About IATP

The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy works locally and globally at the intersection of policy and practice to ensure fair and sustainable food, farm and trade systems.

Founded in 1986, IATP is rooted in the family farm movement. With offices in Minneapolis and Geneva, IATP works on making domestic and global agricultural policy more sustainable for everyone.

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January 05, 2010

Hunger and the human rights solution

As we step into a new decade, imagine we have an eraser to wipe away the tired yet relentless drive to further liberalize trade at nearly every corner—and instead, take a fresh look at what policies could help the over one billion people around the world without enough food to eat. How could we re-write trade and investment policies to support efforts by countries struggling with hunger to better feed themselves? How can we strengthen the resilience of agriculture to better adapt to climate change? How can we better stabilize highly volatile markets that make it so difficult for small scale farmers to make a living?

A new book, edited by FIAN's Armin Paasch and IATP's Sophia Murphy, makes a convincing case that by putting human rights, particularly the right to adequate, healthy food, at the center of economic and development policy we can better address hunger in the short and long term. The Global Food Challenge, with contributions by some of civil society's leading thinkers on food security and trade policy, outlines a series of proposals to integrate established human rights law into multilateral and bilateral trade negotiations. It includes chapters on trade policy, foreign investment, women's role in food production, speculation on agricultural commodities and climate change, and food security. 

The book includes contributions by IATP's Alexandra Spieldoch and the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier De Schutter, among many others. You can read the Executive Summary and find the full book on our Web site. 

—Ben Lilliston

December 23, 2009

APHA: No more hormones

The American Public Health Association's (APHA) resolution to oppose the use of recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH) in beef and dairy production brings much needed support to a seemingly common sense case. In a press release issued yesterday, IATP, Food and Water Watch and the Oregon Physicians for Social Responsibility applauded APHA's recent resolution.

From the press release:

"Americans are now awash in environmental hormones, while the science reveals that hormone-related diseases are on the rise,” said David Wallinga, M.D., physician/director of Food and Health program at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. “The most prudent step—and the one called for by APHA—is to reduce the needless and risky addition of hormones to the food chain wherever possible.”

Take a look at APHA's resolution, or check out IATP's Smart Guide to Hormones in the Food System.

—Andrew Ranallo

December 22, 2009

Trading carbon emissions: Turning a liability into an asset?

Accountants are trying to decide whether credits for trading carbon dioxide are assets or whether they are liabilities unless and until firms comply with progressively more stringent annual limits on their greenhouse gas emissions. The U.S. Congressional Budget Office has estimated the value of credits given away for free to major emitters (or polluters according to the Clean Air Act) under proposed legislation at $50–300 billion USD, depending on the evolution of the carbon price in the commodity futures market. However, if the beneficiary firms fail to invest in a low-carbon economy and fail to comply with their carbon cap, then carbon dioxide emissions are a liability not just for the firm, but for the planet and its people.

This accountancy dilemma was just one problematic aspect of carbon emissions trading GHG-reduction technologies debated at several side meetings that I went to during a week of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiations. The messages from these meetings ranged widely. There were denunciations of carbon trading as a threat to local efforts to reduce GHGs. Carbon trading proponents asserted that only when the futures market discovered the “right” price for carbon on a consistent basis would major investment flows begin to save the planet from the ravages of climate change. Here are a few anecdotes that illustrate the hopes of the carbon traders and the problems embedded in such hopes.

More than one potential beneficiary voiced displeasure at exacting verification requirements. Robert Carlsen, president of the North Dakota National Farmers Union, told participants that about 4,000 of his members had signed legally binding, multi-year contracts. As an aggregator of GHG reductions, NFU was liable to its members for contract performance to deliver GHG-reduction payments. A Canadian farm official asked if disagreements about verification methodologies prevent his farmers from realizing their anticipated payments, following their investments towards changing how they farm. Other participants suggested that until such time as there was scientific agreement about verification, why not certify farms as having complied with GHG-reduction practices? One participant said that farmers could be certified just as organic farmers are.

Certification of good agricultural practices would not suffice to monitor and verify GHG reductions, said Alex Michaelowa, an offset project developer with Perspectives Climate Change. Without GHG-reduction verification, offset credits could not be sold, nor, it was implied, could farmers receive payments from those sales. Michaelowa said that the science demonstrating GHG reductions from sequestering carbon in soil was “ambiguous.” Although U.S. legislation would start a carbon credit and offset credit market in 2012, it is not clear that there will be agreement on verification methodology for various would-be GHG-reduction agricultural activities  in time for the anticipated legislative start of the carbon markets.

