The growing world population and increasing pressure on resources present a pressing need to combat the challenges of food security, nutrition, poverty and environmental degradation in a coordinated manner. A new report examines both biophysical and socioeconomic related monitoring initiatives related to the sustainable intensification of agriculture, in order to inform future DFID research investments.

The Review of the Evidence on Indicators, Metrics and Monitoring Systems was led by the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) under the auspices of the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystem (WLE).

The report focuses upon key questions facing stakeholders in order to generate insights to improve monitoring systems:

• How to evaluate alternative research and development strategies in terms of their potential impact on productivity, environmental services and welfare goals, including trade-offs among these goals?
• How to cost-effectively measure and monitor actual effectiveness of interventions and general progress towards achieving sustainable development objectives?

The review process

The first step in the review process was to identify key initiatives in data monitoring systems relating to agriculture, paying particular attention to those that also acknowledge the impact on ecosystem health, and/or poverty and well-being. A total of 103 monitoring initiatives were identified.

The second step was to review the identified initiatives with respect to their degree of achievement in meeting a set of 34 criteria that had been established from a general literature review. All initiatives were evaluated with respect to their conceptual framework and a subset of 24 initiatives was screened against the full set of criteria. Based on this information a gap-analysis of the systems, indicators and metrics was conducted identifying strengths and weaknesses in methodology and use. Experience with monitoring in other fields, including public health surveillance, systems thinking in industry and public services, and decision sciences was also reviewed. Insights, lessons and recommendations were then drawn.

Insights and lessons

The report found common weaknesses in several areas, including the lack of clear conceptual frameworks, failure to integrate biophysical and socio-economic indicators and sampling frames, failure to use statistically sound study designs, failure to address trade-offs, and the lack of consideration of uncertainties.

Evaluation of monitoring initiatives themselves is lacking and there is virtually no information on cost-effectiveness of the measurements or the impact of the initiatives. Few initiatives have been sustained over the long term, pointing to inadequate consideration of institutional sustainability.

An over-riding lesson outlined in the report was the surprising lack of evidence for the impact of monitoring initiatives on decision-making and management. Thus, there are important opportunities for increasing the returns on these investments by better integrating monitoring systems with development decision processes and thereby increasing impacts on development outcomes.

The report ends with a series of clear steps and opportunities on how to transform these recommendations into reality to help make more informed decisions on agricultural intensification that reduces hunger and poverty sustainably for generations to come.

Further reading

• Review of the Evidence on Indicators, Metrics and Monitoring Systems: full report available to download

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• Sustainable intensification in agriculture
• Sustainable food round-up: fair food, UK food system, world agriculture, community growing
• New online case study library of sustainable development initiatives

The Food Climate Research Network (FCRN) and the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food (OMPFF) have jointly published a new report entitled: Sustainable intensification in agriculture. Navigating a course through competing food system priorities.

Considering sustainable intensification

The report is based on discussions held at a two day workshop held in January 2012 which was co-organised by both organisations. The workshop brought together key thinkers from the academic and policy community, and from diverse disciplines, to consider the meanings, issues and challenges around sustainable intensification in general, and particularly in relation to three areas of concern: environmental sustainability; animal welfare and human wellbeing, specifically nutrition. The report was written by Tara Garnett (FCRN) and Charles Godfray (OMPFF). The workshop participants are listed in the report and commented extensively on the draft version. The workshop was part funded by the UK Government’s Foresight Programme as part of its follow up activities to the Future of Food and Farming project.

The aim of this report is by no means to present the ‘last word’ on sustainable intensification but, rather, to map out some of the conceptual territory needed to be explored in more detail; to seek to stimulate discussion; and to attempt to identify areas where further work is needed.

Food security and agricultural policy

The report is aimed at policy-makers working in areas relevant to food security. While clearly ‘food security’ is about far more than agricultural policy alone, the purpose of this report is to take a small part of the food security puzzle – agricultural policy – and to consider how it intersects with environmental, animal welfare and health policies. Its argument is that agricultural policy, if it is to help rather than hinder the ultimate goal of food security, needs to operate in an integrated manner with these other policy areas.

