The environment in the news monday, 26 May 2008
Associated Press: G8 environment ministers endorse greenhouse gas cuts by 2050, mention need for 2020 target
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Associated Press: G8 environment ministers endorse greenhouse gas cuts by 2050, mention need for 2020 target
The Associated Press Published: May 26, 2008
The statement by ministers from the Group of Eight nations, aimed at preparing for action on climate change at the G8 summit in Toyako, Japan in July, also acknowledged calls for midterm emissions reduction targets for 2020, though it did not specify any goals. The three day meetings of G8 ministers — from Japan, the United States, Germany, France, Italy, Canada, Britain and Russia — and observer countries also strove to revive momentum for wider U.N.-led talks on a new global warming pact. "The major outcome was on climate change: We strongly expressed the will to come to agreement at Toyako so we can halve emissions by 2050," Japanese Environment Minister Ichiro Kamoshita said. "Advanced nations should show leadership to reach this goal." The statement cited the need for global gas emissions to peak within the next 10 to 20 years, and it called on developing countries with rapidly expanding greenhouse gas emissions to work to curb the rate of increase.
"The need was expressed for effective midterm targets which take into account the findings of the IPCC," the statement said, referring to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which shared last year's Nobel Peace Prize with former U.S. Vice President Al Gore. European nations, the U.N. climate chief and environmentalists had clamored in Kobe for progress toward such a reduction pledge by G8 countries, arguing that failure could endanger the U.N. talks, which face a December 2009 deadline. "Without a mandatory midterm target for developing countries, it will be very difficult to get agreement" by that deadline, said Matthias Machnig, the delegate from Germany. Still, he conceded that ministers in Kobe had "made a step here today — a small one, but an important one." The European Union has pledged a 20 percent emissions reduction by 2020 and has offered to raise it to 30 percent if other nations sign on. The United States, however, has not committed to a midterm goal, demanding commitments from top developing countries such as China first. Japan has also not yet set a 2020 target. Kamoshita and Scott Fulton, deputy assistant administrator at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, argued that it was premature for them to set midterm targets, and they said such commitments should be the result of negotiations leading to the climate pact in 2009. "At this point, I'm not sure if it's appropriate for us to cite specific figures," Fulton said. The United States is the only major industrialized country not to have ratified the Kyoto Protocol global warming pact, which commits 37 nations to cutting emissions by an average of 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. Washington has argued that the pact would hurt its economy and is unfair because it does not obligate developing nations to also cut emissions. During a news conference after the concluding meeting, divisions were apparent between Germany and the United States. Machnig forcefully described Germany's commitment to cutting gases by 40 percent by 2020, several times turning in Fulton's direction as he spoke. Fulton, who also called for commitments from heavily polluting emerging economies, defended U.S. action on climate change, citing billions of dollars spent on environmental research and other anti-warming steps. "We've not been sitting on our hands by any means," he said. The ministers also nodded to developing nations' demands for help in financing and technology transfer to become more energy efficient, grow their economies more cleanly, and adapt to changes wrought by warming, such as rising sea levels. The meeting in Kobe took place amid fears by some that the momentum was draining from the U.N.-led talks on a new climate pact to take over when Kyoto's first phase expires in 2012. The talks have struggled to overcome divisions between rich countries concerned about growing emissions in the developing world, and poorer nations who argue industrialized countries must take the first steps to address warming. U.N. climate chief Yvo de Boer said rich nations needed to set national targets — in addition to global goals — as a clear signal to businesses. "If you're a businessman or woman in any country of the world and you're about to build a $500 million power plant, then a global goal doesn't tell you what investment choice to make," he said. "But if you know the country that you're in plans to reduce emissions by 'X' percent by 2020, you're going to want to be part of the solution, not part of the problem."
