CONTEMPORARY WORLD

UNIT 5: Towards a Sustainable World

Introduction
Sustainable development implies economic growth together with the assurance
of ecological quality, each fortifying the other. Sustainable development, in this
way, is keeping up a balance between the human needs to improve ways of life
and feeling of well-being on one hand, and preserving natural resources and
ecosystems, on which we and future generations depend. Thus, sustainable
development does not concentrate exclusively on environmental issues. More
broadly, it encompasses the three general policy areas namely economy,
environment and society.

Sustainable development is the most pressing test confronting humankind. Its

fundamental question is: How can the world economy continue to develop in a
way that is socially inclusive and environmentally sustainable?

In this unit, you will learn that major factors, such as human population size,
biosphere robustness, resource stock, food supply, and environmental quality
must remain in balance, on a global scale. This state of balance should keep
going long enough with the goal that it won't be just a blip on the bend of
unsustainable development. Despite the fact that we may not by any stretch of
the imagination achieve that balance, we should move toward that path if
mankind and the biological system are to survive.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

At the end of this unit, you are expected to:

1. examine the role of sustainability in ushering a sustainable world;
2. discuss the Philippine commitment in Sustainable Development Goals;
3. analyze the difference between stability and sustainability and
4. share one’s commitment to personally contribute in the realization of a
sustainable world.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:

At the end of the lesson, you are expected to:

 differentiate stability from sustainability and
 articulate models of sustainable development.

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PRESENTATION OF CONTENT
STABILITY AND SUSTAINABILITY

Despite the fact that they look and sound similar, the words stability and
sustainability have various implications; however, they do supplement each other
in the realm of economics.

Solidness in position, perpetual quality and resistance to change, particularly in a

problematic manner – these are general affiliations associated with the term
'stability'. In an economic sense this affiliation was progressively explicit. The
International Monetary Fund (IMF) portrays it as 'avoiding large swings in
economic activity, high inflation, and excessive volatility in exchange rates and
financial markets’ (International Monetary Fund, 2012).

Stability implies something is at a state wherein very little or no movement can be distinguished, and
notwithstanding when a solid power is applied toward its direction, it just serves to demonstrate its unwavering
quality. When we put this model into Economic terms, we might discuss a country's
strength to the distinctive economic climate. A stable economy is versatile and
solid and steady for any aggravation, it implies it has set protections to guarantee
its capacity to withstand any financial crisis.

This definition alludes to indexes, which depict the economy in short-term

categories. Headline news saying that the 'economy is stable' signifies really that
the system is in one of the quiet periods of the business cycle, neither heading
towards blast nor towards depression.

The casual concept of stability alludes to the tendency of a system to come back
to a place of harmony or equilibrium when aggravated. For example, in the event
that a weight is added all of a sudden to a raft floating on water, the standard
reaction is for the weighted raft to sway, however the motions continuously
decline in adequacy as the vitality of the motions is disseminated in waves and,
eventually, in heat. The weighted raft will stop in an unexpected position in
comparison to the unweighted raft, yet we think about the new design as
basically equivalent to the old one. The system is steady or stable.

Sustainability ought to be viewed as not the same as stability, in spite of the fact
that at the primary sight the overlap appears glaringly evident. It considers the long term
limits of a system to exist, not its momentary resistance to change. A notable meaning of
sustainability, which underlines its economic idea, originates from the Bruntland
Report (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987) arranged for
the United Nations in 1987. It says that 'development that meets the needs of the
present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own
needs’ merits the mark of sustainability. As such, it is about responsible utilization
of resources.

Economics had a specific issue with sustainability, examining primarily the inquiries
of long-term growth. It was difficult to observe the issue of conceivable exhaustion
of resources in economic theories, since price mechanism in market economies
would decipher scarcity into higher costs and diminished consumption of the

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good. This is the reason the branch dedicated more attention to the issue of what
combination of resources could actuate growth.

Presently, Sustainability has a major impact of what keeps the economy stable. It
implies that the administration has checked every one of the circles and have
arranged a considerable lot of the fundamental needs of the populace. They
have made strides to guarantee the consistency of having supplies and
administrations.

Thus, Stability is the capacity to adjust to unforeseen changes, while sustainability

deals more with ensuring continuity.

