Future Perfect

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ustainable

agriculture

wildlife

food

security

consumption

and

production

patterns

impact; they are also the key resource for agricultural production.

However, land is becoming scarce, with increasing degradation

due to unsustainable practices and growing global competition

for productive agricultural land. Land degradation, and poor soil

fertility in particular, is widely accepted as the most critical limit-

ing factor in constraining agricultural production in sub-Saharan

Africa.

There are some 5 billion hectares of land presently avail-

able for the global food supply: 1.5 billion hectares of farmland and

permanent crops and 3.5 billion hectares of grassland, grazing land

and extensively used steppe.

Of this land, 1.9 billion hectares have

already been degraded to a greater or lesser extent due to inten-

sive and improper use.

Additionally, 10 million hectares are lost to

erosion every year. The need to stop the loss of farmland is urgent,

and this includes regenerating depleted soils so they can be uses in

the future with sustainable production methods.

Sustainable use of natural resources is also especially relevant

when we look at the use of water in agriculture. Agriculture accounts

for 70 per cent of global freshwater consumption today – yet it is

possible to limit water use while still meeting global food and nutri-

tional needs. In various regions such as India, China, North Africa

and the Middle East, depletion of water resources is already a serious

problem. Groundwater levels are falling rapidly. Further, ground-

water resources are only renewable over the very long term, if at all.

Climate change will exacerbate water shortages in drier parts of the

world. Sustainable small-scale farming exhibits a great deal of poten-

tial with regard to reducing water consumption. Efficient irrigation

systems – such as drip irrigation – could reduce consumption by

several degrees of magnitude. Case studies in developing countries

have demonstrated that water consumption can be reduced by 40-80

per cent,

and in 2011 the United Nations Environment Programme

(UNEP) Green Economy report confirmed that production with

sustainable methods, which is adequate to cover humanity’s food

needs in the year 2050 with limited use of water, is

now feasible.

Biological diversity is crucial for sustainable food

production, but it is currently shrinking. Over centu-

ries, humanity has used over 10,000 edible plants:

today we use only 150 and just 12 species make up 80

per cent of plant-based food production.

The edible

plants being grown are becoming increasingly similar

to one another. The enormous wealth of cultivars that

the world’s farmers have created through cultivation

under a variety of conditions has shrunk in parallel with

the rapid rise to dominance of a few globally grown

high-yield cultivars. An estimated 75 per cent of all

economically useful plant cultivars has vanished from

the world’s farms.

With every species that disappears,

valuable genes are lost. Considering that 90 per cent of

pest species have natural antagonists – predatory or

parasitic insects –and over 100,000 species of polli-

nating insects provide their services to the agriculture

sector, this matters a great deal. This is why diversity in

the animal kingdom and plant species is an insurance

against pest problems, and key to ensuring food and

nutrition for all.

A healthy environment, resilience to climate change,

fertile soils, sustainable use of scarce natural resources

including water, and rich biodiversity are the founda-

tion for a secure food supply in the long term. Farms

do produce a number of key ecosystem services that

benefit society, the environment and the economy as

well as agriculture itself, for example with pollination

and natural pest control. Farmers can and should be

supported as needed to assure that these ecosystem

Drip irrigation improves efficiency of water use, significantly reducing consumption

Image: Biovision/Peter Luethi