FAO: food systems resource base is at breaking point
On December 21, the FAO Office in Moscow and the Central Scientific Agricultural Library presented two flagship publications (in Russian): "The State of Food and Agriculture (SOFA) 2021: making agrifood systems more resilient to shocks and stresses" and "The state of the world’s land and water resources for food and agriculture" (SOLAW 2021).
Oleg Kobiakov, Director of the FAO Office in Moscow, reminded that the Central Scientific Agricultural Library started to serve as "a depositary of FAO printed materials back in the days when Russia was not a member of the Organization. Our cooperation goes back two decades. We strive to ensure that all information flows and sources for our readers – and this is a wide range of practitioners in agriculture and related fields, and college teachers of higher education institutions of agriculture sciences, students, and post-graduate students – are always accessible to them. Moreover, in Russian, which is one of the FAO’s official languages."
Elaborating on the topic, Dr Lidia Pirumova, Deputy Director of the Central Scientific Library for Scientific Research, described the algorithm of the search and find mode when seeking the necessary information about the FAO’s agenda on the library electronic resources. She highlighted that all the materials are catalogized and freely available.
The publication SOLAW 2021 was presented by Dr Li Lifeng, Director of Land, and Water Division (FAO Headquarters, Rome). While characterizing the state of the world’s land and water resources, the FAO expert listed the key findings of the report: 1) interconnected systems of land, soil and water "are stretched to the limit"; 2) "the current patterns of agricultural intensification are not proving to be sustainable"; 3) "farming systems are becoming polarized."
The FAO experts prioritize "managing the risks to land and water", as well as safeguarding land and water resources. What is the best solution offered? In FAO’s view, there are several such key decisions.
Firstly, "land and water governance has to be more inclusive, adaptive, and effective." Secondly, "integrated solutions need to be planned and implemented at all levels." Thirdly, technical and managerial innovations can be targeted to address priorities and accelerate transformation." Finally, agricultural support and investment can be redirected towards social and environmental gains derived from land and water management."
"No “one size fits all” solution exists, but a “full package” of workable solutions is available" – emphasized Dr Li Lifen. And as "systems are at breaking point", according to the warnings from the report’s authors, the FAO Director of the Land and Water Division concluded that even more so "we must take the path of creativity and innovation."
The perspective of Russian applied science on the problems, which are under review in SOLAW 2021, was presented by Dr Ivan Vasenev, Head of the Ecology Department of the Russian State Agrarian University – Moscow Timiryazev Agricultural Academy (RSAU-MTAA named after K. A. Timiryazev). He highlighted that "in the report’s structure, first of all, the actual state of land and water resources and their use is being analysed. Next, the main issues, which solution should be a priority, are singled out; they can be exacerbated by such global changes as global warming or innovations in agricultural technologies development and application."
Professor Vasenev opined that "the analysis algorithm itself is very functional and useful… We attempt, in our educational courses and programs, to trace this algorithm as much as possible: from the analysis of changing factors, including the factors of soil formation, to soil degradation or progradation."
The Russian expert shared with the audience the forecast for agriculture development in the Russian Federation for the next 20 years. The expert pointed out the increase in the arable land area suitable for potential use by more than 20 million hectares, as well as the implementation of soil conservation tillage technologies that "ought to be inclusive and adaptive." In his final remarks, Professor Vasenev proposed FAO to shorten the periodicity of the SOLAW report, taking into account the relevance of this topic.
Commenting the speech of the leading scientist at the Timiryazev Academy, Oleg Kobiakov noted that "soil and water are used not only food production, which is experiencing an increasing competition from industries, especially from the extractive and energy ones and from the growing housing and utility sector. The scaling-up of aquaculture production in Russia, when the water itself is a production environment, raises the question of effective wastewater treatment and the introduction of closed-loop systems. The issues of fertilizers’ and plant protection products’ use is no less relevant. The whole range of these problems is fully presented in the report, designed to stimulate discussion among both scientists and practitioners."