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT MODELS

Sustainable development models help us understand the ideas of Sustainability

better. Accomplishing sustainability along these lines, requires more effective,
open, and productive association among the people themselves. Models help us
to assemble, share, and examine data; they help planning work; and educate
and train experts, policymakers, and public in general.

1. Tree Pillar Basic Model

Sustainable Development is modelled on these

three pillars: Economy. Environment and Society.
The diagram shows three interlocking circles with
the triangle of environmental (conservation),
economic (growth), and social (equity)
dimensions. This model is called three pillars or
three circles model, which is one of the most well-
known models of sustainable development.

2. The Egg of Sustainability Model

In 1994 the International Union
for the Conservation of Nature
(IUCN) designed the Egg Sustain-
ability model. It illustrates the rela-
tionship between people and eco-
system as one circle inside another,
like a yolk of an egg, as shown in

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the picture. This infers individuals

are inside the ecosystem, and
that at last one is altogether
reliant upon the other. Social
and economic development can possibly happen if the environment offers the
fundamental assets: raw materials, space for new production sites and
occupations, amusement, wellbeing and so forth.

Ecosystem is along these lines to be viewed as a very organized system to the

other dimension of the triangle or prism models: social, economic, and
institutional. These latter can possibly thrive on the off chance that they adjust to
the furthest limits of environmental carrying capacity.

Thus, according to this model:

sustainable development = human well-being + ecosystem well-being

3. Atkisson’s Pyramid Model

The Atkisson Pyramid process supports and accelerates the progress from
identifying the vision of sustainability, through analysis and brainstorming and
agreements on a credible plan of action. The Structure of the Pyramid guides
through the process of first building a firm base of understanding, searching for
and collecting relevant information and ideas, and then focusing and narrowing
down to what is important, effective, doable, and something that everyone can
agree in.

The five steps or levels of Atkisson’s Pyramid include:

Level 1: Indicators- Measuring the trend

Level 2: Systems- Making the connections

Level 3: Innovations- Ideas that Make a Difference

Level 4: Strategies: From Idea to Reality

Level 5: Agreements: From Workshop to Real World

This model is designed to help groups of 20-40 people move quickly up the
sustainability learning curve, from basic principles and frameworks, to systems
analysis, to innovative strategies for action. Along the way, groups practice
crosssectoral teamwork, make linkages, generate dozens of new ideas, and work
toward an “Agreement” which is a set of actions they agree to follow through
within the real world.

For example, let us consider one components of the pyramid, the Environment. If
the vision is to Maximize the use of available resources in order to improve the
quality of life of people., the possible indicators could be; loss of forest cover,
number of trees cut down in urban areas, number of trees cut down in urban
areas, number of polluting industries being shut down.

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Taking an indicator, say number of polluting industries shut down, the following
system could be connected to it – pollution, livelihood, corruption. Considering
corruption as a major system, the following innovations could be suggested in
curbing down the problem – promote right to information and high reward for
those people found not to be taking bribes. The strategies for implementing these
innovative ideas could include: promoting laws which would generate fear or
bribery, donation receipts should have utilization certificates.

4. Prism of Sustainability

This model was developed by the German Wuppertal Institute and defines
Sustainable Development with the help of four components - economy,
environment, society and institution.

In this model the inter-linkages such as care, access, democracy and eco-
efficiency need to be looked at closely as they show the relation between the
dimensions which could translate and influence policy. In each dimension of the
prism, there are imperatives (as norms for action). Indicators are used to measure
how far one has actually come in comparison to the overall vision of sustainable
development.

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOALS

With the adoption of Agenda 2030 by the United Nations (UN) member states in
September 2015, a new global agenda came into force that puts sustainability
center stage This includes the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as an
important step toward a more sustainable world.

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1. End poverty in all its forms everywhere.

2. End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and promote
sustainable agriculture.
3. Ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages.
4. Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong
learning opportunities for all.
5. Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.
6. Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation
for all.
7. Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for
all.
8. Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and
productive employment, and decent work for all.
9. Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable
industrialization, and foster innovation.
10. Reduce inequality within and among countries.
11. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.
12. Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns.
13. Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts.
14. Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for
sustainable development.
15. Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems,
sustainably manage forests, combat desertification and halt and reverse
land degradation, and halt biodiversity loss.
16. Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development,
provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and
inclusive institutions at all levels.
17. Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global
partnership for sustainable development.