Arguing for a systems approach

Ultimately, this report argues the case for a more ‘systems’ oriented approach to decision making. While it does not go so far as to define a research agenda or make policy recommendations – this would require more work than has been possible in the time available – it urges the need for a substantial programme of future activity in order to:

• Deepen and extend understanding of systems interactions;
• Consider and define what specific goals societies wish agricultural production to achieve;
• Develop metrics that will enable societies to measure progress in achieving them; and
• Iimplement successful policies.

Conclusions

The report’s conclusions as regards sustainable intensification are as follows:

• Both words in the phrase sustainable intensification need to carry equal weight. Intensification, by reducing pressure on land and other resources, underpins sustainability. Equally, food production in the context of a growing population, must ultimately be sustainable if it is to continue to feed people in the future.
• Sustainable intensification is not a movement or a grand socio-political vision. It is not a strategy for the food system as a whole but just for one component within that strategy.
• Sustainable food security requires actions on multiple fronts. On the demand side actions are needed to reduce population growth rates and to curb high levels of per capita consumption, particularly for resource intensive foods. The food system needs to be more efficient by improving governance and reducing food losses and waste throughout the food chain, from farm to plate. On the supply side more food will need to be produced with much less impact on the environment through, we conclude,  sustainable intensification. No one of these actions on its own is able to achieve sustainability and security in the food system. Sustainable Intensification should therefore be seen not as a substitute for, but as a complement to these other necessary measures.
• Sustainable intensification as a concept should be decoupled from specific production targets. Sustainable intensification is about optimising productivity and a range of environmental and possible other outcomes.
• Sustainability needs to be viewed over space and time in order to include the indirect effects and consequences of different policies that may impact on other regions and future generations. The indicators used to measure sustainability may also vary according to temporal and spatial scales.
• Societies need to negotiate what outputs and outcomes from the system they want to intensify production of and to develop metrics that enable us to measure progress against targets.
• Much can be done with existing knowledge but there is also a need for more research that takes a more systemic approach to food production. Greater understanding of  How the various elements of complex systems interact is needed, both at fine grained and broader spatial and temporal scales. This understanding needs to encompass not just environmental interactions but also the relationship between the environment, human health, ethics and livelihoods. In short, there is a need to recognise better that human technical and societal innovations and the environment influence one another, and to understand these interactions further.
• More work is needed to translate this thinking into the development of metrics that are relevant to different stakeholders in different contexts, to assist them in implementing appropriate strategies.
• It is necessary to decide whether sustainable intensification is most helpfully defined only in environmental terms, or whether it should specifically incorporate a broader range of social and ethical concerns. If the former, sustainable intensification nevertheless needs to be mindful of these other concerns, and of the potential for tradeoffs and perverse outcomes.
• There are major opportunities for improving environmental and productivity outputs simultaneously in agricultural systems with current low levels of production. However, trade-offs between yields and environmental outputs are more prevalent in high external input production systems.
• More work is needed to ascertain what mix of policies is needed to transform thinking about sustainable intensification into practice. In particular it is important to identify what can be achieved at the national or even more local level, and where further work is needed to improve the international governance framework.
• While there is a need for more scientific knowledge, it must be recognised that values shape stakeholders’ different attitudes to the food system and their views on what the way forward should be. More deliberate exploration of these different values will help society obtain a deeper and shared understanding of what the challenge is and of  what solutions might work.

The citation for the report is as follows: Garnett T and Godfray C (2012). Sustainable intensification in agriculture. Navigating a course through competing food system priorities, Food Climate Research Network and the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food, University of Oxford, UK

Further reading

• Sustainable intensification in agriculture. Navigating a course through competing food system priorities: FCRN report, invitation to comment and full report available to download.

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• Sustainable food round-up: fair food, UK food system, world agriculture, community growing

In this round-up:

• The Food Transformation: Harnessing consumer power to create a fair food future (Oxfam Report)
• What’s Cooking? Adaptation and mitigation in the UK food system (Sustainable Consumption Institute Report)
• Agricultural Outlook 2012-2021 (OECD and FAO Report)
• Community Food Growing Topic Sheet (ACRE publication)

Read about more recent publications and research in the latest SDRN bulletin…

The Food Transformation: Harnessing consumer power to create a fair food future

Oxfam has published a new report entitled ‘The Food Transformation’. This report, written by Brook Lyndhurst, examines the global food system and the social and environmental injustices inherent in it, and at the potential of consumer action to effect change. It looks at four different scenarios involving consumer action, and calculates the scale of the positive social and environmental impacts that would result. Each of the scenarios focuses on one of the following areas: reducing food waste; supporting fair trade; being energy efficient; eating less meat.