For developing countries expecting offset credit payments from the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) operated by the World Bank, agriculture and food security are vulnerable to offset development projects, even if GHG reductions can be scientifically verified. One UN Food and Agriculture Organization official estimated that offset revenues could never amount to more than 10 percent of small landholder revenues, so the transaction costs of offset projects would have to be very low to attract the cooperation of farmers. Otherwise, said one participant from India, the transaction costs could damage already economically vulnerable farmers, including commercial farmers.

At the unofficial side events in the Klimaforum, there was widespread opposition to using land in developing countries for offset projects.  At “Agrofuels in Africa,” the African Biodiversity Project noted that about 70 percent of African land was communally owned with no formal land titles. The expropriation of these lands for growing biofuels crops and the eviction of their indigenous peoples was predicated on a myth that these lands “marginal” to agricultural production. The contribution that biofuels might make to reducing GHGs by reducing fossil fuel use is controversial.  In land classified by governments as “marginal” in order to justify expropriation to benefit investors, dry land agricultural and pastoralist livestock husbandry are the basis of food security and rural development. However, the UNFCCC sustainability criteria for offset projects exclude food security as a climate change concern.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES) which includes carbon “border adjustment measures,” both tariff and non-tariff measures to impede the entry of products from countries that the U.S. judges to not have a “comparable” GHG-reduction regime. One participant said that if “border adjustment measures” were signed into law by President Barack Obama, all industrialized countries would be compelled to introduce their own measures. There was disagreement about whether such border measures would be consistent with the governments’ commitments to World Trade Organization agreements. But there was general agreement that the WTO could not act as a “policeman” for the UNFCCC.

In a remarkable exchange, Resources for the Future, a U.S. NGO with major corporate backing, asked an EU consultant whether the European Commission was likely to emulate the ACES provision that allowed major emitters to “update” their GHG cap every year, to provide flexibility in meeting the overall 2020 cap. The consultant replied that if emitters were allowed to adjust the cap at their convenience, what would be the incentive for planning to meet the cap? Since the EU GHG-reduction commitment is based on the more stringent 1990 emissions baseline and ACES uses a more emitter-generous 2005 baseline, allowing emitters “updating” flexibility may be the least of the difficulties of linking EU and U.S. carbon markets.

We were able to participate in only one side event in the Bella Center, the site of the UNFCCC negotiations. Increasingly restrictive access culminated with the arrival of the Heads of State, when only 90 of nearly 30,000 registered NGOs were able to enter the Bella Center. That event, hosted by the Carbon Marketing and Investors Association, addressed what investors would need in a climate change agreement to put their money into both a low-carbon economy and GHG-reduction technology. First, said one participants from Bank of America, negotiators would have to produce a “credible cap” on emissions in order to generate demand for buying offset credits and for firms to meet their caps through technology investments. CAMCO, a large offset project developer through the World Bank’s CDM, said that investors needed faster verification of CDM GHG reductions. They couldn’t invest in CDM projects and then wait 3–4 years for verification that would release CDM funds to their investors. The climate change negotiators had to find a way to CDM projects more widely to attract more investors. There were more CDM projects in Chile than in all of sub-Saharan Africa.

—Steve Suppan

December 18, 2009

Copenhagen is not the end, but the beginning

At his press conference in Copenhagen a few minutes ago, U.S. President Barack Obama said, "This agreement is not the end, but the beginning of a process." In a candid moment discussing the global climate agreement reached today, Obama explained why: the national emission targets to be outlined in the agreement will not achieve the necessary reductions in greenhouse gas emissions needed by 2050.

Below is our press release on the conclusion of the climate talks, plagued by problems throughout the last week. Let's hope this is only the beginning.

Weak climate deal leaves hard choices for next year

Copenhagen – A watered down political agreement reached today in Copenhagen lacks the firm commitments needed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and address global climate change, said the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP). Progress on agriculture within the climate talks sets the stage for important negotiations in 2010.

“It’s fortunate that a total breakdown was avoided, but this weak agreement needs to go much further in 2010,” said IATP President Jim Harkness. “The meeting lacked both transparency and democratic participation, both inside and outside the negotiating convention. The UN needs to do a comprehensive review of what went wrong in Copenhagen so that we can avoid having tens of thousands of accredited NGOs, including IATP, as well as country delegates locked out of the negotiations.”

