Rural 21 (Englische Ausgabe)

“Rural 21 – The International Journal for Rural Development” widmet sich seit über 50 Jahren den Fragen der ländlichen Entwicklung in Entwicklungs- und Schwellenländern. Neben den 17 Nachhaltigkeitszielen (SDGs) der Vereinten Nationen bis 2030 stehen thematisch Landwirtschaft, Klimawandel, Forstwirtschaft, Nahrungssicherheit, Armutsbekämpfung, Gesundheit und Bildung, natürliche Ressourcen und Umweltschutz im Mittelpunkt. Erfahren Sie mehr

Focus 2/2024: Livestock

Regarding the transformation of our agricultural and food systems, hardly any sector has been as controversially discussed as livestock farming. In the Global North, quite a few people would like to see animal products entirely deleted from the human diet – because this could reduce the emission of harmful greenhouse gases; because valuable natural resources such as land and water could be used more efficiently; because deforestation to create pastureland could be stemmed, which would protect biodiversity; and because, in many cases, they cannot reconcile animal husbandry with their animal welfare aspirations. Not to mention the rapid growth of malnutrition and nutrition-related illnesses through excessive consumption of animal-sourced food and health risks such as the transmittance of zoonotic diseases.

However, a world without animal agriculture is simply not realistic. The issue here is not just that of producing food such as milk, eggs and meat, which represent an important source of proteins and micronutrients for many people, or of using draught animals for land cultivation. For women in particular, keeping small livestock is often the only option to earn their own income, and is hence key to economic and social empowerment. Animals can serve as forms of saving, insurance and social security. And they are an integral element of the urgently needed agro-ecological transformation, which is also based on the principles of the circular economy and (nutrient) recycling.

By declaring 2024 the International Year of Camelids, the United Nations has been highlighting the importance of these animals – and hence also the importance of the pastoralist way of living – for food security and ecosystem functions. Knowing fully well that sustainable solutions for tomorrow’s livestock systems always need a multi-faceted and context-specific lens, our authors ultimately back livestock farming too.

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Focus 1/2024:  Indigenous people – why rights and resources matter

Currently, there are around 477 million indigenous people living in roughly 70 countries across the world. They speak more than 4,000 of the world’s 7,000 languages, and they protect roughly 80 per cent of the world’s remaining biodiversity. But while making up slightly more than six per cent of the global population, indigenous people account for about 15 per cent of the extreme poor, and their life expectancy is up to 20 years lower than that of other population groups.

There are many reasons for this. The great majority of indigenous communities live in remote and fragile environments, with very limited access to basic services, including healthcare, water and sanitation, energy and education. Moreover, territories and natural resources which provide livelihoods for a large number of these people are increasingly under threat – not only from the impact of climate change, but also because of the growing demand for foodstuffs and forest products, fuels and valuable minerals. Violations of rights are a regular occurrence.

Our authors – many of whom belong to Indigenous Peoples – demonstrate which international bodies of law indigenous people can refer to and describe the strengths and weaknesses of tools and instruments which have been developed to enhance their access to justice and development. They show the flipside of the green energy transition and give examples of successful advocacy work. And they report how the valorisation of indigenous knowledge can be achieved – including rewarding people for the valuable ecosystem services they provide.

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Focus 4/2023: Stemming food loss and waste

According to the latest progress report for the Sustainable Development Goals, about 8 per cent of all food produced in the world is lost on the farm, 14 per cent is lost between the farm gate and the retail sec­tor, and 17 per cent is wasted at the retail, food service provider and household levels.

What is disturbing here is that these figures haven’t changed significantly in the past decade. Roughly 40 per cent of food still doesn’t get where it is meant to go, namely to the stomachs of the consumers. But hasn’t any progress at all been made in terms of food loss and waste? Or don’t we simply have any reliable methods to adequately assess the phenome­non? The answer is that both applies.

A recent study by the UK’s University of Greenwich arrives at the con­clusion that food loss and waste measurements are usually aggregated from relatively small samples to national levels. This can result in vol­umes being considerably under- or overrated. Moreover, while we have a good knowledge of the problem in developed countries, above all of waste, little is known about that phenomenon in low- and middle-income countries. The question arising here is how to tackle a problem which can’t be properly measured.

While keeping these shortcomings in mind, we have asked our authors to present innovative, practical and, above all, scalable solutions from the fields they work in which can contribute to less food being wasted – for global food and nutrition security, for the economy, for the environment and for our climate.

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Focus 3/2023: Joining forces for agri-food systems transformation

Our current agricultural and food systems are not capable of providing the global population with sufficient and healthy food within the planetary boundaries. Worse still, with their high freshwater consumption, their greenhouse gas emissions and their representing a threat to biodiversity, they destroy their very own ecological basis. The multiple crises of the last few years have added to all this, with the consequence that Sustainable Development Goal 2 – ending hunger by 2030 – will definitely not be reached.

It is generally agreed that our agricultural and food systems need fundamental changes – towards sustainability, resilience, health, equity and inclusiveness. But how can this best be achieved? Based on the global discourses of the past years and the initiatives emerging from them, our authors have identified key levers and cornerstones for successful agri-food systems transformation.

As can be expected, these vary depending on whether they reflect the view of politics, science or civil society. Nevertheless, consensus has been reached on many issues. The transformation pathways have to be systemic and cross-sectoral, and must break down complexity. They have to be locally owned, context-specific and include all stakeholder groups. They must regard trade-offs as inherent and create an acceptable compensation for the losers. And they have to contain short-, medium- and long-term activities. Based on experience gained in Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania, in Chile and Brazil, and in Bangladesh and Vietnam, our authors show what this can look like in practice.

 

 

 

 

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Focus 2/2023: Agrifood prices, food security and the role of trade

Following the Russian Army’s invasion of Ukraine in late February 2022, food prices soared up world-wide in next to no time. