In November 2007, Greenpeace published a report on the impacts of the palm oil industry on rainforests and climate change. It singles out three companies in particular: Nestle, Proctor & Gamble and Unilever. It argues that these companies are sourcing from suppliers who ‘aren’t picky’ about where they get their palm oil from, despite the fact that these 3 companies are members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil.

Download the report here or more directly here.

This discussion paper explores some of the challenges that come with taking a global perspective on sustainable farming and food. In particular the paper explores six key questions:

• Farming the land: What role does agriculture have in the Uk in light of competition from other land uses
• Global climate: How can farming and the food sector meet the challenge of climate change without exposing the UK food supply to other environmental and economic shocks?
• Biodiversity and animal welfare: How far can we protect biodiversity and improve the animal health and welfare standards of our food, wherever it is produced, within th terms of our international trade commitments?
• International development: How can our international trade in food best support the wellbeing of people, animals and the environment in poor countries, within the UK and globally?
• Consumers and public health: How can agriculture promote the wellbeing of both people and the environment in the UK and internationally
• Governance: How can we address the big challenges in sustainable farming and food, yet also give communities, regions and nations greater freedom to pursue their distinctive priorities?

The report shows that substantial progress has been made in the development of agri-environmental indicators at EU-15 level but that there are a number of remaining challenges to fully realise the potential of the indicators in support of the policy process. The project covered the 15 Member States that formed the EU in 2002.

See here for the follow-on document: Integration of environment into EU agriculture policy – the IRENAindicator-based assessment report which reports on the EU-15's progress is tackling environmental concerns as measured using the IRENA indicators.

Further information on the work of the Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment (SAGE) and their publications can be found here.

The report can be found at the IDPM's website, here.

Work is now ongoing on fisheries (see Relevant Projects section).

Published by the Sustainable Development Commission, a new study undertaken by ADAS, starting with the premise that oil prices reach $100/barrel of oil, explores:

• The direct impact of increased energy prices upon UK farm businesses, with consideration to the potential for a change in farm practice.
• The wider impact of increased energy prices on the UK food supply chain, and hence the competitiveness of the UK agricultural industry.

You can download the report here.

An FCRN summary is available here.

This report, published in July 2008 by CSIRO (Australia’s national science and research agency) brings together the latest science from research groups around Australia, and provides an overview of the steps that need to be taken to adjust to the ongoing changes to the Australian climate. The report looks at each of Australia’s main agricultural sectors, including cotton, sugar cane, livestock, rice and grapes. For more information see here.

In May 2008, the Australian Government’s Bureau of Rural Sciences (BRS) published Climate Risk and Industry Adaptation which looks at climate change, how rural farming communities perceive the risks and how these risks are being managed in four drought-affected areas.

According to the BRS’s director: “The report suggests there is uncertainty in rural Australia about climate change, including: whether it is, in fact, happening; the causes, the impacts and its links with the current drought. It found that many in the sector are adapting well to change – changes such as water availability, terms of trade, commodity prices and labour shortages – but not necessarily to the specific challenges posed by climate change. But it also found that others were already focussing on the changing climate and adopting new technologies, particularly in important areas such as water efficiency – and especially after suffering through seven years of drought."

To read the press release see here, and for the full report see here.

In May 2008. the UK’s Farming Futures project (funded by Defra, among others) released a survey of farmers’ attitudes to climate change. It found that ‘almost half of farmers in England interviewed by Farming Futures report that they believe climate change presents more risks than opportunities to their businesses. More than 50% say they are already affected by climate change, and almost 70% expect to be affected in the next ten years.’ To read the survey and the other new resources on the site see here. Note that in the ‘interactive’ section – there are videos showing what Peter Kendall (President of the National Farmers’ Union) and Henry Aubrey-Fletcher (President of the Country Land and Business Association) are doing on their own farms by way of mitigation.

In this article, published in Science in January 2008, the research team analysed climate risks and adaptation priorities for crops in 12 food-insecurre regions, basing the analysis on statistical crop models and climate projections for 2030. Their results highlight the fact that in the absence of sufficient adaptation measures, there will be negative impacts on crops grown in South Asia and Southern Africa, that are important to large food-insecure human populations.

You can read coverage of the article here.

See here for an interesting article looking at the impact of climate change on agricultural systems worldwide, and at some of the efforts being made to improve crop resilience.

Added: 25.10.07

This Environment Agency report was launched in October 2007 and sets out the Agency’s strategy for protecting, managing and restoring soil. The strategy highlights the “profound effects” on soil caused by climate change, how the climate can be affected by soil management and the important, if poorly understood part that soils play in sequestering carbon. Read the Environment Agency's summary here.

An FCRN summary is available here.

The Country Land and Business Association and Savills plc have launched a new free web-based calculator to enable farmers and land managers to work out their carbon (actually GHG) accounts.

The calculator calculates emissions from direct on farm activities (livestock and soil emissions, machinery use), indirect emissions (eg. true GHG emissions from electricity) and other indirect emissions (eg. Feed and fertiliser inputs). It deducts emissions from carbon sequestereed in forests and trees. You can read the press release here, and find links to the calculator itself here.