More from Oxfam…

What’s Cooking? Adaptation and mitigation in the UK food system

This SCI Report argues that greenhouse gas targets will be missed unless policymakers take account of the potential impacts of climate change on food-related emissions.

The authors argue that emphasis is placed on decarbonising the energy system, yet the emissions associated with agriculture, particularly the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide, are likely to be much more difficult to cut. Not only that, as climate change impacts become more severe over the coming decades, more fertiliser may need to be added just to achieve the same yields, which will further elevate levels of nitrous oxide. Because emissions are cumulative, this means that the harder it is to cut nitrous oxide emissions, the greater the efforts needed to curb the carbon dioxide emissions from energy for the same climate impact.

The report concludes that the importance of food system emissions in the climate debate cannot be overstated. Only by acknowledging the extent of food-related emissions can the energy challenge be fully recognised, because all emissions are constrained by cumulative carbon budgets.

More from SCI…

Agricultural Outlook 2012-2021

This 18th edition of the Agricultural Outlook gives an overview of market trends and prospects for production, consumption, trade stocks and prices of agricultural commodities.

The report suggests that agricultural commodity prices will remain high throughout the next decade, based on an assumption that oil prices will continue to rise. The report indicates a need for a 60% increase in agricultural production over the next 40 years, if rising demands for food and expanding biofuel production needs are to be met.

The report also identifies an urgent need to improve the sustainable use of available land, water, marine ecosystems, fish stocks, forests, and biodiversity. Based on its findings, the report identifies key agricultural policy challenges for the future, including: creating the right commercial, technical and regulatory environment; strengthening agricultural innovation systems; and encouraging better agronomic practices.

More from OECD…

Community Food Growing Topic Sheet

ACRE has written a new resource about Community Food Growing. It is hoped that communities producing community Led plans will use this new topic sheet to think about whether it is appropriate to develop food growing projects in their area and to give them ideas about what they could do.

ACRE has worked with the Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens on this topic sheet that highlights key issues and ideas for rural communities thinking about creating a community growing space. It has been developed for use alongside ACRE’s Community Led Planning Toolkit launched earlier this year and one of several new topic sheets being published this summer.

More from ACRE…

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• Sustainable intensification in agriculture
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• Growing food in disused green spaces

As regards economic power, Power in Agriculture finds that power is still concentrated in North America and Europe. However, certain countries such as Brazil and New Zealand are currently the largest exporters of some commodities (eg beef and dairy products) in the world. While there is little evidence to suggest that this current power situation is likely to be changed markedly in the next 10 years, it is also apparent that the EU as a whole has retreated from world markets as policies have changed and that the export capabilities of the EU-27 in some key commodity sectors are predicted to decline further in the next 10 years, unless policy measures change markedly.

Although the emerging economies, in particular, China and Brazil, have clear advantages in certain commodity markets, their corporate power in agriculture is still not on a par with that of North American (US and Canada) and European countries, especially the UK, France and Germany. These major North American and EU economies are therefore in a strong position to consolidate their economic power through their transnational agribusiness corporations. However, a major challenge for them is to balance corporate power with consumer and farmer power domestically, while maintaining global power.

The political power relevant to global agriculture is still concentrated in the hands of the USA, major EU countries and some other economically powerful countries within the G8 coalition. However, recently there have been indications that this situation is changing and some emerging economies in the developing world are increasingly appearing to be powerful players at the world stage. This has important implications for European and UK agriculture, in particular, in terms of transnational agricultural trades. In the coming decades, EU countries may have to confront increased pressure to allow greater access to their markets. These competitions are likely to come from emerging economies – like China, India and Brazil – and will have implications for domestic producers. The report’s analysis also confirms the political influence of transnational corporations (TNCs) in global agriculture. However it finds evidence that their power is not limitless and that ultimately it is nation states who can control agriculture – as shown for example in 2008 when a number of countries implemented export bans to try to ameliorate the impacts of a food crisis. This finding does not corroborate the suggestions made by some that, in this age of corporate globalisation, the state is powerless to resist corporate activities. Evidence is also found that in some cases civil society organisations and farmer groups have had a significant impact in countervailing or balancing corporate influences.