“It’s shameful that developed countries still haven’t taken responsibility on climate nor made firm, legally binding commitments,” said Harkness. “Instead, they often attempted to cast developing countries as an obstacle to reaching a deal, even when leaked UNFCCC documents indicated that the total pledges of developing countries were larger than developed countries.”

The controversial ending to the meeting, meant that countries did not approve a agriculture work plan for 2010. That work plan had cited the need to safeguard food security and livelihoods in climate adaptation and mitigation, also making specific reference to the interests of small farmers, the rights of indigenous peoples and importance of traditional knowledge. Now, it is unclear when that work plan will be approved.

In contrast to the timid approach of the official negotiations, civil society groups engaged in a series of vigorous discussions throughout the rest of Copenhagen. On December 16, IATP participated in the founding meeting of the Round Table of Organic Agriculture and Climate Change, which established a new international consortium of the world’s leading organic research institutions to provide strong scientific evidence to the SBSTA process and coordinate research efforts on organic agriculture’s solutions to climate change.

—Ben Lilliston

Women speaking out on climate change

Climate justice has been the central focus of the civil society meetings at the Klimaforum this week in Copenhagen. Discussions in the halls and protests on the street have focused on the unfairness of greenhouse gas emissions that have been overwhelmingly generated in the countries of the North but whose impacts will be experienced most severely in the South. 

That inequality plays out within countries too, as well as within households. In many cases, it will be women who face the harshest impacts of wild swings of droughts and flooding, ever shrinking growing seasons and competition for diminishing resources. At a session on women and climate change, Ekenma Julia from the University of Nigeria described studies in several local communities showing that women are already more aware of climate change than men. Some 61 percent were aware of recent climate change, compared to 34 percent of men. Those women tended to earn incomes selling poultry or vegetables or other jobs that were dependent on nature in some way. They were also more likely than men to already be doing what they could to cope with these changes, such as building rainwater catchment systems to confront increasing droughts. Nigerian women’s groups and their allies were demanding that rich countries drastically lower their emissions and that gender issues be mainstreamed into climate talks.

The World March of Women held a meeting to talk about how to refocus some of their work on the impacts of climate change and women's demands. Women from Brazil, the Philippines, Peru and the UK talked about how climate change is aggravating existing inequality. They are considering how to shift some of their campaign efforts to take this new challenge into account.

In some ways, climate change seems like a new lens to focus on existing problems of gender inequality, food security and livelihoods. The difference is that weather extremes and shifts in resources could mean that those problems become much worse. The tepid responses in the official negotiations aren’t nearly enough. We need more of the sense of urgency, righteous indignation and calls to action taking place in the Klimaforum.

—Karen Hansen-Kuhn

Groups issue letter to Obama: Earn your Nobel Peace Prize

A number of groups from 28 different countries, including IATP, have issued an open letter to President Obama asking him to reconsider the climate emissions reduction target put forward in Copenhagen today.

"A reduction by the United States of only 3 percent below 1990, contingent on greenhouse gas cuts by China and other developing countries, is scientifically unsound and deeply unjust," says the letter.

The letter concludes by saying: "If ever there was a time for you to exert bold leadership, this is it. Last week you received the Nobel Peace Prize. Now, we call on you to earn it."

The full letter, including a list of signing groups, is available on our climate page.

—Andrew Ranallo

Ag offets: 0, Alternatives: 1

One of the benefits to the U.S.’s proposed cap-and-trade–based climate legislation is the profitability it would offer farmers through an agriculture-based offset program. That, at least, is what we’ve been told by the schemes' authors and supporters (Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Agriculture Sec. Tom Vilsack, etc.).

It was surprising, then, to hear Stabenow aide Chris Adamo confess his uncertainty over how long it would take for farmers to actually begin receiving offset credits for carbon sequestering activities during a panel discussion here in Copenhagen on Wednesday.

“I can't tell you farmers would get credit if this bill were passed tomorrow,” said Adamo, one of several U.S. and European panelists discussing agriculture's emissions reduction potential at a side event sponsored by the International Emissions Trading Association.

Wow. Score one for the no-ag-offsets team. I’ve written a lot about the trouble with agricultural offsets recently (see here and here), including the uncertainty offsets could create for farmers. This sounds about as uncertain as you can get.

We know agriculture done right can be a boon for climate mitigation. Offsets are NOT the way to get there. We need monetary support, lots of it, to help farmers transition to different ways of farming. We need that support to be consistent, predictable and substantial enough to really matter. Offsets can promise none of those things. Look for more writing soon about other ways we might get there.