AFP: Warm winds comfort climate change models: study Sun May 25, 1:38 PM ET PARIS (AFP) - Climate change models predicting a dangerous warming of the world's atmosphere got a confirming boost Sunday from a study showing parallel trends at altitudes nearly twice as high as Mount Everest. The new research, published in Nature Geoscience, will help remove one of the remaining scientific uncertainties about the general thrust of global warming, the authors and commentators say. Over the last two decades, temperature readings from the upper troposphere -- 12 to 16 kilometres (7.5 and 10 miles) above Earth's surface -- based on data gathered by satellites and high-flying weather balloons showed little or no increase. Oft cited by climate change sceptics, these findings were known to be flawed but still challenged the validity of computer models predicting warming trends at these altitudes, especially over the tropics. In the new study, climate scientists Robert Allen and Steven Sherwood of Yale University use a more accurate method to show that temperature changes in the upper troposphere since 1970 -- about 0.65 degrees Centigrade per decade -- are in fact clearly in sync with most climate change models. Rather than measuring temperature directly, which had yielded inconsistent results, they used wind variations as a proxy. "We take an alternative approach by using trends in winds to infer those of temperature," say the authors. "Winds are observed by radiosonde tracking" -- which relays data on temperature and humidity from a balloon via radio transmitter -- "in a matter completely independent from temperature observations." There are approximately ten times fewer discontinuities in wind than in temperature records, making wind measurements a more reliable indicator of long-term trends, notes Peter Thorne of Britain Met Office Hadley Centre in a commentary, also published in Nature Geoscience. The new study "provides ... long-awaited experimental verification of model predictions," Thorne wrote.
By David Shukman Environment correspondent, BBC News Dramatic evidence of the break-up of the Arctic ice-cap has emerged from research during an expedition by the Canadian military. Scientists travelling with the troops found major new fractures during an assessment of the state of giant ice shelves in Canada's far north. The team found a network of cracks that stretched for more than 10 miles (16km) on Ward Hunt, the area's largest shelf. The fate of the vast ice blocks is seen as a key indicator of climate change. One of the expedition's scientists, Derek Mueller of Trent University, Ontario, told me: "I was astonished to see these new cracks. "It means the ice shelf is disintegrating, the pieces are pinned together like a jigsaw but could float away," Dr Mueller explained. According to another scientist on the expedition, Dr Luke Copland of the University of Ottawa, the new cracks fit into a pattern of change in the Arctic. "We're seeing very dramatic changes; from the retreat of the glaciers, to the melting of the sea ice. "We had 23% less (sea ice) last year than we've ever had, and what's happening to the ice shelves is part of that picture." When ice shelves break apart, they drift offshore into the ocean as "ice islands", transforming the very geography of the coastline. Last year, I was part of a BBC team that joined Dr Mueller and Dr Copland as they carried out the first research on Ayles Ice Island, an iceberg the size of Manhattan. It has since split into two, each vast chunk of ice now 400 miles (640km) south of its original position. The rapid changes in the Arctic have reignited disputes over territory. The Canadian military's expedition was billed as a "sovereignty patrol", the lines of snowmobiles flying Canadian flags in a display of control. After the record Arctic melting last year, all eyes are now on what happens to the sea ice this summer. Although its maximum extent last winter was slightly greater than the year before, it was still below the long-term average. Back to Menu ________________________________________________________________________ Reuters: Exxon again cuts funds for climate change skeptics Fri May 23, 2008 6:34pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp is pulling contributions to several groups that have downplayed the risks that greenhouse gas-emissions could lead to global warming, continuing a policy started in 2006 by Chief Executive Rex Tillerson. Exxon will not contribute to some nine groups in 2008 that it funded in 2007. It said in its corporate citizenship report that the groups' "position on climate change could divert attention from the important discussion on how the world will secure the energy required for economic growth in an environmentally responsible manner." The groups Exxon has stopped funding include the Capital Research Center, Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow, Frontiers of Freedom Institute, the George C. Marshall Institute, and the Institute for Energy Research, according to Exxon spokesman Gantt Walton. Exxon's tone on climate change has softened since Tillerson took the reins of the company at the beginning of 2006, replacing the often-combative Lee Raymond. Tillerson has said that nations should work toward a global policy to fight climate change and in 2006 the company stopped funding a handful of groups that were climate change skeptics. But environmental activists charged that Exxon continued to fund other groups working against policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, with Greenpeace arguing that the company gave more than $2 million to climate change skeptics in 2006 alone. The company cut its spending again in 2007 on such groups, including the Heartland Institute, which hosted a conference in March with the theme, "Global warming is not a crisis." (Reporting by Michael Erman; Editing by Braden Reddall) Back to Menu ________________________________________________________________________ Reuters: Race for Antarctic krill a test for green management Sat May 24, 2008 8:44pm EDT
By David Fogarty SINGAPORE (Reuters) - In the global rush for resources, a tiny pink crustacean living in the seas around Antarctica is testing man's ability to manage one of the world's last great fisheries without damaging the environment. Krill, which grow to about 6 cm (2 inches), occur in vast schools and is the major source of food for whales, seals, penguins and sea birds. Without it, scientists say, the ecosystem in and around Antarctica could collapse. But krill is rich in oil brimming in omega-3 fatty acids that Norwegian and Canadian companies sell in pills. The crustaceans are also harvested for special enzymes that can be used by surgeons to clean wounds, even to clean contact lenses. And the pinkish remains after processing can be used as fish meal, for example to give salmon flesh a richer pink color. So far, difficulties in processing krill on ships, high fuel prices and the expense of sending fleets to the bottom of the globe has kept a lid on annual catches, which remain far below levels set under a treaty governing Antarctic marine life. But the economic equation is changing fast, scientists and fishery regulators say because of soaring food prices, falling global fish stocks and better ship-based processing technology. Within five years, the annual krill catch could jump from just over 100,000 tonnes to several million tonnes. "The potential of the krill story is that the competition for protein of whatever form is becoming more and more acute," said Denzil Miller, Executive Secretary of the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR), based in Hobart in southern Australia. "I think in the next two to three years we are going to see a lot of changes in the way governments and the international community addresses problems of expectation around food security," he said. He said the commission has created guidelines that managed how and where krill were caught to try to minimize the impact on whales, seals and other predators. The idea is to spread out the catch once it reaches a certain size, particularly in the south Atlantic, where the bulk of the krill fishing occurs. Failure to do so could have disastrous consequences, he said. KRILL SEEKERS Krill catches are already rising quickly. "The most recent total notified catch was about 684,000 tonnes for the year 2007/08 (December-November). That's all the countries that have notified -- about 25 vessels from 7 members of the commission and two non-members," Miller said. While it is still unclear if 684,000 tonnes will be taken during the 2007/08 fishing season, the figure presents a sharp jump from 109,000 tonnes caught the previous season but still way below the total allowed catch of 6 million tonnes set under commission rules. But new processing techniques by Norwegian firm Aker BioMarine has recently changed the whole krill fishery, scientists and environmentalists say. The company has created a new way to harvest and process krill continuously. Previously, it was hard to catch and then later process large amounts of krill because the enzymes inside them break down quickly, spoiling much of the catch. "The upshot of all this is that instead of one fleet catching 100,000 tonnes in a season, one boat can catch 100,000 tonnes in one season," said Gerry Leape, director of the Antarctic Krill Conservation Project. "All of a sudden if that technology is replicated, you could go from a conservative catch to something that could start being a problem," said Leape, also of the Washington-based Pew Environment Group, which runs the krill project as one of its campaigns. "We are not against krill fishing. We're just against an explosion of it that will not only jeopardize the krill but also have the impacts on the predators and not take into the necessary changes that will be caused by climate change," he said. Aker BioMarine says it cooperates with global environmental group WWF to ensure its krill harvesting methods are sustainable. The company also says it wants to increase production of its krill products, including krill oil and krill meal and is building a high-tech harvesting and processing vessel to go into service in 2009. The problem with krill, though, is that there are a lot of unknowns. Scientists say no one really knows how abundant krill are, with estimates ranging from about 200 million tonnes to 500 million. And no one really knows the exact numbers of whales, seals and penguins that rely on krill or how climate change will affect those populations or krill numbers. Krill rely heavily on sea ice for breeding and feeding, particularly during winter months. They eat tiny phytoplankton that thrive on the underside of sea ice but global warming is changing the amount of sea ice down south, particularly around the Antarctic Peninsula where temperatures have risen dramatically in recent years. In Hobart, scientist Andrew Constable is leading a project to create a management program that will help fishing firms adapt to changing conditions in the Antarctic ecosystem. "There are a number of different elements to consider with krill. One is the food-web function and being confident the food web can be