despite its documented benefits, agroecology is still largely limited to localized experiences and a few, poorly funded university programs. The problem is systemic. The solution is social and political, as discussed in this article from The Huffington Post.

Scientists call for agroecology research (online)

Scientists Call for Public Investment in Agroecological Research

A distinguished group of scientists and experts from universities and colleges across the United States—including land-grant universities in agricultural powerhouse states such as Iowa and California—has launched the following statement calling for increased public investment in agroecological research. Their statement describes agroecological methods as productive, profitable and sustainable.

Addressing water scarcity (book)

Chasing Water: A Guide for Moving from Scarcity to Sustainability

Water scarcity is spreading and intensifying in many regions of the world, with dire consequences for local communities, economies, and freshwater ecosystems. Current approaches tend to rely on policies crafted at the state or national level, which on their own have proved insufficient to arrest water scarcity. To be durable and effective, water plans must be informed by the culture, economics, and varied needs of affected community members. Chasing Water tells a cohesive  story that sustainable water sharing in the twenty-first century can only happen through open, democratic dialogue and local collective action.

Fly less but stay connected (book)

Beyond Flying: Rethinking air travel in a globally connected world

Fourteen authors from around the world share their stories about how they came to the conclusion that reducing their air travel was necessary to avoid playing their part in climate change, and how they changed values and attitudes to businesses and personal travel. These are the stories of how these remarkable people found easy and better ways of living and working in a globalised world with less air travel.

UN Special Rapporteur advocates agroecology (report)

Report of the Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier De Schutter 

Final report: The transformative potential of the right to food

(From The Guardian online). In his final report (pdf), Olivier De Schutter, UN special rapporteur on the right to food, offers a detailed critique of industrial agriculture that has boosted food production over the past 50 years, yet leaves 842 million – 12% of the world's population – hungry. As an alternative, he champions agroecology; both more environmentally friendly and contributing to improved nutrition. Other measures to improve the system would be to abandon mandates for biofuels and cut down food waste in rich countries and post-harvest losses in poor countries.

The Campaign for Real Farming (online)

Campaign for real farming website

'The Agrarian Renaissance needs new kinds of farms – polycultural, low-input, skills intensive; and these new farms need appropriate markets – generally local, and geared to the small-scale; and overall we need a true food culture – people who truly appreciate what good food is, and are prepared to seek it out.'
The mission statement of this website is reflected in its contents, and unlike many it is kept right up to date.

Scaling up agroecolgy (report)

Scaling-up agroecological approaches: what, why and how? 

The objectives of this paper are:

•To contribute to ongoing debates on agroecological approaches and their centrality for more sustainable agricultural and food systems;

•To provide key evidence and arguments for supporting advocacy work calling for the scaling-up of agroecological approaches.

The paper includes four main parts:

Part I explains what agroecology is, situating it in light of peasant and industrialized agricultures and introducing its three interconnected dimensions as a science, an agricultural approach and a movement. Part II clarifies how scaling-up an agroecological transition can contribute to achieving sustainable agricultural and food systems. Part III identifies the main challenges to be met for scaling-up at a higher stage agroecological approaches.The conclusion formulates recommendations that help in addressing major challenges involved in scaling up agroecological approaches

Want to prevent flooding? Fix your soil (report)

The All Party Parliamentary Group on Agroecology

Briefing Paper 4: February 2014 Land management, soil quality and flood prevention

In the light of recent extreme weather and severe flooding across large parts of the UK, there has been much debate about how to prevent similar problems in the future, how to manage rivers and waterways and discussion on the future of farming in areas such as the Somerset levels, which are prone to flooding.

One way of addressing multiple issues at the same time is to ensure that the type of farming that does take place works to decrease rather than exacerbate flooding. In particular, the health of the soil has a great effect on how much water it can hold, how much water runs off, and how much the soil itself is eroded – silting up rivers and streams. In most rural areas the key determinant of the health of the soil is the way that land is farmed.

Trees help farmers manage drought (report)

Managing the drought: A review of the evidence of the benefits of native trees species for shelter on the water regime of pasture and arable crops

This review assesses the benefits of native tree species for shelter on the water regime of pasture and crops. It draws on evidence from the UK, Europe and other temperate zones. Before the evidence is presented overviews are given of evapotranspiration, shelterbelt design and crop micro-climate. The evidence in the review suggests that under the right conditions native tree shelterbelts could enable UK crops to use water more efficiently. Shelterbelts can be viewed as an insurance policy. They may not provide yield increases every year, but they can buffer crop production when extreme weather events strike.

Sustainable intensifcation of smallholder cropping (online)

Save and Grow: A policymaker’s guide to the sustainable intensification of smallholder crop production

A straightforward guide from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization to the need for a change in direction in food production away from intensive mono-cropping and towards smallholder productivity with an ecological focus. 7 articles consider the challenges, farming systems, soil health, crops and varieties, water management,  plant protection and policies and institutions. Aimed at policy makers, this report makes a great introduction to a topic close to the heart of permaculture; who will grow our food in the years to come and how will they grow it. Permaculture practitioners may not agree with all the solutions put forward, but will recognise the need for a paradigm shift in how humanity grows its food.

Biodiversity vital to public health (#journal)

Biological Diversity and Public Health

In the wake of a species extinction event unprecedented in human history, how the variety, distribution, and abundance of life on earth may influence health has gained credence as a worthy subject for research and study at schools of public health and for consideration among policy makers. This article reviews a few of the principal ways in which health depends on biodiversity, including the discovery of new medicines, biomedical research, the provision of food, and the distribution and spread of infections. It also examines how changes in biological diversity underlie much of the global burden of disease and how a more thorough understanding of life on earth and its relationships has the potential to greatly alleviate and prevent human suffering.

Drivers of environmental change (report)

World in Transition – A Social Contract for Sustainability

In this report, the German Advisory council on Global Change explains the reasons for the desperate need for a post-fossil economic strategy, yet it also concludes that the transition to sustainability is achievable, and presents ten concrete packages of measures to accelerate the imperative restructuring. If the transformation really is to succeed, we have to enter into a social contract for innovation, in the form of a new kind of discourse between governments and citizens, both within and beyond the boundaries of the nation state. Factsheet 5 includes detailed descriptions of 'Drivers of Transformation', such as permaculture activists and transition towners. 

The latest news on climate change (website)

Responding to Climate Change

A great site that carries all the latest news on climate change politics, policy and science from around the world. Dozens of articles, with a good mixture of factual reporting and opinion stating, plus headlines and research reports.

Permaculture and labour market policy (online)

The Integrative Analysis of Economic Ecosystems: Reviewing labour market policies with new insights from permaculture and systems theory

This paper explores new ways of applying ecological knowledge to solve economic problems. The integrative analysis method uses systems ecology in order to characterize economic systems with their energetic properties and model them as ecosystems. This makes it possible to assess them with the design principles of permaculture. Through a process that adopts the main characteristics of the "Soft Systems Methodology" incremental changes can be found to make economies increasingly resemble the natural functioning of healthy and stable ecosystems. To show the capabilities of the integrative analysis, it is applied to three different perceptions of the labour market and its surrounding actors, starting with the viewpoint of the European Commission. Many EU proposals to meet labour-related challenges can be refined and complemented with existing alternative proposals.