—Julia Olmstead

Different paths in Copenhagen

From day one of the global climate talks, discussions within the Bella Center (home of the official negotiations) have differed greatly from those at the Klima Forum (home of NGO-led discussions). Put simply, at the Bella Center the main issue of contention is money—not the climate. A new pledge of money from U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has supposedly jump-started the talks. This money is targeted toward developing countries suffering the effects of climate change. But there's something for developed countries too—money to be made within a new carbon market—where buyers and sellers trade carbon credits.

At the Klima Forum, the theme is "system change." Namely, how do we transform the global economy away from a fossil-fueled intensive, unsustainable path and shift toward a different system that values the protection of the earth. It is filled with critiques of our current polluting economy, but also ideas for bottom-up change within communities, cities and regions for a new low-carbon economy. IATP and others will talk about this new vision for both cities and agriculture at a workshop tomorrow at the Klima Forum. Perhaps it is symbolic that this panel was originally scheduled to be in the Bella Center, but was canceled after the UN kicked out nearly all accredited NGO observer organizations.

Tonight, UK barrister Polly Higgins outlined a very different approach to considering the climate at the Klima Forum. Instead of looking at carbon as a commodity, Higgins asserted that we should establish a Planet Earth Trust, where we are all trustees who accept responsibility for the earth's future. "The planet is a capital asset and we the people have a responsibility to ensure this asset is protected, not exploited." Higgins is proposing that the UN establish a system of Planetary Rights—a commons-based idea that would certainly change the dimension of climate talks. 

It's idealistic, perhaps not politically practical right now, but also represents the important, creative thinking going on at the Klima Forum that is focused first and foremost on addressing climate change. Five years from now, it is likely that new ideas at the Klima Forum supporting efforts on the ground will eclipse the big money talks in the Bella Center. 

—Ben Lilliston

December 16, 2009

Add water to the climate change negotiations and stir?

As of late last night, December 15, the climate change negotiations in Copenhagen are deadlocked. According to excellent Third World Network reporting, developed country governments want to scrap the Kyoto Protocol and draft a new agreement that would allow developed countries to choose the baseline from which they would make greenhouse gas (GHG) emission cuts. (The Kyoto Protocol requires GHG cuts from a 1990 baseline, whereas U.S. climate change legislation proposes cuts from the much higher 2005 baseline, to ease the burden on U.S. industry.) The developed country governments also want developing countries to commit to emissions reductions, which is not a provision of the Kyoto Protocol. At a contact group session, a U.S. negotiator said that the United States would never ratify the Kyoto Protocol.

It does not seem likely that the arrival tomorrow of more than a hundred heads of state will lead to an extension of the Kyoto Protocol, whose first GHG reduction commitment period ends in 2012. Nor does it seem likely that the presidents and prime ministers will agree to launch negotiations for a new agreement. In the midst of this logjam, why are advocates for water as a human right proposing to add water to the climate change negotiations agenda?

Advocates for water as a human right made the proposal at an event last night in the Klimaforum, the site of the unofficial side events to the negotiations. “A Call for Water Justice in Copenhagen” was read out to general applause from participants in the event, “World Water Movements and CoP 15: Proposals and strategies for water and climate justice.” IATP’s Shiney Varghese helped to draft the two page call, which asserted that “The effects of climate change on water will directly affect agriculture and the food security of billions. The agricultural sector, accounting for 70 percent of global water use, is not only affected by climate change but can also help to mitigate it,” i.e., to repair the economic and environmental damage caused by climate change. The call proposes that by 2012, governments negotiate a legally binding World Water Agreement to be administered by a World Water Agency under United Nations auspices.

Water policy advocates want to get a foot in the door of the negotiations, as agricultural policy advocates have just achieved. This year agriculture became a topic of climate change discussions for the first time and the International Federation of Agricultural Producers was recognized as the Farmer’s “focal point” (representative group) of the a UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

In response to a question from Klimaforum participants about why water policy advocates should get involved in the protracted and deadlocked negotiations, Maude Barlow, of the Council of Canadians, said that the first effects of climate change had arrived in the form of drought, floods, melting glaciers and their social, economic and environmental consequences. Water is the “first face” of climate change. However the United Nations had ceded control of water governance to the World Water Forum, a transnational corporate association. Although the UN system itself is dominated by transnational corporations, Barlow believes that the UN must assert global governance over water as a global public good and human right. The climate change negotiations offer both a venue and a crucial issue though which the UN system, aided by civil society, can take back water as a global public good and reject the transnational corporate commodification of water.