self-sustaining in the future and not impact on the recovery of whales," he said. "How do we make sure that the recovery of whales is not going to be jeopardized by krill fishing because they are going to targeting the same locations that the krill fishers will," said Constable, a leader in the Antarctic Marine Ecosystems Program of the Australian Antarctic Division and the Cooperative Research Centre for Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems. OPEN AND CLOSED FOR BUSINESS One idea was to learn by a structured fishing approach. "You actually have fishing in one location and not in another and you can compare the two to see what affect the fishery might have. "And can you arrange the fishery in such a way that you have a mosaic of areas where they fish and a mosaic of areas where they are not fishing and you measure a few key parameters in each of those areas. You can then start to tease out 'this is how we think the system works'," Constable said. And on top of all that, scientists needed to know what impact climate change will have. "That's another reason I think we need areas which are closed to fishing so we can tease out what the effects of climate change might be from the effects of fishing." Krill expert Steve Nicol said it was crucial for any management tool to be very conservative. "When you calculate how much krill it's safe to take, you put an awful lot of precaution in every aspect of the modeling you use to do it," said Nicol, program leader of the Southern Ocean Ecosystems Group at the Australian Antarctic Division in Hobart. He also said with grain prices rising, krill could soon become economic to catch as fish meal. "The supply of fish meal has gone right down, so you are actually getting a double-whammy on fish meal and the cost of what people are prepared to pay for good-quality fish meal is going up all the time. "At some point it's going to become economic to go fishing for krill just as a fish meal product." Miller said krill was already part of the bigger picture of global food security and that a robust management system was crucial for Antarctica's future. "We've got to get this one right, because if we don't there's a whole lot of dominoes that follow afterwards that just looks too horrendous to contemplate," Miller said. (Editing by Megan Goldin)
Regional News REGIONAL OFFICE FOR AFRICA (ROA) MEDIA UPDATE THE ENVIRONMENT IN THE NEWS 26 May 2008 UNEP In The News Nigeria: Oceanic Bank Partners UN On Environmental Development Leadership (Abuja): Worried about the high level of environmental degradation, Oceanic Bank International Plc in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative (UNEPFI) has resolved to work towards introducing measures that would promote environment and sustainable development. UNEPFI is a global partnership between UNEP and the financial sector. Over 160 institutions, including banks, insurers and fund managers are currently working with UNEP to understand the impacts of environmental and social considerations on financial performance. Chief executive officer of Oceanic Bank Mrs. Cecelia Ibru, speaking at the signing ceremony, on Wednesday, said that promoting sustainable development is the collective responsibility of not only the government but also businesses and individuals. According to her, the bank as a corporate social responsible citizen is committed to economic and social development as well as environmental protection. She assured that Oceanic Bank, which has already partnered several states on Public Private Sector Partnership (PPP), especially in the area of infrastructure, education and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) will partner the UNEP and all other relevant agencies towards promotion and development of the environment. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230311.html Africa: Deforestation Threatens Biodiversity Efforts Friends of the Earth (London): The continuing failure to prevent catastrophic deforestation is hampering global efforts to reverse the loss of biodiversity and has become a major threat to forest-dependent people, warned Friends of the Earth International on ‘International Biodiversity Day’, 22 May. The warning was made during a May 19-30 United Nations meeting of the Convention on Biological Diversity. The Bonn gathering, attended by delegates from 191 countries, aims to find ways to meet a globally agreed target for reversing the loss of biodiversity. “The destruction of forests and the consequent erosion of biodiversity severely impact millions of forest-dependent people. But it also affects global food security and accelerates climate change,” according to Belmond Tchoumba, co-coordinator of the Forest and Biodiversity Programme of Friends of the Earth International. “Governments must let local communities and Indigenous Peoples who depend on forests manage their forests, rather than evicting them and selling off the forests,“ added the Cameroonian activist. According to Friends of the Earth International the Bonn conference participants should take immediate action to stop the deforestation of prime forests, to stop the destructive illegal logging and to stop the trade of illegally derived forest products. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230626.html Cameroon: Preserving Biodiversity through Sustainable Agriculture Cameroon Tribune (Yaoundé): Experts in biological diversity yesterday discussed the challenges of reconciling nature conservation and agricultural practices, all elements necessary for the enhancement of man's wellbeing. Meeting under the patronage of the Ministry of the Environment and Nature production and organised by the Biodiversity Development and Conservation Programme-Cameroon (BDCPC), the experts drawn from the administration, university institutions and the civil society, discussed with diligence things to consider when carrying out agricultural activities in order to better preserve biodiversity. The workshop which consisted essentially in presentations and discussions was, in effect, organised as one of the activities to mark the 2008 United Nations World Diversity Day in Cameroon. Among the topics handled were: Biodiversity and Food production with focus on animal and plant food, Rangeland Composition, use and Sustainable Agriculture, Agricultural Biodiversity and Health and Wildlife Conservation in relation to Food: short and Long Term Perspective. The papers tried to demonstrate in essence that biodiversity conservation entails maintenance of gene banks, sensitisation of the population and discouraging of poor farming practices such as bush fires and deforestation. The experts demonstrated that sustainable practices such as application of land use planning systems, respect of carrying capacity of land, rational grazing, regeneration, proper burning practices and multi-specie grazing practices are important elements in enhancing agriculture. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230838.html General Environment News Kenya: 74 Sue Firms Over Toxic Fumes Effect The Nation (Nairobi): Seventy four people who fell ill after inhaling toxic fumes from leaking containers are demanding compensation. Mombasa's Kalahari slums residents inhaled the fumes from two leaking containers that were dumped at Kipevu. The group has sued five companies involved in the shipping, transportation, clearance and handling of the containers and the owners. The residents are demanding Sh2, 000 each to cater for their medical expenses and another claim for restoration of their environment affected by the poisonous gas. Those sued are the Kenya Ports Authority, Kasese Cobalt Company Limited, the owners of the consignment, African Liner Agencies, (shipping agents), Southern Enterprises Limited, (clearing agents), and Final Destinations Incorporated Limited who were the transporters. The initial consignment of 144 drums, each weighing 280 kilogrammes. The drums contents were 68 per cent nitric acid shipped from India to Mombasa on transit to Uganda. But while at the KPA yard, the containers started leaking and emitting hazardous fumes. They were then dumped at Kalahari where they stayed for about a month. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230177.html Zimbabwe: Conserve Biodiversity for Food Security - Nhema The Herald (Harare): Zimbabwe should conserve landscape varieties of its major food crops and also integrate biodiversity conservation in the agricultural sector to realise the benefits of dietary diversity and promote food security, the Minister of Environment and Tourism, Cde Francis Nhema, has said. Speaking at the commemoration of the International Day of Biological Diversity yesterday, Cde Nhema said the nation also needed to guard against biopiracy that is resulting in huge biological losses. "The role of biodiversity in poverty alleviation cannot be over-emphasised. However, many actions to promote economic development and reduce hunger and poverty could contribute to the loss of biodiversity particularly in Africa where the majority of people continue to depend directly on the natural resource base for their daily livelihoods. It is of paramount importance that we integrate biodiversity conservation in our agricultural landscapes for better dietary diversity. Although agriculture is a major driver of biological diversity loss, it also contributes to the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity," he said. Cde Nhema said farmers and agricultural producers were custodians of agricultural biodiversity hence should possess the knowledge needed to manage and sustain it. He said the loss of bio-diversity was being compounded by climate change, which is threatening the extinction of many ecosystems and economic loss for the region. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230211.html Namibia: Enviro Management Act Almost There New Era (Windhoek): Namibia's Environmental Management Act is at an advanced stage of being put into practice, as regulations that will be the tools of the Act are about to be completed. The Act is the basis for environmental management in Namibia and makes an environmental impact assessment mandatory for any listed project. It also serves as a basis for Namibia to comply with international obligations in terms of environmental agreements Namibia has signed so far. "We are also busy with putting institutions in place in terms of personnel, like the Environment Commissioner and members of the Sustainable Advisory Council," Teofilus Nghitila, the Director of Environmental Affairs in the Ministry of Environment and Tourism, said in an interview with New Era yesterday. Nghitila said consultations with regard to the draft regulations will be done on regional level involving all stakeholders affected, as from next month. A simplified version of the Act has also been finalized and will be used during the public education campaign. