Agriculture%20at%20a%20Crossroads_Global%20Report%20(English)

2 | IAASTD Global Report
Key Messages
1. Agriculture is multifunctional. It provides food, feed,
fiber, fuel and other goods. It also has a major influence on
other essential ecosystem services such as water supply and
carbon sequestration or release. Agriculture plays an important
social role, providing employment and a way of life.
Both agriculture and its products are a medium of cultural
transmission and cultural practices worldwide. Agriculturally
based communities provide a foundation for local economies
and are an important means for countries to secure
their territories. Agriculture accounts for a major part of the
livelihood of 40% of the world’s population and occupies
40% of total land area; 90% of farms worldwide have a
size of less than 2 hectares. Agriculture includes crop-, animal-,
forestry- and fishery-based systems or mixed farming,
including new emerging systems such as organic, precision
and peri-urban agriculture. Although agricultural inputs
and outputs constitute the bulk of world trade, most food is
consumed domestically, i.e., where it is produced.
2. Agricultural systems range across the globe from
intensive highly commercialized large-scale systems
to small-scale and subsistence systems. All of these
systems are potentially either highly vulnerable or sustainable.
This variability is rooted in the global agrifood
system, which has led to regional and functional differences
around the world—the social, economic and ecological effects
of which have not yet been assessed and compared.
The global agricultural system faces great challenges today,
as it has to confront climate change, loss of biological and
agrobiological diversity, loss of soil fertility, water shortage
and loss of water quality, and population growth. Sustainable
agricultural production is dependent on effective management
of a range of interdependent physical and natural
resources—land, water, energy, capital and so on—as well
as on full internalization of currently externalized costs. The
sustainability of production also depends on the continuing
availability of and generalized access to public goods. Finding
ways of dealing with these challenges is a highly contested
matter: strategies differ because they are based on different
visions of agriculture, different interests and diverging
values. However, while agriculture is a strong contributor
to the most critical problems we face today; it can also play
a major role in their resolution.
3. Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology
(AKST) can address the multifunctionality of agriculture.
It plays a key role in shaping the quality and quantity
of natural, human and other resources as well as
access to them. AKST is also crucial in supporting the
efforts of actors at different levels—from household
to national, sub-global and global—to reduce poverty
and hunger, as well as improve rural livelihoods
and the environment in order to ensure equitable and
environmentally, socially and economically sustainable
development. On the one hand, tacit and locallybased
agricultural knowledge has been, and continues to
be, the most important type of knowledge particularly for
small-scale farming, forestry and fishery activities. On the
other hand, the development of formal agricultural knowl-
edge has been enormously successful particularly since the
1950s, and forms a dominating part of agricultural knowledge
today. Challenges ahead include the development and
use of transgenic plants, animals and microorganisms for
increased productivity and other purposes; access to and
use of agrochemicals; the emerging challenges of biofuel
and bioenergy development, and in a broader sense, the political,
social and economic organization of agriculture as a
component of rural development. All these challenges have
implications (both positive and negative) on the environment,
human health, social well-being and economic performance
of rural areas in all countries. The combination
of community-based innovation and local knowledge with
science-based approaches in AKST holds the promise of best
addressing the problems, needs and opportunities of the
rural poor.
4. The majority of the world’s poorest and hungry live in
rural settings and depend directly on agriculture. Over
70% of the world’s poor live in rural areas. These 2.1 billion
people live on less than US$2 a day. This is not inevitable,
and an improved economic environment and greater social
equity at local, national, and global scales have the potential
to ensure that agriculture is able to provide improved
livelihoods. Inextricably linked to poverty are vulnerabilities
relating to production and consumption shocks, poor
sanitation, and lack of access to health care and deficient
nutrient intake, placing many in agrarian societies at risk.
AKST may help mitigate these negative effects by supporting
appropriate interventions, but it may also increase the
vulnerability of poor farmers if no attention is paid to the
risks and uncertainties to which these farmers are exposed.
The livelihoods of many poor farmers are oriented towards
meeting basic needs, particularly food. With insufficient income,
households have little money to invest in increasing
the productivity or sustainability of their production systems.
The global trend has been towards a decapitalization
of poor farmers and their resources (as well as rural areas),
as they experience declining terms of trade and competition
with low-cost producers. AKST offers opportunities to contribute
to recapitalization of such farming households.
5. A vicious circle of poor health, reduced working
capacity, low productivity and short life expectancy
is typical, particularly for the most vulnerable groups
working in agriculture. All persons have a right to sufficient,
safe, nutritious and culturally acceptable food. Good
nutrition is a prerequisite for health. Although global production
of food calories is sufficient to feed the world’s population,
millions die or are debilitated every year by hunger
and malnutrition which makes them vulnerable to infectious
diseases (e.g., HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis). In many
developing countries hunger and health risks are exacerbated
by extreme poverty and poor and dangerous working
conditions. In contrast, in industrialized countries, overnutrition
and food safety issues, including food-borne illnesses
affecting human health as well as diseases associated with
agricultural production systems, are predominant concerns.
Notwithstanding, in industrialized countries there is also a
significant incidence of undernutrition among the poor, and
a higher burden of both infectious and noncommunicable