Dr Andrea Cattaneo, Senior Economist, Agricultural Development Economics Division (FAO Headquarters, Rome), shared his thoughts about the report "The State of Food and Agriculture 2021: Making Agrifood Systems more Resilient to Shocks and Stresses" (SOFA). He elaborated on the lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic, explained the importance of the transition to sustainable development practices, as well as the significance of agrifood systems’ indicators and the agrifood sector’s comparative analysis for over 140 countries.
Dr Cattaneo defined the 4 key functions of agrifood systems that is to ensure primary production, physical access to food within a country or a region, economic access to food (taking into account the purchasing power of a population), and provide a diverse range of food.
The FAO expert described the indicators to measure the capacity of primary producers to absorb shocks and stresses. The first indicator is the primary production flexibility index (PPFI). "Russia is more oriented towards the domestic market and much less to the export compared, for example, to the Republic of Moldova," he noted.
The second indicator is the dietary sourcing flexibility index (DSFI) that, from the consumer's perspective, reflects the multiplicity of pathways of obtaining a food unit that can be made available to a consumer. This indicator is critical to measure the capacity to absorb shocks and ensure the availability of food. "High-income countries have a higher level of DSFI," said the expert. Dr Cattaneo concluded that the report stresses the importance of resilience within agrifood systems, particularly within value chains.
Professor Evgenia Serova, Director for Agricultural Policy and Head of the Institute for Agrarian Studies at HSE (National Research University), commented on the SOFA publication on the Russian side. She shared her views on the state of agriculture in Russia, which passed the "point of no return" about 5-7 years ago. "There is no longer any threat to food security in the Russian Federation. And this is so for the first time in our country’s history," the professor added, noting that, according to the Global Food Security Index 2021, Russia ranks 23rd at the top of the list comprising 113 countries.
Professor Serova touched upon the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and inflation on food systems, food quality and the epizootic situation. The expert pointed out the agricultural policy’s instability, which affects the interest of private capital to invest in the agricultural sector.
"Agribusiness has a very long investment cycle, up to 10-15 years in some cases, but in Russia planning horizon spans on average 3-4 years. Combined with the constant threat of a shift in agricultural policy, this sector is not a priority or interesting target for private capital investment," stated professor Serova. In her opinion, as for today, public investment in the agrifood sector and the agrarian science in Russia leaves much to be desired.
Finally, commenting on the SOFA report’s conclusions, Oleg Kobiakov pointed out that they are based on a clear "mathematical model that allows us to understand the mode, the nature and the quantitative parameters of the agrifood systems’ functioning.
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The conference was attended by more than 150 participants.
Further information
"The State of Food and Agriculture", FAO's flagship annual publication, aims to provide for a general reader a balanced, science-based assessment of food and agriculture’s key dimensions. Each edition provides an overview of selected topics most relevant to developing the agricultural sector and rural areas and ensuring global food security.
The current edition of the report presents the resilience indicators of agrifood systems at the country level. These indicators measure the robustness of primary production and food availability, as well as the physical and economic access to food. The indicators therefore allow measuring the capacity of national agrifood systems to absorb shocks and stresses, which is a key element of resilience.
"The State of the World's Land and Water Resources for Food and Agriculture – Systems at breaking point" (SOLAW 2021), first published in 2011, comes at a time when human pressures on the systems of land, soils and freshwater are intensifying, just when they are being pushed to their productive limits.
The impacts of climate change are already constraining rainfed and irrigated land productivity, which had already been declining due to the environmental consequences resulting from decades of unsustainable land use.
The final recommendations of SOLAW 2021 suggest reversing this detrimental course, as the world has come to the need for a fundamental transformation of global food systems, starting from their very foundation, which is made up of water, land and soil resources.
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Presentations of experts:
- Dr Lifeng Li, SOLAW 2021
- Dr Evgenia Serova, Resistance in Russian food sector
- Dr Ivan Vasenev, SOLAW 2021
The recording of the conference can be found here.