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230559.html Namibia: Enviro Group Protests City Decision to Develop Avis The Namibian (Windhoek): An environmental group is up in arms about a Windhoek City Council decision to allow part of the Avis Dam recreation area to be developed for a hotel and restaurant, despite an alternative spot being proposed for such a facility. Last Thursday the Council decided at a meeting, which was called at short notice, to go ahead with the development of the four-hectare Erf 2882 opposite the Windhoek Dog Club, apparently bowing to pressure of eager developers. It might cost up to N$7 million to service the plot with water, sewerage, electricity and an access road. "We deplore the decision and will take the Council to task," said a committee member of the organisation Greenspace, which is leasing the area, except for the plot in question. Greenspace members on Wednesday night decided at their annual general meeting to protest the Council decision. "We asked several times to give a presentation of development proposals to the City Council, but were never granted the opportunity," the member, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told The Namibian yesterday. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230851.html Cameroon: Hysacam Pledges to Keep Douala Clean on Feast Days Cameroon Tribune (Yaoundé): In carrying out their mission to keep towns clean, the Hygiene and Sanitation Company, Hysacam has invented a new style to keep the surroundings of the ceremonial ground clean while the ceremony is still going on. This is usually on occasions such as the Youth Day, National day, and other feast days which require a gathering of many people. Usually, after an occasion, the area is always littered with plastic bags, papers, empty bottles, etc, bought by those present and then clean up will have to begin the next day after the ceremony. Hysacam has been solicited and they have a new method where they use a very big plastic bag to collect refuse while the ceremony is still on. Workers in Hysacam, who are concerned specifically with this domain, place the plastic bags on some strategic corners while they pick dirt and throw in the bags they also call on the population to empty their dirt in the bags rather than to throw on the lawn.These plastic bags are not out of place in the ceremonial ground because they look very attractive and they add more colour to the decorations in the vicinity. http://allafrica.com/stories/200805230894.html Rwanda puts hopes in methane power plant Los Angeles Times (LA): Extracting the gas from Lake Kivu's depths is a risky venture. But officials say it can help solve two problems: drain the deadly pool and provide energy to the electricity-starved nation. With Kivu's rolling green swells and serene coastline, it's hard to imagine why this is called one of Africa's "killer lakes." Fishermen have known for more than a century about the mysterious gas that occasionally bubbles up, killing fish and sometimes swimmers. The source, scientists say, is a massive pool of methane and carbon dioxide that lies at the bottom of the deep-water lake on the border between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Gas levels have been steadily rising, and experts say the gases might one day explode or burst to the surface, releasing a deadly cloud similar to one that killed more than 1,700 people at Cameroon's methane-rich Lake Nyos in 1986. Hoping to avert a catastrophe on the shores of a lake where 2 million people live and to solve its energy woes at the same time, the Rwandan government is embarking on a risky project to extract the methane and use it to generate electricity. Methane-power generation plants exist elsewhere, but the effort here is the first attempt to extract the gas from underwater and burn it to fuel an electricity plant. "It's the first of its kind in the world," said Albert Butare, Rwanda's minister of state for infrastructure. "In the beginning, it was a myth. But now the technology is promising." The government this month launched a $15-million pilot project that will try to power a four-megawatt generator with methane from the lake. A floating platform, installed this year, dropped a pipe more than three football fields deep to reach the methane-rich water. An American energy investment firm, New York-based Contour Global, is close to signing a deal to build the permanent electricity plant on Lake Kivu's shore, which would eventually produce 100 megawatts of sorely needed power for Rwanda, nearly twice the country's daily production, government officials said. Only about 5% of Rwandans are connected to the country's national grid, and prices are twice as high as those of other East African nations because of inadequate supply, mostly from diesel-fueled generators. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-lake23-2008may23,0,5609738.story Africa: There's no Green Revolution for Africa Ottawa Citizen (Ottawa): Many explanations have been offered for the food shortages and soaring prices afflicting much of the world but one that's rarely heard is the disastrously low productivity of African agriculture. Per hectare farm yields in sub-Saharan Africa are only about one-third those in Asia. They are one-tenth American yields. If African productivity were to rise even to Asian levels, much of the current food crisis would vanish - and many of the poorest people on earth would be far better off. Why is African agriculture so unproductive? It's not the fault of African farmers, who "handle their tools, cropping systems, and animals with experienced judgment and considerable skill," writes Robert Paarlberg, an expert on agriculture at Wellesley College and Harvard University. The problem is that the technologies used by those farmers are the same they've used for centuries, if not millennia. "No matter how long or hard they work with these unimproved