In the Philippines, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) is at

the front line in organizing and checking SDG implementation. The SDGs is still new
and in the roadmap to localizing them, the Philippine government is still in the
mindfulness raising and advocacy stage. There is yet a need to build up a system
to concoct an accumulated information coming from the LGUs and other sectors
that add to the national performance in measuring SDG implementation in the
country. In order for the SDGs to take off in the Philippines, a number of
requirements have to be addressed. One is political commitment. The SDGs have
to be integrated in the next Philippine Development Plan (PDP) and the country’s
long term vision document – Filipino 2040.

During President Benigno Aquino III’s administration from June 2010- 2016, the
conditional cash transfer scheme known as the Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino
Program (4Ps) is compatible with the MDGs and the SDGs as it tries to address
extreme poverty by providing conditional cash grants to the poorest of the poor,
to improve the health, nutrition, and the education of children aged 0-18.

The 4Ps will be improved upon by the current Duterte administration; hence,
continuing poverty eradication efforts.

The PDP 2011-2016 is congruent with the SDGs as the national development
framework seeks to improve transparency and accountability in governance,

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strengthen the macro economy, boost the competitiveness of our industries,

facilitate infrastructure development, strengthen the financial sector and mobilize
capital, improve access to quality social services, enhance peace and security
for development, and ensure ecological integrity. For the PDP priority areas in line
with the SDGs to be actualized, they have to be complemented with the
necessary budget allocation for specific programs. Financing is key. Efficient and
effective use of public funds in support of this is necessary.

There are already existing programs in government and private/ NGO sectors that
can be fine-tuned and aligned to the SDG targets and indicators. These need to
be integrated in the national development framework and the Philippine
Development Plan under the Duterte administration.

The 10-point agenda of the Duterte administration seems to be consistent with

SDG items 5 to 10 namely, to achieve gender equality and empower all women
and girls (SDG 5); ensure availability and sustainable management of water and
sanitation for all (SDG 6); ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and
modern energy for all (SDG 7); promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable
economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all (SDG
8); build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization
and foster innovation (SDG 9); and reduce inequality within and among countries
(SDG 10). Concrete policy actions have to be put in place to ensure that
outcomes add up to the Philippines’ performance in meeting the SDG targets.

With an integrated effort from government and other stakeholders including the
academe, hopes are high that the Philippines can achieve the main goal to end
extreme poverty by 2030 as envisioned in the post-2015 global development
agenda.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
At the end of the lesson, you are expected to:
 define global food security and
 critique existing models of global food security.

PRESENTATION OF CONTENT
Food Security: An Evolving Concept

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Food security is generally connected with availability of food to meet demand

and people’s access to food at the local, national and global levels. Hence, the
absence of food security is qualified by the presence of hunger and
malnourishment. While there are numerous definitional varieties of food security,
the first operational definition was developed at the 1974 UN World Food
Conference, and expressed that food security means ‘the availability at all times
of adequate world food supplies of basic food stuffs to sustain a steady expansion
of food consumption and to offset fluctuations in production and prices’'
(FAO,2003). The focal point of the definition was on availability and supply was
intensely influenced by the experience of a worldwide food price crisis in 1972,
hastened by unfriendly climate conditions that caused a scarcity in key staples
like rice, wheat and coarse grains and saw prices of these food grains rise (Timmer,
2010).

The second change in perspective featured the significance of livelihood security

as a key household priority and segment of food security, molding choices around
whether to go hungry in the short term so as to save job continuing resources (and
in this manner the capacity to access food) in the long term (Maxwell, 1996). The
third change demonstrates a move far from an absolutely calorie-counting
approach to food security, to one that includes subjective measures of being
foodsecure, including access to food that is ideal. With regards to these changes,
the FAO updated its meaning of food security over the last decades of the
twentieth century before landing to the current definition of food security in 2001.
It expresses that food security exists ‘when all people, at all times, have physical,
social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their
dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life’ (FAO, 2002).
In articulating its methodology, the FAO recognizes four key pillars of food security
– avail, access, utilization and stability in connection to those three perspectives.

Food Security and Human Security

Food security has turned out to be emphatically connected with the more
extensive idea of human security. In spite of the fact that there is no generally
concurred meaning of human security, in essence the idea prioritizes the
wellbeing of people and communities from a scope of dangers emerging from
various sources. As indicated by the UNDP, this means 'first, safety from such
chronic threats as hunger, disease and repression. Second, protection from
sudden and hurtful disruptions in the patterns of daily life –whether in homes, in
jobs or in communities’ (UNDP, 1994). The concept of human security is engrained
in the international human rights movement and approach to development
(Suhrke,1999) that has emphatically influenced the discourse on food security
over the previous two decades (FAO, 2003). Defenders of human security
consider hunger to be 'the most pervasive danger to human security, and one of
the gravest' (UNDP, 2009).