There were more than a dozen speakers at the three hour long Klimaforum water event and no summary here can do them justice, but three speakers stood out as representative of the issues discussed. Professor Ricardo Petrella presented a “Memorandum for a World Water Protocol,” that resulted from a World Political Forum conference with the European Parliament in February 2009. He said of the climate change negotiations, “Our leaders believe that the future of the world depends on price of carbon emissions [in a UN approved carbon trading scheme]. That’s criminal. That’s nonsense.” Improving water use is a more effective climate change mitigation practice than relying on “market mechanisms” to find the "right" carbon price to induce investments in a low carbon economy. 

Michal Kravcik, of the Kosice Civic Protocol gave a powerful and detailed overview of various technical projects, distributed to over 7,000 institutions, for climate change mitigation through anti-flood protection, rain-water harvesting, anti-erosion techniques and other water mediated mitigation means. He showed projects not only from his native Slovakia, but from projects in Africa to prevent desertification that exacerbates climate change.

Alivio Aruquipa, of the Bolivian mountain community of Khapi, closed the event by discussing the loss of potable water, food security and livelihoods as the Ilimani glacier above his village of 190 people disappeared. If the shrinking of the glacier could not be reversed, his people would be forced to migrate. Aruquipa’s sobering account depicted a future that now directly affects the most vulnerable populations but soon could directly affect us all if there is no effective global governance of water, combined with local projects to make the use of water sustainable and the fulfillment of a human right.

—Steve Suppan

A rude awakening in Copenhagen

This morning as I was getting ready for another day of climate work I heard police sirens and shouting outside the window of our hotel here in Copenhagen. I looked out just in time to see a pretty brutal take-down of protestors by police. We're only a few blocks away from the Bella Center, the massive conference hall where the negotiations are taking place, and today a large march had been planned across town, ending at Bella. I saw protestors running, coming I assume from a nearby metro station, one of two meet-up points for activists. As I watched, police with dogs chased the protestors, slamming them to the ground in a show of force that seemed pretty unjustifiable for weaponless activists. As you can see from some of the photos below, several of the police were clearly undercover, dressed as activists. Nothing new as far as riot police tactics go, but chilling just the same. As I sit writing this in our hotel lobby, I've watched no fewer than 30 police vans fly by with sirens blaring. Copenhagen is under a state of virtual martial law, and police are able to search and arrest anyone, at any time, for any cause. "Preventative measures," they've said.

In a way, this is one of the biggest stories to come of COP15. Not this protest specifically, or these arrests, but the two worlds that have formed here: an "official" one made up of negotiators and heads of state that hovers just out of reach of the other world, the one the rest of us make up—NGOs, activists, students, youths and citizens.

We've spent hours alongside thousands waiting in the cold to get Bella Center access. We finally got in, but it won't last. The UN has progressively whittled down NGO access over the week. We just heard that the environmental group Friends of the Earth has been banned entirely from the Bella Center, and none of us will be there for the final (and most important) days of negotiation. So much for a democratic process.

Ultimately, though, I'm not sure it matters much whether we're in the Bella Center or not. It's seeming increasingly unlikely that a binding deal is going to come out of this meeting, and if it does, it's probably even more unlikely that it will mean much at all. Yesterday, negotiators took all the numbers (emission cap levels, etc.) out of the text for now. Not a hopeful place to be with just two days to go. 

Two worlds here in Copenhagen, the one that cares mostly about looking as though they're making progress, happy to end the week with a watered down "agreement," and the one that knows that time is running out for real action. This is our chance, and I don't think we'll get many more of them.

—Julia Olmstead

December 15, 2009

Proposals for a strong agriculture agenda in Copenhagen

While IATP staff (among many other delegates, NGOs and even country delegates) have been struggling to stay on schedule in Copenhagen due to over-booking (on the part of the UNFCCC), our press conference today (December 15) went on as scheduled. We focused on the importance of including agriculture in the climate negotiations with a panel including:

• Jim Harkness, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
• Niggli Urs, International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements
• Dale Wen, International Forum on Globalization

The discussion addressed the adaptation and mitigation potential of agriculture as related to climate change, and the importance of the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD)—a global blueprint for a transition in agriculture that both addresses food security and climate change.