In terms of control over natural resources the study finds that European countries, including the United Kingdom, appear to be relatively poorly endowed in global terms with the critical natural resources used in agriculture – such as land, water, potassium, phosphate, oil and natural gas. This situation, especially the availability of water and energy, is likely to become worse because of the impacts of climate change. Although many emerging economies like Brazil, China and Russia are better placed in terms of water and energy endowments, some of these countries appear to be vulnerable in terms of their possession of agricultural lands (more specifically, arable lands) and critical minerals relative to their population size. This partly explains the much reported phenomenon of ‘land-grabbing’ in Africa, in which some major EU countries have also taken part.

The implications for the EU (and UK) are:

• EU countries are likely to face competition for land from countries like China.
• In the shorter term, further improvements in resource use efficiency (water, fertiliser and energy) are needed to sustain current levels of production.
• As traditional resources become more scarce, alternative practices will need to be developed and adopted.

Finally the report attempts to present all these types (economic, political, resource related) of power as an index. The index ranks each country/region on a scale of 1 to 5 (five is high) for the individual components of power discussed. For example the US and the EU top the power index by some margin. However, the index also highlights their potential vulnerability in terms of natural resources (key agricultural minerals and oil). The emerging countries at the moment have lower political and corporate power but seem better placed in terms of natural and mineral resources. It finds that the UK ‘punches above its weight’ in terms of trade, corporate and political power. However, in a global sense it is a small country, and it is lowly rated in terms of natural resources on the power index and this puts it behind Russia and China on the overall index.

Regional power index for agricultureRankings on scale of 1 to 5 (five is high)

Further reading

• Oxford Farming Conference 2012 papers: report available to download, with presentation by one of the authors, Alan Renwick, summarising the findings.

You may also be interested in...

• Sustainable intensification in agriculture
• Sustainable food round-up: fair food, UK food system, world agriculture, community growing

A new evaluation of the risks posed to the food security of people in 196 countries finds that sub-Saharan Africa dominates the ‘extreme risk’ category: Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo have the lowest food security rating in the world, while other countries in the drought stricken Horn of Africa are also at ‘extreme risk’, with the crisis heightened by man-made factors.

The new Food Security Risk Index (FSRI) has been published by risk analysts Maplecroft, and is based on the key elements of food security set out by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). The index is calculated using 12 indicators, measuring the availability, access and stability of food supplies across all countries, as well as the nutritional and health status of populations.

Countries at extreme risk

Of the 12 countries categorised as ‘extreme risk’, ten are in sub-Saharan Africa, an area particularly vulnerable to food insecurity: the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) (1), Somalia (1), Burundi (3), Eritrea (4), Angola (5), Chad (6), Ethiopia (7), Liberia (9), Comoros (11) and Sudan (12). Haiti (7) and Afghanistan (9) are the only two countries categorised as ‘extreme risk’ outside of sub-Saharan Africa.

Maplecroft identifies a combination of critical factors that is intensifying the food crisis in the Horn of Africa:

• low capacity to combat the effects of extreme weather events such as drought;
• prevalence of poverty;
• failing infrastructure, undermining both food production and emergency food distribution capacity.

Conflict also contributes to food insecurity as it displaces people from normal social networks and livelihoods. The on-going violence in eastern DR Congo, for example, is largely responsible for its precarious food security situation.

Maplecroft CEO, Alyson Warhurst warns of the potential impact of food crises:

“Food insecurity can not only cause humanitarian disasters; we have also seen it emerge as a contributing factor to societal unrest. As global demand for food grows due to rising populations, food security will take on increasing importance for governments and it needs to be on the risk agenda of multinational corporations.”

Low food stocks, natural disasters and human factors

Despite a slight easing of global food prices, the World Bank has warned that global food stocks remain at “alarmingly low” levels, resulting in volatile commodity prices and widely fluctuating domestic food prices:

“Global prices of food in July 2011 remain significantly higher than their levels in July 2010 and close to the 2008 peak levels, with the World Bank Food Price Index increasing by 33 percent in the last year. Prices for the period April to July 2011 have declined slightly from their peak in February, although prices remain volatile for specific commodities such as rice, maize, and wheat. Prospects for the overall supply of food have improved since April 2011, but several sources of uncertainty remain. Global stocks still remain alarmingly low. For example, the stocks-to-use ratio for maize currently stands at 13 percent, the lowest since the early 1970s. At these low stock levels, even small shortfalls in yields can have amplified effects on prices.”

A series of climate-related natural disasters in cereal producing countries over 2010 and 2011 contributed to global food price rises. The severe drought and wildfires in Russia in 2010 destroyed 20% of its wheat crop, which constituted a 1.6% reduction in global wheat production and resulted in an export ban that was only lifted in July 2011. Floods in Pakistan, Australia and China also added to market pressures.

Maplecroft states that human factors – including speculation in commodity markets and increased use of biofuels – are compounding the impact of natural hazards on global food security, with severe effects on the most vulnerable populations.

Grabbing land for biofuels

As well as driving up commodity prices, increased use of biofuels has led to a ‘land grab’ in Africa. Private energy companies based in the United Kingdom, Germany and Sweden are reported to have secured contracts for land in high risk African countries for the production of biofuels.

Alyson Warhurst suggests that large-scale land acquisitions in developing countries nonetheless present opportunities as well as risks, with the potential to benefit the rural poor by generating employment in the sector, by developing rural infrastructure, as well as by contributing to poverty reduction:

“Responsible investment can lead to development and play an important role in expanding access to sufficient and stable food supplies. The transfer of technological advances and expertise in agronomy may also help to improve the capacity of the agricultural systems of developing countries to increase production of food crops for both domestic consumption and export markets.”

You may also be interested in...

• Feeding a thirsty world: threats and opportunities for water and food security

Reforming the Common Agricultural Policy: implications for UK agriculture and rural areas

This seminar will bring out the latest thinking on reform of the Common Agricultural Policy and the impact of reforms for UK farmers and rural areas, in the light of the European Commission’s forthcoming legislative proposals.

It follows recently released proposals to freeze the CAP budget at 2013 levels until 2020 – and to link almost 30% of direct payments to ‘greening’ measures.

At this early stage we expect discussion will centre on how proposed changes are likely to affect farmers in England and the devolved administrations, and how additional sustainability measures will be built into the future Common Agricultural Policy.

Planned sessions include:

• A fresh look at the legislative proposals and their reception in the European Parliament;
• An update on the UK position in the negotiation process;
• The budget for the CAP going forward – and the implications of a budget freeze for UK farmers;
• ‘Greening’ the CAP – what sort of measures might encourage more sustainable farming, and how will they be implemented?; and
• Effects for UK farmers – will proposed reforms reduce form-filling and support active farmers?

The seminar will be chaired by William Bain MP, Shadow Minister for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and George Lyon MEP, Member, Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development (AGRI) and Rapporteur of First Parliament opinion on CAP Reform.

The seminar includes a keynote address from Gwilym Jones, International & Legal Affairs, Cabinet of Commissioner Cioloş, European Commission, as well as a senior representative of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Further confirmed speakers include: Professor Rob Ackrill, Professor of European Economics and Policy, Nottingham Trent University;Richard Ashworth MEP, Conservative Spokesman on Agriculture and Rural Affairs and Substitute, European Parliament Budgets Committee;David Barnes, Deputy Director, Agriculture & Rural Development, Scottish Government; Professor Allan Buckwell, Policy Director, Country Land & Business Association (CLA); George Dunn, Chief Executive, Tenant Farmers Association; Martin Harper, Director of Conservation, RSPB; Peter Kendall, President, NFU; Martin Nesbit, Director of EU and International Agriculture, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs; Gail Soutar, Senior CAP and International Affairs Adviser, NFU and Christine Tacon, Managing Director, The Co-operative Farms, together with a senior representative of the Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP). Further senior participants are being approached.

Proposals to support research and innovation in agriculture will also be examined, in addition to measures to protect against market volatility – at a time when global food prices look set to rise.

For more information, see full seminar information and booking details.

The seminar is presented by the Westminster Food & Nutrition Forum.

In this look-ahead:

• How to Achieve Zero Waste: The importance of managing, minimizing, and monetizing material waste
• How IKEA is Managing Sustainability
• The Route to Zero Carbon Homes
• Passivhaus: Applying the low energy standard to social housing refurbishment
• Sustainability vs. Engineering: Balancing what is needed strategically, with what technically works
• Open Innovation in the Agricultural Supply Chain

For a full calendar of what’s planned for the coming weeks in 2degrees, including many more events, see the 2degrees calendar of events.