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In this point of view, food security by way of hunger and malnourishment is a

profoundly crippling danger to people and one that leaves them unfit to lead
'the essential elements of life, [and in this state] … no individual can be secure in
his or her individual or exercise any human ability' (AHDR, 2009). The primary driver
of food insecurity is poverty, which is thusly connected extensively to 'political
security, socio-economic development, human rights and the environment',
putting it unequivocally at the core of all human security concerns (UNOCHA-
HSU,2009). The connections between poverty, food security and human security
are especially obvious despite food price spikes, in two significant ways. First,
abrupt and sharp increase in food prices are most unsafe to the individuals who
are poor – in many developing countries in Asia and Africa, a larger part of family
units spends 50–70 percent of their month to month salaries on food alone.
Despite abrupt food price spikes, such family units become especially powerless
against hunger and malnourishment. At the point when high food price is
sustained, different parts of human security may likewise suffer, as families cut
back spending on education and medical services so as to have the option to
bear the price of food, and dive further into destitution (UNOCHA-HSU, 2009).

Second, in certain socio-political settings, food price spikes may likewise help fuel
common agitation as protests and riots, frequently violent in nature (Arezki and
Bruckner, 2012). The 2007 global food price spike found afterward brutal riots and
protests in more than 30 countries around the globe, including Ethiopia, Senegal,
Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso, Egypt, Morocco, Bangladesh, Indonesia and Pakistan
(Evans, 2009). In 2011, some countries in the Middle East and North Africa
experienced wide spread protests and riots against government decisions, and
rising food price were a key factor in powering these events (Lagi et al., 2011). The
writing analyzing the effect of high food price on political stability underlines a
few logical factors as hidden facilitators for such distress, including feeble
administration organizations, financial imbalances, injustice and political
constraint.

Key Critique of Food Security

The formal concept of food security was criticized for some reasons, yet most
devastatingly for its neglect for power relations describing food frameworks, and
for its accentuation on a trade-based way to deal with solving hunger. As Patel
(2009) brings up, the official food security approach does not adequately
consider the broader social and political settings within which its purpose of
eradicating hunger and malnourishment are sought after, for example it neglects
to handle 'inquiries concerning the relations of intensity that portray choices
about how food security ought to be accomplished'. In this regard, 'Food security

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is skeptical about the production routine, about the social and economic
conditions under which food winds up on the table' (Patel, 2009). It doesn't, for
instance, genuinely consider the way that the huge scale mono-cropping of
crops for export – for example, oil palm (to produce palm oil), rubber and
soybean – requires huge tracts of land, and will in general lead to the
combination of land in the hands of rich farmers and landowners, and huge
agribusinesses.

In this procedure, small farmers are frequently constrained off their properties, and
traditional farming practices and local food frameworks are disturbed. In many
developing countries, this procedure of confiscating small farmers of their
property is generally aided by the absence of clear land titles and government
agencies that are quick to welcome private investors in agribusiness for corrupt
purposes. Without clear land proprietorship and land use rights, small farmers
might be compelled to sell their property at a small amount of its genuine worth,
and with negligible or no pay.

A formal approach to food security is a substantial concentration on trade and

export-oriented agriculture as the principle pathway out of food insecurity is
ostensibly supported by a genuine responsibility the 'right to trade' as enshrined in
the World Trade Organization (WTO). Wittman (2011) pointed out that the
principle impact of bringing agriculture into the WTO was not to reform global
agriculture in accordance with market rationalities, yet to heighten already-
existing uneven chances in the world food framework.

Critics contend that the push for agricultural trade liberalization and the rise of the
market-drove corporate global food regime, founded on industrial agriculture,
has seen those groups that are least fortunate and most helpless against hunger
and malnourishment – small farmers and marginalized communities around the
world – most badly affected. Moreover, various different patterns and factors are
forming global food security prospects, as discussed in some detail below

Global Security – Key Trends

The future of global food security relies on

how states and other actors respond to a
range of complex, interconnected and
multi-faceted forces affecting food systems
around the world.

