At a recent European regional dialogue, politicians, researchers, farmers, civil society organization leaders, and others gathered to discuss “The Politics of Knowledge,” a new compendium from the Global Alliance for the Future of Food, and the Role of agroecology to help solve. networked global crises.
“We really need a different paradigm, it’s not just about adapting the current system to make it a little more effective,” says Emile Frison, interim coordinator of the Agroecology Coalition and member of the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems ( IPES food).
According to Frison, another paradigm for global food production must have diversified agroecological systems to address economic, ecological, health, social and cultural goals simultaneously, “and no longer work in silos.”
The current food system is responsible for one-third of all human-produced greenhouse gas emissions and is the primary driver of global biodiversity loss. A 2019 study published in The Lancet estimated that worldwide poor nutrition is responsible for more deaths than any other risk factor. Meanwhile, there is a crisis in generational renewal: a third of farmers in the European Union are aged 65 or older, and the average age of US farmers has been increasing for four decades.
The panelists agreed that agroecology can provide the transformational change needed to solve these multiple, interconnected global crises.
“We’re now in a position to really change at scale,” says Frison.
A 2019 study by the University of Gloucestershire, published in the Journal of Rural Studies, showed significant economic gains for farmers using agroecological versus conventional practices: income per kilogram of milk increased by 110 percent for dairy farmers in the Netherlands, income per family worker increased for farmers in France by 73 percent, and the gross margin per hectare increased by 75 to 80 percent for farmers in Ireland.
Frison says that agroecological practices not only increase income, but also promote resilience and stability on the farm – and this is already happening at scale globally.
Millions of hectares of farmer-managed natural regeneration are regreening the Sahel region of Africa. Seventy-two organizations have come together to form an alliance for agroecology in West Africa. And more national policies support agroecology including Mexico, Senegal, Nicaragua, India, France and Denmark.
But “if agroecology works, both for large and small farms, why isn’t it more widely accepted…if the evidence is there, why isn’t there more action?” says Nina Moeller, Associate Professor at the Center for Agroecology, Water, and Resilience at Coventry University in the UK.
Agroecology remains marginalized in the agricultural industry despite evidence on the ground supporting its value and potential. According to Moeller, this is because “we are locked into the existing system” of industrial food production.
“There’s a huge infrastructure that’s in place that makes it so much easier and so much more convenient for all stakeholders to just carry on with business as usual,” says Moeller.
Frison says that large multinational corporations that control the global seed, fertilizer, pesticide and grain trade have a strong influence on agricultural policy, “and they have an interest in maintaining the current system because it is what serves their needs .”
And according to Lili Balogh, farmer and president of Agroecology Europe, agricultural education mostly teaches about the benefits of industrial agriculture, which further strengthens this model.
“The big companies mostly finance these institutions and research centers,” says Balogh. “They portray agroecology as an idealistic and unrealistic narrative that is not productive enough, when in reality it is quite the opposite as real evidence and scientific data show.”
To overcome these systemic barriers, Moeller says it’s critical to expand the industry’s understanding of what counts as evidence. This means valuing not only qualitative data, but also evidence from the ground – from farmers, indigenous peoples and social movements as well as researchers and politicians working in agroecology.
“This evidence is abundant,” says Moeller, “but it is marginalized in decision-making processes…power dynamics determine much of what is understood and disseminated as evidence.”
Christophe Larose, Head of Sustainable Agriculture / International Partnerships at the European Commission, believes that building partnerships with different actors, from the private sector to civil society organizations and research actors, is the key to supporting a wider transition to agroecological practices.
“We don’t have to oversimplify what agroecology means, but it lands on more concrete aspects. For example, to accept and engage with partners if we want to move forward with a transition that is not easy, but it is certainly necessary,” says the Larose.
And these partnerships must include conversations with farmers, says Alfred Grand, farmer and owner of Grand Farm in Austria. “It is important to show the farmers that there are solutions.”
Throughout the dialogue, panelists agreed that it is critical to take an inclusive, participatory and transdisciplinary approach to producing evidence for agroecology.
“Systemic problems require systemic solutions, and therefore we need different perspectives and input from many different disciplines, but also from points of view that are non-disciplinary,” says Moeller. This includes the lived experience and cultural history of farmers, ranchers, indigenous peoples, and various types of practitioners who use agroecological practices throughout the world.
Frison is hopeful as more and more countries recognize the value of agroecological systems. He points to the lessons learned from global supply chain disruptions related to the COVID-19 pandemic and crisis in Ukraine.
“More local, shorter value chains and more diversified systems have really been able to overcome many of the shortcomings in the crises in many countries,” says Frison. “The evidence is there.”
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Photo courtesy of Derek Liang, Unsplash