The press conference can be viewed on the COP 15 on-demand page or below:

—Andrew Ranallo

"Big River" Nets Big Donation for Mississippi River Gorge Stewards Program

IATP staffers (from left) Abby Rogosheske, Julia Olmstead, and Mark Muller proudly handed over $2000 in proceeds from the "Big River" movie premiere to the Friends of the Mississippi River's Gorge Stewards Program. FMR and IATP partnered with the Birchwood Cafe and Land Stewardship Project to bring Curt Ellis (of movie "King Corn" fame) and his new documentary "Big River" to the Riverview Theater in Minneapolis last month. Ticket sales from the near-capacity crowd generated a big donation to the Mississippi River Gorge Stewards Program. This program brings neighbors and committed citizens from throughout the metro area together to protect and restore the Mississippi River Gorge, the very unique river ecosystem that stretches from downtown Minneapolis to Crosby Farm Nature Area in Saint Paul. We are all grateful to everyone who supported both the movie premiere and this important river program. Thank you!      

—Julia Olmstead

The waiting game in Copenhagen

In this information age, most of us just want the bottom line from our news. We read the headlines, skim some paragraphs, check out the graphics—information in short, efficient bursts. But if the climate talks fall apart, it will be important to understand how and why they weren't successful. And part of that story needs to include the poor planning by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

They booked the Bella Center in Copenhagen to host the talks, which has a capacity of 15,000. Amazingly, they then allowed 45,000 people from around the world to register, according to the New York Times. This doesn't include country delegations. So, much of yesterday was spent waiting in lines—and if you were lucky like me, you got into the Bella Center. Several IATP staff waited six hours in the cold and never got in. They weren't alone, there were country delegates, climatologists and many others who were forced to miss or cancel meetings yesterday.

The overbooking is wreaking all kinds of havoc this week. The UNFCCC is now severely limiting the number of accredited observers into the Bella Center today and tomorrow. Then Thursday, only 1,000 will be allowed in. Finally, on Friday, when President Obama and other heads of state arrive, they will only allow 90. Many organizations and governments had organized side events to take place on Thursday and Friday. As of now, they will be canceled.

Negotiating a new global climate deal within today's international context—as countries like the U.S., EU, China jockey for power—is incredibly challenging under ideal conditions on the ground. The UNFCCC, while having good intentions on inclusiveness, has made the hill to climb even steeper.

—Ben Lilliston

Eyeless in Copenhagen

We have been told, by more than one speaker of very different viewpoints about climate change, that nothing less than the future of the planet will be negotiated in Copenhagen. Expectations had been lowered by the assurance that no legally binding agreement would result from the negotiations. Instead, President Barack Obama announced there would be a “political agreement,” that would frame the terms of a legally binding agreement to be finalized next year in Mexico City. But the “Danish text,” leaked to The Guardian, provoked such outrage among developing countries that it has been withdrawn, at least procedurally, as a basis for any discussion towards negotiations. The negotiations were suspended today, December 14, but then renewed. The Climate Action Network reportedly "awarded" the United States its first "Fossil Award" for bad behavior after it announced that it would never sign the Kyoto Protocol that would bind it to a greenhouse gas reduction mandate. Instead the U.S. will attempt to make a global carbon emissions market the primary means to allow it to meet GHG-reduction targets. Such a market includes the buying of carbon offset credits at a cheap price in developing countries.

More officials have arrived to negotiate and NGOs have arrived to participate in side events in the gargantuan Bella Center, the site of the negotiations. The line of those waiting with letters of acceptance and passports in hand waited in vain for hours today. Those IATP staff who had managed to register before the “badge making machine had broken” (the security office explanation) called from inside the Bella Center to arrange meetings for what we hope will be a more logistically successful tomorrow. But right now rumors abound and we feel eyeless in Copenhagen, as far as the Bella Center is concerned.

But however frustrating the registration process, we have been able to learn and inform about what IATP is doing on climate change. From our participation in Agriculture and Rural Development Day (www.agricultureday.org), we learned that much bigger institutions than IATP were surprised at the exclusion of agriculture, until now, in the negotiations. ARDD delivered the “messages” gathered from four Roundtable discussions, characterized by one speaker as “no agriculture, no deal.” Since the United States and the European Union plan to “reduce” more than half of their GHG emissions by buying much cheaper offset credits based on GHG reductions from agriculture and forestry practices, it is a little more than bizarre that agriculture has not had a working group in the negotiations.