The eventual fate of global food security

depends on how states and different
actors react to a scope of perplexing,
interconnected and multi-faceted forces
influencing food frameworks around the
globe.

These frameworks contain collaboration

between and within bio-geophysical and
human environments, which define a lot of activity; the activities themselves (from
production to consumption); outcomes of the activities (commitments to food
security, environmental security, and social welfare) and other determinants of
food security. These food framework activities, results and connections at the

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local, national and regional level have over the past turned out to be
progressively tied up in a complex global system of relations, which is additionally
enmeshed within other global systems, for example, transport, broadcast
communications and finance (McDonald, 2010). The following section gives a
review of a portion of the key elements forming global food security dynamics in
this regard.

Rising Food Prices and Poverty

In the mid-2000s, global food prices started to climb steeply and paving the way
to July 2008 wherein FAO food price index swelled by 51 percent. The costs of key
staples, for example, wheat, rice, maize and soybean, and edible oils all took off,
and as stated earlier, they helped precipitate common turmoil such as protests
and riots in various countries around the globe. Albeit global food prices declined
in the quick consequence of the crisis to pre-crisis level, they climbed forcefully
indeed in late 2010, achieving a noteworthy crest in February 2011. The effect of
ongoing food price spikes has been most obliterating for the individuals who live
in, or unstably near, poverty. It is evaluated that the 2007 global food price crisis
may have constrained upwards of 100 million individuals more profound into
poverty, while the later global food price spike in 2010 may have dispatched an
additional 44 million around the world to a real existence of poverty and food
insecurity (Rastello and Pugh, 2011). Sharp and abrupt increments in food prices
are unfavorable to small farmers who regularly come up short on the ability to
react to such price increments so as to have the option to exploit them. They are
likewise hurtful to those farming families that are net consumers of food, and
depend on the market to satisfy their food security needs.

Other than eating less to adapt to higher food price, those families likewise
regularly resort to selling valuable resources, for example, family belongings;
selling land; marking on high-interest credits, and reducing education and
medical expenses. In the long run, this affects their capacity to lift themselves out
of poverty (Narayan, 2011). Experts have indicated various mind boggling and
interconnected factors as having added to these floods in global food prices in
differing degrees. On the demand side, for instance, numerous experts have
accentuated the role of progressing world population and the corresponding
growth in the demand for food, and rising salaries and growing per capita food
consumption (particularly of meat, dairy and plant crops) in developing countries
in particular. On the supply side, experts have featured recent trends, for
example, the increasing expense of fuel and farming inputs like fertilizers and
pesticides. In developing countries, declining or stagnating agricultural yield

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growth rates with regards to poor or dropping heights of public investment in

agricultural infrastructure and research and development; adverse climate
conditions (like dry spells and floods) in key food-exporting countries, trailed by
automatic government export bans despite apparent food deficiencies, and
financial assumptions in agricultural commodities prospects markets.

In the outcome of recent global food price spikes, both official and different
voices on food security have recognized the noteworthy role played by growing
biofuel production in the United States and European Union (EU) in pushing up
global food prices. Other voices on food security, seem to do as such
considerably more fundamentally with regards to the role played by the
International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank's structural adjustment
policies in turning countries once independent in staple crops (for example the
Philippines and Mexico) into countries now vigorously reliant on food imports, and
hence exceptionally defenseless against the more extensive negative results of
biofuel production on food security.

Population Growth and Urbanization

The contention that a bit by bit rising
of worldwide populace is behind
sharp and abrupt increments in
global food prices is a questionable
one. This does not mean anyway that
key demographic changes presently
occurring in the world are
insignificant for food frameworks. By
mid-century, the world's total
populace is set to reach more than
nine billion, replicating the demand
for food, feed and fiber (FAO, 2009).

The greater part of this demand is relied upon to originate from developing
countries, especially in parts of Asia and Africa. Concentrating on Asia, regardless
of decelerating yearly population growth rates, the region’s general populace is
expected to swell by another billion or more in the following four decades
(UNDESA,2004). India alone is relied upon to have practically 1.7 billion individuals,
overwhelming China's populace as ahead of schedule as 2025. In the meantime,
upgrades in health have prompted sharp decreases in death rates and boost life
expectancy. Along these lines, the over-65population is currently the quickest
growing group across Asia (CISS, 2013). This pattern has been predominantly
distinct in rural areas, as there has been a mass movement of individuals
relocating from rural to urban areas in late decades, particularly by youthful men.
In China, for instance, roughly 150 million individuals have moved from rural to
urban regions over the past two decades, and it is normal that another 300 million
will do as such throughout the following couple of decades.