In early 2008 Warwick HRI produced a report for Defra entitled Direct energy use in agriculture: opportunities for reducing fossil fuel inputs. The report examines energy use in agriculture and the scope for emissions reduction. According to its analysis, agriculture emits around 1.19 million tonnes of carbon as a result of direct energy use, which is equivalent to 0.8% of total UK emissions (and higher than previous DUKES calculations – Digest of UK Energy Statistics) NB: note that this is energy-related emissions only and does not take into account nitrous oxide and methane emissions which account for the bulk of agriculture related GHG impacts. The report finds that measures to improve energy efficiency could reduce emissions by 15% by 2015 but it says that this saving could be much higher with the adoption of alternative, low-carbon energy sources. It looks at a spectrum of technologies on offer, including anaerobic digestion, wind and solar and concludes that, if all of the barriers to the uptake of alternative fuels were removed, agriculture could ultimately become almost carbon neutral with regards to direct energy use. However, without Government support, the high associated costs are likely to be a considerable barrier to the uptake of such energy sources.

Defra has published a new review of the potential for reduced tillage practices and organic matter returns to increase the carbon content of English and Welsh arable soils as a means of mitigating greenhouse gas emissions.The research, undertaken by ADAS can be read here.

An FCRN summary is available here.

Cool Farming:Climate impacts of agriculture and mitigation potential

This report, published by Greenpeace International was written by researchers from the University of Aberdeen. It puts agriculture’s global contribution to GHG emissions at 17 and 32% of all human-induced GHG emissions, including land use changes.

However, it also says that agriculture has a significant climate change mitigation potential, which could change the position of agriculture from the second largest emitter to a much smaller emitter or even a net sink. Mitigation options fall into the following categories:

• Cropland management
• Grazing management
• Restoration of organic soils
• Water and rice management
• Land use change, agroforestry, set aside etc
• More efficient fertiliser manafacture
• Eating fewer meat and dairy products

See here for the full report.

• More emphasis on supporting UK food production as a means of promoting self sufficiency
• More support for biofuels production and for the use of biomass in local Combined Heat and Power Plants
• The use of energy saving technologies in the pig, poultry, egg and protected horticulture sectors
• More emphasis on novel and non-food crops
• Land management and carbon storage including zero-tillage practices
• Action to reduce methane emissions from livestock through modifying feed inputs

Biomass policy has a clear link with food issues; sources of biomass include animal wastes, manures and slurries, energy crops and municipal solid waste (which will include a food element).

Click here to see an FCRN summary of key points arising from the report.

In addition, the research findings have been published in a special edition of Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment. This is a subscription journal. If you're not part of an institution with access to this publication you can purchase individual articles or email relevant authors ask for a copy of specific articles.

This paper measures the production of greenhouse gas emissions in a variety of cropping systems and concludes that the vast majority of cases, nitrous oxide production was the single greatest source of GWP (global warming potential).

An FCRN summary is available here.

An FCRN summary is available here.

The study looks at both the production (ie. livestock rearing) and at the milk processing stages and finds that 80% of the global warming potential is accounted for by the production stage. It also notes that the methane produced by the cows contributes 30% of the total GHG emissions.

Commissioned by Defra and undertaken by Cranfield University, the report examines the following: bread wheat, potatoes, oilseed rape, tomatoes, beef, pig meat, sheep meat, poultry meat, milk and eggs. For each product is quantifies resources used and emissions rising from diferent production options (including organic versus non organic, extensive versus intensive and so forth).

An FCRN summary is available here.

An FCRN summary is available here.

Published by the International Trade Centre in April 2008, Organic Farming and Climate change concludes that organic agriculture has much to offer in both mitigation of climate change through its emphasis on closed nutrient cycles and is a particularly resilient and productive system for adaptation strategies. It also raises the issue of whether organic agriculture should be eligible for carbon credits under voluntary carbon offsetting markets and the Clean Development Mechanism. You can read the report here. (NB: The ITC is the joint technical cooperation agency of the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and WTO for business aspects of trade development – see here for more.

Wood R, Lenzen M, Dey C and Lundie S (2006). A comparative study of some environmental impacts of conventional and organic farming in Australia, Agricultural Systems 89 324–348 is an Australian input-output analysis which concludes in favour of organic across a range of indicators (including GHGs). NOTE that since it’s an input-output analysis, emissions are expressed in terms of kg GHGs per Australian dollar. Since the value of organic goods tends to be higher, the dollar figure represents less edible output for the organic sector than the conventional one ie. on an emissions-per-volume of yield the difference would be less. Nevertheless, notwithstanding the smaller volumes, there still appears to be a significant discrepancy between organic and conventional.

The summary is available here.

The UK's Department for International Development has details of its current and past research on sustainable agriculture here.

The non governmental organisation GRAIN promotes the sustainable management and use of agricultural biodiversity based on people's control over genetic resources and local knowledge. It produces publications on a range of issues including genetic modification and biofuels.

This Friends of the Earth report on biotech and the developing world published in January 2008 argues, among other things, that GM crops have so far not made any contribution to tackling hunger and poverty.