How to Achieve Zero Waste: The importance of managing, minimizing, and monetizing material waste

7th September 2011: In this webinar, we are joined by Brooke Farrell, President and Founder of RecycleMatch, a company that specializes in managing, minimizing, and monetizing material waste, as she discusses how RecycleMatch has helped organizations understand how waste can be used as a valuable resource. In addition, Brooke will explain RecycleMatch’s ambitions to make landfills obsolete and to open up new markets for the 7.7 billion tons of material currently considered waste.

More from 2degrees…

How IKEA is Managing Sustainability

13th September 2011: Join this webinar to hear from the Chief Sustainability Officer at IKEA, on how they are managing sustainability in practice: internal administration, notable project, funding for sustainability initiatives, and the role of the CSO in the organization.

More from 2degrees…

The Route to Zero Carbon Homes

14th September 2011: The UK has set an ambitious target for all new homes to be ‘zero carbon’ by 2016. By bringing together experts from the Zero Carbon Hub and the Home Builders Federation, this webinar will explore the ‘zero carbon’ definition and the approach for delivering homes to the standard. Together with a clear understanding of the challenges the requirements bring and some of the solutions and technologies for achieving it, you will also get a unique insight into how low and zero carbon homes have been successfully delivered in Canada and the lessons that can be applied in the UK.

More from 2degrees…

Passivhaus: Applying the low energy standard to social housing refurbishment

20th September 2011: Passivhaus, the German low energy standard is now being used to transform existing buildings. In this webinar we look at a recent scheme to refurbish a social housing project, explore the approach taken, the lessons that have been learned and how it might be applied to other projects.

More from 2degrees…

Sustainability vs. Engineering: Balancing what is needed strategically, with what technically works

23rd September 2011: This webinar will explore ways to overcome the divide between the sustainability team and the engineering staff, by helping sustainability teams understand what technically works, and give those with engineering expertise an understanding of their role in the sustainability work of an organization.

More from 2degrees…

Open Innovation in the Agricultural Supply Chain

29th September 2011: This webinar introduces a novel method from the FAO for improving decision-making in agro-food production chains. ‘Social Spaces for Innovation’ is a collaborative framework that will facilitate greater interaction between stakeholders and address price volatility in world food supply chains.

More from 2degrees…

Water scarcity is no longer just an issue impacting others overseas; we only need to look back to earlier in the year, when Eastern England in particular suffered severe water shortages and droughts, to realise that water scarcity is a national concern in the UK.

In addition to the increasing demands being placed on our own water resources, the UK is the sixth largest net importer of ‘embedded’ or ‘virtual’ water in the world. The impact of UK consumption of water overseas in water scarce areas is therefore fast becoming a cause for concern for our businesses and government.

The realities of a changing climate reinforce the importance of understanding water use and managing water effectively, particularly in reference to food production. Businesses need to assess the impact that climate change can have on their ability to continue to reliably deliver their goods and services.

To fully assess a business’s water footprint it is necessary to engage with the supply chain, quantifying water consumption at all its stages, from the production of raw materials through to product use and understanding the impacts of this consumption at the specific geographic locations at point of water use. There can be considerable business risks related to the unsustainable use of water resources so it is essential that effective and targeted risk management strategies are formulated to develop responsible and resilient supply chains.

Water footprint assessments provide a way of quantifying the amount of ‘virtual’ water associated with a product and provide a means of understanding the impact that it has on the environment by comparing the consumption to available water resources. ADAS regularly carries out such assessments for companies, and has recently been working with the Environment Agency and the Welsh Assembly Government investigating issues surrounding food production and the impact on water resources, supporting policy development and long term water resource management.

Further reading

Other articles from ADAS in World Water Week include:

• Water resources: why landowners need to prepare for unpredictable water supplies and ensure farms are prepared for future droughts;
• Water quality: how modelling can help target management in catchments to reduce multiple pollutants;
• Water and food security: the importance of water availability when assessing the risk of food security;
• Water and livestock: the importance of water availability for livestock businesses.

At the core of the Natural Environment White Paper (NEWP) is a call for a more integrated approach in the management and governance of the English countryside.

This call is evident in NEWP initiatives, such as the Local Nature Partnerships and Nature Improvement Areas, where stakeholders in areas relating to agriculture, enterprise, health and wellbeing are encouraged to join strategic and delivery discussions on improving the quality of the environment. A two-way exchange is essential to establish a shared vision. 