Such demographic trends in Asia have genuine effects for food frameworks in the
region. As more increasing number of individuals, particularly among the
adolescent, move from rural to urban areas looking for better employments, there
are less individuals of working age deserted to deliver the growing quantities of
food required to fulfill rising demand in urban areas. In addition, a growing number
of family units in rural areas across Asia are presently headed by women, who

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tend to lack access to the equivalent socio-economic rights as their male

partners. Except if farming and other significant approaches are acclimated to
turn out to be increasingly touchy to the work and food security needs of rural
women, this possibly have negative effect in local food frameworks with more
extensive repercussions for food security in urban areas. The mass movement of
individuals from rural to urban areas has likewise been joined by a quick and
continuous extension of cities and slums in parts of Asia. At present, the greater
part the worldwide populace lives in urban areas, and 'by 2030 this number will
swell to practically 5billion, with urban development amassed in Africa and Asia'
(UNFPA, 2011).

Urban populaces and the quantities of slum occupants in these areas are set to
twofold by 2030 (UN-HABITAT, 2007). Slums are described by absence of access
to clean drinking water insufficient sanitation and waste transfer systems, making
occupant populaces highly susceptible against snappy spreading diseases and
chronic food security (CISS, 2013). As urban populaces grow further, the pressure
on food frameworks in terms of the increased demand for land and water, and
environmental degradation and contamination from urban and industrial waste,
are set to strengthen further.

Rising Income and Changing Diets

A generally growing worldwide populace implies a comparing increment in the

total demand for food at the global level. In the meantime, rising urbanization
and growing per capita food consumption is likewise adding to this growing
demand. Normal global food consumption expanded from 2,370 kcal per
individual per day in 1969–71 to around 2,770 kcal per individual for each day in
2005–7 (Alexandratos and Bruinsma, 2012).

As incomes in developing countries keep on growing, an ever increasing number

of individuals can access food in greater quantities. While introductory increments
in food consumption may relate to the intake of higher amounts of key staples –
for the most part grains – this is by and large pursued by 'a substitution stage,
where the latter are supplanted by more vitality rich foods, for example, meat
and those with a high convergence of vegetable oils and sugar' (Godfrey et al.,
2010). Animal products, for example, meat and dairy, are grain-escalated to
grow, and in this manner lead to more noteworthy, indirect human consumption
of both grain and water.

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Worldwide consumption of meat expanded by around 62 percent somewhere in

the range of 1963 and 2005, and consumption in developing countries grew by
triple during this period. A lot of this growth is generally occurred in Asia, and
specifically in China (Kearney, 2010). Not every single developing country anyway
are encountering this phenomenon of nutrition progress similarly. In India, for
instance, the consumption of meat keeps on lingering behind when contrasted
with China and Brazil for people at comparative income levels. There are also
substantial differences in the consumption of domesticated animals and
agricultural harvests locally in developing countries (Alexandratos and
Bruinsma,2012).

Regardless, the general demand for grains for direct consumption and indirect
consumption through animal products (poultry, pork, eggs and dairy items) keeps
on extending. In China, the expanding change of land for intensive
monocropping of soy beans and corn for animal feed throughout the decades
has come at the expense of enormous pollution of waterways by fertilizers and
pesticides, decreases in biodiversity, the demolition of natural carbon sinks and
rising greenhouse gas emissions (Schneider, 2011). At the worldwide level, tensions
about China's demand for grains surpassing local supply have existed for quite a
while (Huang et al., 1997), especially as far as the effect on global food prices if
China starts to depend progressively on the international market to meet the gap
in domestic supply. For much of the recent years, China has managed to remain
largely independent in key staples (other than soybeans), a contemporary
examination of production and consumption patterns demonstrates that China's
dependence on corn imports in particular is probably going to grow significantly
in the near future (Keats and Wiggins, 2012).

If this somehow happened to occur, the pattern may serve to further heighten
the growing demand for corn (and farming resources in general) that has been
impelled on in no little measure by the worldwide surge in biofuel production,
driven by the United States and EU.

