Can agriculture deliver what Europe needs?
Do we have the natural resources?
Thierry de l’ESCAILLE
ELO Secretary General/ CEO
Natural resources are naturally occurring substances that are considered valuable in their original form. Their value rests in the amount of the material available and, of course, the demand for it.
The dramatic consequences of climate change and loss of biodiversity, when combined with the rising demand in food following the steepening of the population curve above all in developing countries, and with a global energy demand forecast to increase by 50% by 2025- hence two factors really not likely to improve the situation-, imply that the demand in natural resources will follow the trend.
Natural resources are mostly classified into renewable and non-renewable resources.
Today’s conference aims to deal with the renewable resources that will impact the future of agriculture, but I’m afraid to say, not only the future of agriculture, but the future of the whole humanity.
To make it simple, renewable resources are generally living resources (wheat and forests, wildlife or fish, for example), which can restock themselves if they are not over-harvested but managed sustainably, otherwise, if consumed at a rate that exceeds their natural rate of replacement, the standing stock will diminish and eventually run out, which in case of natural resources aimed to ensure food, feed and energy can lead to dramatic consequences.
This is the case for soil and water, which are 2 extremely precious media to ensure the future of agriculture. –To quote Schumacher on “Small is beautiful, “the capacity of nature to resist pollution is limited”- and I would add that this is especially true for soil, water, not mentioning the air that we breathe.
As land manager, let me focus more precisely on soil. It is indeed a most valuable but finite resource under environmental pressure. It performs many functions vital to life such as food and biomass production, storage, filtration and transformation of many substances including water, carbon, and nitrogen, etc.
Besides its role as raw materials provider, it also serves as a habitat and gene pool, as well as a platform for human activities, landscape and heritage. The functions of soil are worthy of protection thanks to their socio-economic as well as environmental importance, according to the 3 pillars of sustainability.
These functions involve complex interactions within the soil itself, between the soil and the crop/grazing animal and between the soil and the wider environment.
The intervention of man into this natural set of inter-relationships has provided the basis for much of modern life from food production to infrastructure grounds.
We cannot deny that some European soils are facing major threats, reversible or not, enhanced by unsustainable use of soils and climate change. The point is however NOT to forbid human activities on soil, but to minimise their negative effects on its functions, and even, through adequate management, to mitigate this negative effect.
In this respect; unjustified burdensome implementation of regulations might constitute major threats, especially when coupled with a lack of justification. This will inevitably have terrible consequence on their acceptance.
Let’s take for example the disastrous example given by the Flemish region with its legislation on nitrates. This legislation creates, according to an old planning law, areas where no fertilizer may be used, without neither taking into account the existence of ongoing farming businesses or, even worse, any scientific evidence of a need to do so, not to mention the absence of any compensation for farmers and landowners being de facto expropriated. These are behaviours of another time which create nothing but suspicion and unrest!!
As for now, the EU has in principle the natural resources necessary to deliver what Europe needs, but it cannot be done at all costs and we need to think long term.
These natural resources need indeed an ad hoc management, as they can be threatened, because of climate change as previously said but also because of human activities such as pollution from the industry or over extensive agriculture.
Land managers therefore play an essential role in the promotion, the conservation and the preservation of these natural resources, including biological diversity, through the sustainable use of their land and its components.
Their mission is to ensure food and environmental security thanks to the multiple outputs of sustainable land management, what Pr Allan BUCKWELL who delivered a most interesting speech this morning has called the 9 ‘F” words.
Let me cite them:
Food and fibre
watching, hunting and fishing, tourism, culture, or heritage
As you see, sustainable rural development can be reached through adequate soil management, combined with the protection of water and of the further natural resources that constitutes the rural ecosystem.
The main barrier to the adoption of improved soil and other natural resources management practices in agriculture is sadly their cost. These practices can be considered as environmental services which should be compensated according to their nature of public goods provided by the private sector, for example via agri-environmental payments. The potential lack of natural resources availability could also be compensated by better access for the farmers to the new technologies, including biotechnologies.
Land managers are at the forefront of feeding the world, halting the loss of biodiversity, preserving the environment, increasing wealth and developing new jobs: that is exactly what society is expecting from them.