technologies," Paarlberg writes, "their productivity will remain constrained and their incomes will scarcely rise." Making a bad situation worse is Africa's rapid population growth. More mouths means more pressure on land and other resources - a big reason why African productivity is not only low, it's falling. In 2005, Africa's farms produced three per cent less per capita than in 2000 and 12 per cent less than in 1975. As Paarlberg puts it in the title of his book, recently released by the Harvard University Press, Africans are "starved for science." What we see today in Africa isn't new. Traditional farming techniques are good enough to keep farmers alive - barring the occasional famine - but they aren't enough to lift people out of poverty. Only the introduction of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and machinery allowed European and American farmers to boost productivity and prosper. In the 1960s and 1970s, the widespread application of the same technology, plus the introduction of improved seed varieties, brought similar gains to Asia in what became known as the "Green Revolution." It's easy to forget that in the 1960s it was Asia, not Africa that was considered the hopeless case. "There were Malthusians in the 1960s, and into the 1970s, who argued we should stop giving food aid to India because it would only keep people alive to have more children who would starve in greater numbers in the future," Mr. Paarlberg says from his office in Massachusetts. Fortunately, the Malthusians were ignored. Food aid was delivered. Lives were saved. And rich countries poured money into agricultural research and development. Within 20 years, Asian agriculture had transformed. And 20 years after that, Asia looks set to lead the world. The Green Revolution never came to Africa, Paarlberg argues, mainly because rich countries focused their resources on Asia. When the productivity of Asian agriculture soared, and the food crisis of the 1960s and 1970s passed, the donors lost interest in the whole subject. "Over the last 20 years, the donor community has effectively stopped assistance for agricultural modernization in Africa. The percentage of U.S. bilateral development assistance that goes to agriculture has fallen from 25 per cent to one per cent. The World Bank has cut its lending for agriculture from 30 per cent of its lending to eight per cent of its lending. European donors have cut back as well," Paarlberg notes. "So Africa has had the rug pulled out from under it." African governments simply don't have the resources to pay for major agricultural investments. So food production stagnates. Populations climb. And the future looks grimmer by the year. Making things worse, Paarlberg argues, is a cultural shift in rich countries. Agricultural technology and "industrial farming" have fallen out of favour in the West. The cutting edge of agricultural science - genetic modification - is widely feared. Organic is in. No pesticides. No synthetic fertilizers. No genetically modified organisms. We tend to think of organic as a modern movement but it really amounts to removing the technologies developed over the last century and returning agriculture to its roots. It is pre-modern. Just like Africa's farmers. "Many NGOs working in Africa in the area of development and the environment have been advocating against the modernization of traditional farming practices," Paarlberg says. "They believe that traditional farming in Africa incorporates indigenous knowledge that shouldn't be replaced by science-based knowledge introduced from the outside. They encourage Africa to stay away from fertilizers, and be certified as organic instead. And in the case of genetic engineering, they warn African governments against making these technologies available to farmers." The NGO-led campaign against genetically modified organisms has been particularly successful. African elites have become so convinced that GMOs are dangerous to human health - despite reams of evidence to the contrary - that the president of Zambia once referred to them as "poison." Even facing famine, many African countries have refused to accept American food aid containing GMO varieties - the same GMO varieties eaten daily by almost every American. Only South Africa permits its farmers to plant GMOs, thanks to a regulatory system set up shortly before western environmentalists launched the anti-GMO crusade. In the right-left paradigm of politics, Paarlberg's argument may be dismissed as "right-wing." Just how wrong that is can be seen in the foreword to his book. One of the foreword's authors is Norman Borlaug, the father of the Green Revolution. The other is former U.S. president Jimmy Carter. Both are Nobel Peace Prize winners. Both are humanitarians who have saved countless lives. And both say Paarlberg is right. Robert Zoellick, the new president of the World Bank, seems to agree. After admitting the bank was wrong to abandon African agriculture, Zoellick recently announced it would double loans to the sector in 2009. So is the food crisis shaking up the West's thinking? Paarlberg is uncertain. He ruefully notes that at the same time the World Bank changed course, the U.S. government's development agency announced a cut in funding for a network of international agricultural research centres. This is hardly the stuff of which Green Revolutions are made. Back to Menu _______________________________________________________________________ REGIONAL OFFICE FOR ASIA PACIFICE (ROAP) MEDIA UPDATE THE ENVIRONMENT IN THE NEWS Monday, 26 May, 2008
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