Biofuel Production, Land Use Change and Access to Land

The worldwide surge in biofuel

production was activated in 2004,
when the United States and the EU
embraced various arrangements
and motivating forces to support
biofuel consumption (USAID, 2009).
Biofuels rapidly came to be viewed
as a substantial method for
diminishing reliance on petroleum
derivatives in various countries
around the globe, while concurrently
fulfilling the growing local demand
for energy just as decreasing
greenhouse gas (GHG)emissions and
kindle rural improvement.

Recently, biofuel production – and approaches that energize and bolster it –

have turned out to be very controversial in the context of global food security.

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UNIT 5: Towards a Sustainable World

Original biofuels are produced from plant starch, oils, animal fats and sugars.
Bioethanol, for instance, is produced from food crops, for example, sugarcane,
maize, wheat, sugar beets and sweet sorghum, and is now the most broadly
utilized type of biofuel. The United States and Brazil are the world's biggest
bioethanol producing countries, while biodiesel – produced using edible oils
delivered from crops like oil palm, sunflower and soybean – is produced in the
large quantities in Germany, France, United States and Italy (Naylor et al., 2007).

Actually, various studies have now stressed the significant commitment of biofuel
production and related policies in the United States in pushing up worldwide
maize prices in particular and food prices in general in 2007. The United States is
the world's biggest provider of maize, and in 2012 the US Renewable Fuel
Standard (RFS) required around 42 percent of the country's maize to be utilized
toproduce bioethanol – in a year when chief maize-creating areas in the United
States were hit by the most exceedingly terrible dry season in decades (Schulte,
2012). The dry season and accompanying heat-wave harmed 80 percent of all
maize crops in the country and set off a spike in the worldwide price of maize
(Alessi, 2012; Kollewe, 2012), prompting the FAO requiring the United States to
change the RFS (Hornby, 2012).

Aside from contending with the demand for food grains for human consumption,
and putting upward weight on global food prices, there is currently broad
understanding that biofuel generation also has genuine environmental and
socio-economic ramifications that encroach on food security concerns at the
local and global dimensions. The 'enormous thought' driving biofuel mandates is
that increasing biofuel consumption would help ease reliance on petroleum
products for transport, while in the meantime bringing down GHG emission with
an end goal to moderate climate change. There are likewise worries around GHG
emissions coming about because of both direct and indirect land use change for
biofuel generation. In diverting food crops from use as food and domesticated
animals feed, biofuel production puts weight inside the food framework to bring
other land into cultivation for food purposes, with implication for GHG emissions.
Before uncultivated land is brought into cultivation for growing biofuel feedstock,
it may also add to GHG emissions. According to the study conducted by German,
et.al. (2011) the procedures of biofuel generation (for example land use change
and input-intensive farming practices in growing feedstock and other supply
chain activities) may themselves lead to possibly serious levels of GHG emissions,
in this way killing any climatic advantages gained from substituting them for
petroleum products.

In spite of the fact that governments frequently guarantee that biofuel feedstock
is grown carefully on idle lands, these are regularly uncultivated plains, pastures
and forest lands that rural communities claim aggregately under indigenous land
residency system, and depend on for food and livelihood security. Anseeuw et.
al. (2012) pointed out that according to the International Land Coalition, since
2008 there has been a particular worldwide scramble for land, and 78 percent of
land procurement deals around the world have been for agricultural purposes,
with seventy-five percent of these being explicitly for bio-fuel feedstock
production.
In developing countries around the globe, numerous deals that involved small
farmers being persuasively expelled from their land without just compensation,
consequently adding to both land focus in the hands of wealthier ranchers and
enormous agri-businesses and landlessness in these communities. In Asia, for

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UNIT 5: Towards a Sustainable World

instance, an enormous number of small farmers in countries like Cambodia, Laos,

the Philippines, Bangladesh and Nepal keep on experiencing powerless access
to land and tenure instability, in the wider perspective of weak governance, poor
law enforcement and endemic corruption. Without tenure security, Small farmers
tend forgo putting resources into practices that guarantee the sustainable use
and management of natural resources such as land and water because of the
absence of security of tenure. This has negative ramifications for the environment
just as farm productivity (IFAD, 2008). In Brazil and Indonesia, for example,
enormous swathes of timberland grounds have been cleared to take into
consideration the mono-cropping of biofuel feedstock, like sugarcane and oil
palm, respectively. In Indonesia, the world's biggest GHG emitter, the
advancement of oil palm farms on peat-lands is especially connected to genuine
worries coming about GHG emissions from the decomposition of peat (Burgers
and Susanti, 2011). These worries are situated inside the more extensive setting of
the effect of climate change and environmental degradation on global food
security.