One such example has been developed in Gloucestershire by the Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group (FWAG) and evaluated by the Countryside & Community Research Institute (CCRI) with funding from Natural England. The Integrated Local Delivery (ILD) model has also been presented to Jim Paice MP, Minster for Agriculture, included on the RDPE Network as a case study in best practice, and fed into the NEWP.

The Integrated Local Delivery model

So what underpins the ILD model?

Environmental land management initiatives tend to be top-down, driven by large institutions citing national legislation, policy obligations and international directives and conventions. Local communities, including farmers, who often feel protective of the natural assets within their vicinity (that may also make a considerable contribution to a local sense of identity), may feel alienated from the imposition of targets from whose formulation they have been excluded. Yet these communities frequently have essential knowledge, experience and a sense of pride and commitment to the future survival of such areas.

Furthermore the range of national organisations, strategies and policy frameworks can sometimes end up working against each other in a particular area. This is particularly true of complex sites and issues with a wide range of legal obligations and other interests. In such multi-objective areas there is a need for greater connectivity at all levels to enable synergy on the ground. This lack of co-ordination, coherence and integration at the national (and even regional) level results in a series of confusing, disjointed and contradictory signals and mechanisms for those who live and work close to these areas and, most importantly, have the capacity to assist in their management and governance.

The ILD model developed by FWAG, has been implemented in a range of situations that utilises and enables those with local skills and environmental land management knowledge that contributes to the management of sensitive and key environmental sites.

Outline of the Integrated Delivery Model Approach

There are 8 key themes to the ILD model, which:

• Works within the lowest appropriate National and European administrative structure (parish or ward, town, county, district, region, country);
• Clarifies which statutory and non-statutory partners have an interest in the area so that they can be involved and their strategic aims and objectives identified and delivered within that administrative area;
• Seeks to deliver a wide range of strategic objectives within the defined area in order to maximise the wider landscape scale potential effective use of public funds;
• Seeks to strongly support and value the role and knowledge of the farming community;
• Promotes the use of facilitation through an independent third party to develop a local management group that acts as the collective discussion forum for the area, with clear lines of communication to those public agencies with legal responsibilities;
• Incorporates the parish council (or other local government framework) into the communication structure of the local management group to ensure continuity beyond project timescales;
• Provides a forum for all those within the defined area to take action and offer knowledge and resource to achieve multi-objective delivery with an inclusive list of partners;
• Identifies funding opportunities, particularly through the Rural Development Programme for England (RDPE), and match funding through joined up partnership working.

The ILD model uses a 6 stage process of facilitation, involving all partner organisations with an interest in a particular area to inspire and enable action from local landowners and neighbouring communities.

The first part of the scoping phase is to gather information on the key natural assets and characteristics within the inner circle (a), the agreed area of interest. Next move to the middle circle (b), and record all the regional strategic frameworks that could be delivered within the defined central area. Finally move to the outer circle (c), representing the national and in some respects international strategic and policy frameworks relating to the inner circle (a). This should provide a good grasp of the range of physical assets and the associated frameworks at the local, regional and national level.

The next part of the scoping is to identify the contacts responsible for delivery of these frameworks.  This is done in reverse order (d to f), because a secondary aim here is to make the connections from the national and regional to the local level.  So the aim at the national level (outer circle) is to identify the person (d) with responsibility for delivering the legal obligation associated with a designation or policy objective (c).

The ILD model in action: Walmore Common

One area where the ILD model have been used to secure sustainable local management is the area around Walmore Common, near Westbury and part of the floodplain of the River Severn in Gloucestershire.

Walmore Common (photo © Copyright Kevin Gilman and
licensed for reuse under Creative Commons licence)

The area is part of a network of smaller catchments that are low lying and close to the main river and drain into it through a series of ditches. The area has multiple designations at international (Ramsar and SPA) and national level (SSSI) due to its geology (lowland submerged peat) and ecology (overwintering of Berwick Swans and nesting of wading birds).

There are two clear national interests and legal obligations – flood prevention and environmental protection – meaning that the State does not speak with a single voice on Walmore. In 2008, a series of one-to-one discussions, open meetings, site walks and other examples of direct communication between the FWAG officer, interested NGOs and agencies and the local farmers were introduced. Using the ILD model the full range of assets in the wider Walmore area was established.

