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Home > Reports and Documents > Trade and environment review 2013: wake up before it is too late - make agriculture truly sustainable now for food security in a changing climate > Trade and environment review 2013: wake up before it is too late - make agriculture truly sustainable now for food security in a changing climate

Trade and environment review 2013: wake up before it is too late - make agriculture truly sustainable now for food security in a changing climate [1]

Developing and developed countries alike need a paradigm shift in agricultural development: from a "green revolution" to a "truly ecological intensification" approach. This implies a rapid and significant shift from conventional, monoculture-based and high external-input-dependent industrial production towards mosaics of sustainable, regenerative production systems that also considerably improve the productivity of small-scale farmers. Need to see a move from a linear to a holistic approach in agricultural management, which recognizes that a farmer is not only a producer of agricultural goods, but also a manager of an agro-ecological system that provides quite a number of public goods and services (e.g. water, soil, landscape, energy, biodiversity, and recreation) UNCTAD's Trade and Environment Review 2013 (TER13) contends. TER13 highlights that the required transformation is much more profound than simply tweaking the existing industrial agricultural system. Rather, what is called for is a better understanding of the multi-functionality of agriculture, its pivotal importance for pro-poor rural development and the significant role it can play in dealing with resource scarcities and in mitigating and adapting to climate change. However, the sheer scale at which modified production methods would have to be adopted, the significant governance issues, the power asymmetries' problems in food input and output markets as well as the current trade rules for agriculture pose considerable challenges.

Publication Date: 
18/09/2013
UNCTAD [2]
Tags:
Agriculture [3], Food Security [4], Climate Change [5], Developing Countries [6], India [7], Global Warming [8], Green House Gases [9], Carbon Sequestration [10], Climate Mitigation [11], Climate Adaptation [12], Organic Farming [13], Livestock [14], Trade [15], Environment [16]
Centre for Science and Environment
National Knowledge Commission Government of India

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[1] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/reports-documents/trade-and-environment-review-2013-wake-it-too-late-make-agriculture-truly
[2] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/publisher/unctad
[3] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/agriculture
[4] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/food-security
[5] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/climate-change
[6] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/developing-countries
[7] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/india
[8] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/global-warming
[9] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/green-house-gases
[10] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/carbon-sequestration
[11] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/climate-mitigation
[12] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/climate-adaptation
[13] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/organic-farming
[14] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/livestock
[15] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/trade
[16] http://admin.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/category/thesaurus/environment