Agriculture Day plenary speakers, including Kanayo Nwanze, the President of the International Foundation for Development, insisted that the more than two billion small land holding farmers affected by climate change would feel failure in Copenhagen in their stomachs before anybody else. In sub-Saharan African alone, 75-250 million people could be added to the total number of more than a billion food insecure peoples, as the natural resources for agriculture are damaged by climate change.

I participated in the round table on “Potential benefits of emissions trading for small [land] holder farmers.” What several speakers and participants conveyed was just how little was known about how to verify that offset projects reduced GHGs. Since carbon emissions trading had been sold to farmers as a solid income stream ($40 billion a year in offset sales by 2020, according to the World Bank), more than one of them was upset to find out that stringent verification would be required for their projects to be certified as having reduced GHGs. For example, according to the International Panel on Climate Change, the science on carbon sequestration (usually by returning emissions to the ground) is ambiguous as to whether GHGs are reduced. Managing livestock diets to reduce methane emissions is even more unproven. In light of the science based doubt about agricultural offsets, one participant suggested that agricultural practices, rather than results, be certified as the basis for offset credits in carbon trading. The suggestion was met with scientific disdain.  If the scientists are so unclear about the feasibility of basing emissions trading on verifying offset GHG reductions, the terms for doing so in the climate change negotiations will only be more contentious.

I had ten minutes in the “Ideas Marketplace” to summarize an IATP webinar on carbon trading and U.S. climate change legislation. The poster that I used, graduate student style, explained how the present terms of U.S. legislation could create extreme carbon price volatility that would impede not only the rate of investment return analysis to invest in a low carbon economy, but would exacerbate agricultural futures prices. When the $3 trillion carbon derivates market projected for 2020 is bundled into commodity index funds, the effect is likely to be similar to how oil future prices drove agricultural futures prices up and down in 2007-2008. Discussion was lively, so maybe we opened up the eyes of a few people who otherwise might have assumed that carbon markets would be an unqualified benefit for farmers. Tomorrow we’ll try to open a few more eyes on other agriculture and climate change topics.

—Steve Suppan

December 14, 2009

Complications in Copenhagen

As the overall climate negotiations hit an impasse, so did discussions focusing specifically on agriculture. IATP's Anne Laure Constantin gives the latest news from Copenhagen:

—Ben Lilliston

Agriculture walks the tightrope in Copenhagen

At the massive global climate meeting taking place this week in Copenhagen, agriculture has played a largely secondary role. Negotiators seem most eager to put off the tough questions on agriculture until next year (see IATP's Anne Laure Constantin's report). But at a conference a short distance from the Bella Center (where the climate talks are taking place) agriculture was on everyone's lips. And the results were both encouraging and troubling.

Agriculture Day was organized by a host of international agriculture research, aid and farm organizations (see the list). The idea was to establish a consensus on how agriculture should be incorporated into the global climate talks.

There certainly was a consensus on a few things: 1) agriculture faces severe challenges due to climate change; 2) countries in the global south, particularly Africa, will be more severely affected; 3) there needs to be additional money (not simply shifting money) to help farmers, particularly small-scale farmers and women, adapt to climate change; 4) there needs to be more money for research and extension systems on adaptability and assessing mitigation efforts such as sequestration; 5) agriculture needs to be part of the solution to climate change; and finally, 6) the global food crisis and rural development issues are intricately linked. As the World Bank's Juergen Voegele said, "agriculture is where poverty reduction, food security and climate intersect."

But two big differences emerged that will largely define the debate on agriculture and climate change in the next year. One was whether a carbon market, with offsets for agriculture, would actually benefit farmers. Complications are certainly scientific (can we effectively measure practices that sequester carbon, and at differing scales of production?), but also economic (who will really make the money here? will it be speculators and the carbon aggregators buying and selling credits or farmers on the ground? See IATP's Steve Suppan presenting at Ag Day, right). Unfortunately, it seemed a lot of participants assumed that a cap-and-trade system was the best way to involve agriculture. IATP's Julia Olmstead outlines other options in her analysis of U.S. climate policy.

The second big difference had to do with the type of investments and priorities that should be made in agriculture within climate policy. There was an emphasis on new technology—primarily genetically engineered seeds and some for nanotechnology. "Traditional breeding is not going to be enough," said Gordon Conway, of Imperial College London and one of the leading proponents of the Green Revolution, (see left). This sentiment was pushed by nearly all the presenters—from USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack to Dr. Adel El-Beltagy of the Global Forum on Agricultural Research (GFAR) to representatives from CropLife and Bayer. The arguments were familiar: new GE crops will help farmers manage risk brought on by climate change (such as water and temperature variations and increased pests and weeds), and help mitigate climate change through a reduction in nitrogen fertilizer and pesticide use.