Each environmental feature generates a petal of integrated delivery with the defined administrative area.

Walmore Case Study Integrated Local Delivery Flower

This resulted in the development of the Walmore Common Management group, which identified a number and range of tasks, the most straightforward of which have already been implemented. This is a clear contrast to the inactivity of previous years. Different types of knowledge, for example surrounding the hydrology, are now more widely recognised by a wider range of interests, although this is not always the case. Crucially, most people feel listened to, or at least taken seriously.

Overall, there is agreement that the situation around Walmore is now closer to a shared vision, with both locals and agency staff agreeing that communication is clearer.  The management group is seen as a source of accurate information on what is actually happening, thus replacing hearsay. The actions of the group and the transparent, accountable and effective nature of the meetings mean that the agencies are more confident that their legal requirements and obligations can be met locally. Conversely, the local community is beginning to take collective responsibility for management that will meet national targets and obligations as well as meeting other concerns such as flooding and access provision.

One of the major changes that the approach has brought about is the number of surrounding landowners participating in Environmental Stewardship, mostly the Higher Level Stewardship (HLS) scheme that will deliver greater environmental benefits to the area. The in-depth nature of the management decisions has meant that local members of the management group have dramatically increased their understanding of what environmental agencies are expecting on the site and this has led to an increased awareness of the uniqueness and complexities of this wet lowland area with its high biological and productive diversity.

Wider lessons

The end result on Walmore is the introduction of a landscape scale process that is delivering far more than just the management of the designated areas within it. The surrounding areas provide a significant buffer, a key recommendation of Lawton Review and taken up by the NEWP.  However, this task requires high skills of facilitation and the ability to link up various strategic frameworks.

There are international examples using approaches such as community-based conservation, co-management or adaptive management, all of which start from the premise that nature conservation and community engagement can be simultaneously achieved. However, this requires a shift in ecological thinking that recognises the social as part of the ecosystem and the need for participatory approaches to identify and integrate traditional human activities into conservation management.

The type of approach implemented by FWAG reflects the principles and process of co-management described by Friket Berkes, at the University of Manitoba as ‘the result of extensive deliberation and negotiation’ – meaning it is very much a process rather than a fixed state.

The experience within Gloucestershire suggests that an integrated approach can inspire and enable communities to help meet national environmental targets and obligations. This appears at odds with the more regulatory and incentive driven approach preferred by some within the conservation movement where environmental management is determined externally and implemented using a business model rather than one more attuned to the existing custom within a landscape.

Next Steps

FWAG’s ILD model is now part of the wider discussion within national, regional and local fora, meaning that it will be tested thoroughly and made available more widely.

The full report, including a tool kit and details of the environmental scoping used in the ILD approach, is available to download from the CCRI website.

One of the most satisfying parts of my job is when I see that the NFU has managed, even in a small way, to influence the Government’s agenda. So I was really pleased to see a distinct change in the tone and language of the Natural Environment White Paper: The Natural Choice: securing the value of nature compared to the tone of the original discussion document Defra published last summer. I’ll be frank, when I read the summary last year, I despaired at the overall tone. Needless to say, we made our concerns known.

In just the first two pages of the summary, the words ‘degraded’ or ‘degradation’ were used no less than 8 times in relation to the environment. Now, I accept that it is a technical term, but if the Government wants to inspire an entire generation of farmers and land managers, it needs more than the presentation of a gloom and doom scenario. We need to know that what we do matters, that many of the official indicators are moving in the right direction, and that farming can make a positive contribution to the environment.

And let’s be clear; that’s not about producing less in order to impact less, it’s about producing more while impacting less. The food security challenge demands that we produce more; even on this tiny island we need to play our part. The White Paper acknowledges that. It explicitly talks about the Government’s goal of increasing food production. And it talks about bringing government, industry and environmental players together to work out how we can do that at the same time as improving the environment. That’s a great step forward, and I look forward to being part of it.

As farmers we’re completely reliant on the quality of our soils and plentiful and clean water supplies; if we don’t have those we can’t farm, it’s as simple as that. But if the recent Foresight Report into food and farming tells us anything it’s that a healthy environment is just one part of the story. Protecting and enhancing it must not be at the expense of food production, and sometimes that will mean difficult trade-offs. I hope that the group the Government brings together will be brave enough to look at what that might mean in practice.