Climate Change

Climate change influences each of the four elements of food security: food
accessibility, food availability, food usage and food systems stability. This imply
that it has an effect on human wellbeing, livelihood, food production and
conveyance channels, and the changing purchasing power and market flows.
Agribusiness is exceptionally delicate to climate, and food production is
influenced legitimately by variations in agro-biological conditions for growing
crops (Schmidhuber and Tubiello, 2007).

Current patterns recommend that in the next four decades or so, the normal
worldwide temperatures will ascend by 2–3°C (Stern, 2006). In mid-to high-latitude
regions, such an ascent in local normal temperatures is relied upon to be valuable
for the efficiency of certain yields. For countries situated at lower latitudes, the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) cautions that the
productivity of significant crops (for example rice, wheat and corn) is anticipated
to drop with even little increments in local normal temperature (1–2°C). This is
especially the situation for countries that are situated in seasonally dry and
tropical regions (IPCC, 2007).

As it occurs, the geographic area of poorest, developing countries around the

globe and their remaining reliance on farming as the absolute source of

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UNIT 5: Towards a Sustainable World

livelihoods, implies that climate change will bring them high expenses and few
benefits (Stern,2006: vii). Low-income developing countries will in general need
sufficient foundation for social insurance, and enormous lumps of the populace
frequently do not have access to essential luxuries, for example, clean drinking
water and sanitation.

Their elevated vulnerabilities to the

effects of climate change are a
hindrance to adaptation. In many
developing countries, the
accessibility of farming resources is as
of now compromised by boundless
environmental degradation (e.g. due
to huge scale deforestation, land
and water contamination from
mechanical, rural and urban
effluents). The effects of climate
change may further harm their
farming resource base by
contracting the availability of
appropriate land for crop production
and freshwater resources.

As climate change antagonistically influences agricultural productivity through

changes in agroecological conditions, it is relied upon to correspondingly affect
wages, intensifying poverty and the capacity of family units to put resources into
a better future, constraining them to go through pitiful reserve funds just to survive
(Stern, 2006).

Indeed, even as climate change genuinely undermines livelihood in developing

countries that depend vigorously in agriculture, it is relied upon to bring on
additional increments in global food prices and keep on driving people out from
their homes within countries and across borders looking for food, water and
livelihoods. In this specific circumstance, both sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia
– with the utmost number of hunger and malnourishment around the globe – are
set to experience the ill effects of the negative effects of climate change on crop
production. As indicated by a recent report for the International Food Policy
Research Institute (IFPRI), in sub-Saharan Africa, yields of key staple crops, for
example, rice, wheat and corn are probably going to drop by 15 percent, 34
percent and 10 percent respectively under environmental change impacts.

In South Asia, rice production is anticipated to decrease by 14 percent, wheat by

44–49 percent and corn by 9–19 percent. These decreases underway are
connected to higher temperatures and changing precipitation designs – that
have effects for soil moisture, nutrient content and pest and disease-related
occurrences – influencing both rain-fed and irrigated crops. A significant extent
of agriculture in South Asia, around 60 percent, is rain-fed however storm
precipitation patterns are being upset by climate change. The IPCC ventures that
as temperatures keep on rising, the rainstorm are probably going to turn out to be
progressively exceptional as more precipitation happens over less days, with
uplifted danger of flooding in affected areas and delayed droughts causing dry
spells. Numerous crops dependent on water system are requiring more prominent

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UNIT 5: Towards a Sustainable World

amounts of water as temperatures rise, while the availability of freshwater

resources in the area is being endanger in the long term (IPCC, 2001). Rising
ocean levels are causing saltwater invasion in groundwater and expanding
upstream saltiness in waterways, undermining crop production just as inland
fisheries. It is normal that across South, Southeast and East Asia, as ocean levels
keep on rising they will immerse low lying regions, suffocate seaside swamps and
wetlands, dissolve shorelines, worsen flooding and increment the saltiness of
waterways, bays and aquifers. The defenselessness of waterfront zones in Asia,
and those communities which depend on the coastline for food security and
employments, is also very high in the face of progressively extraordinary tropical
storms in the region (IPCC, 2007).

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