The other side of the coin was a call for more diverse cropping systems. There was a recognition that farmers need to become more adaptable—growing multiple crops with multiple varieties under changing conditions. Farming regions will be affected differently around the world so solutions need to be flexible and fit the need of each community (exactly the kind of diverse approach not suited for GE seeds). A speaker from Senegal echoed the findings of a recent global report that IATP contributed to emphasize the need to better utilize traditional knowledge to strengthen resilience and mitigate climate change. A representative from Nairobi talked about how our current systems have become too vulnerable to weather events—we have always had severe weather, but we are less able to adapt. Instead, we need to focus on resilience through diversity. Another researcher working in Africa emphasized the need to invest in roads, infrastructure and credit.

It is expected that over the next few days Copenhagen will create a plan for agriculture that will carry through next year. These two questions will be at the heart of the debate: Who will really benefit from how agriculture is treated within climate policy? And what type of agriculture will be promoted as a response?

—Ben Lilliston

December 13, 2009

Agriculture text moving fast in Copenhagen

IATP's Anne Laure Constantin has been following the agriculture negotiations at the global climate talks in Copenhagen. She gives a rundown of where the fast-moving agriculture talks are going in the video below.

—Ben Lilliston

December 11, 2009

Climate, agriculture and water

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports that water will be particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. Effects on water, whether flooding or drought, inevitably affect agriculture and food security; and of course agriculture, particularly heavily irrigated agriculture, affects both water and the climate. These interconnections are the subject of a new IATP issue brief by Shiney Varghese.

The paper looks at the critical importance of rain-fed crops on food security in developing countries around the world, and the role of industrial agriculture and its intensive water use on the environment. The paper calls for agriculture-based climate strategies to include water efficiency, ecosystem and socioeconomic impact assessments. In addition, climate proposals should support the Right to Food and the Right to Water for people to meet basic needs, prioritize water availability and support a host of sustainable water management tools including organic matter management, rainwater harvesting, small-scale water storage, community-based irrigation and water maintenance for grazers and small-holder livestock.

You can read the full issue brief here.

—Ben Lilliston

US on the wrong track

Long, long meeting this afternoon (Dec. 10) on sectoral language for agriculture. First of all, there is confusion as to what the text will end up being—part of a comprehensive Copenhagen agreement? A separate COP decision? Something else still? Everything seems pretty much up in the air on this topic as different countries hold very different views on this matter.

And then there is the U.S. position. Arguing that the language on agriculture needs to be short and very specific, and that it should avoid any mention of food security, or of linkages between mitigation and adaptation. Hard to believe. How does the U.S. government expect this to be acceptable to developing countries where agriculture is a source of livelihoods for large shares of their populations? And, more broadly, to all stakeholders involved in discussions about agriculture, food and climate change? It has become widely accepted that Copenhagen needs to open a space to deal with agriculture and food security concerns associated with climate change—the U.S. cannot be serious!

—Anne-Laure Constantin

December 10, 2009

Delicate balance—agriculture in global climate talks

Given agriculture's unique role as both an emitter and mitigator of climate change, and its enormous contribution to land use patterns around the world, agriculture must be part of any global response to climate change. But agriculture's multifunctionality must not be lost within climate negotiations due to its essential role in providing enough healthy food for everyone; its impacts on water and biodiversity; and of course how it affects rural livelihoods around the world.

Throughout this year, agriculture has taken a more prominent role within the climate negotiations and has actually become part of the negotiating text, but many developing countries are concerned that climate negotiators have not devoted enough time or resources to consider the best way to deal with agriculture.

In a new issue brief, IATP's Anne Laure Constantin outlines a series of benchmarks for negotiators as they consider the role of agriculture within a global climate deal in Copenhagen. She emphasizes the need for a transparent and inclusive process to assess climate solutions against a broad set of metrics for impacts on food security, water and rural livelihoods. In addition, proposals need to prioritize socially and environmentally sustainable solutions that break away from high-input agricultural production and increase support for low-input, sustainable systems. Climate negotiations should not be used to expand trade interests and there needs to be a critical assessment of the role of carbon markets for agriculture. Read the full issue paper here.

—Ben Lilliston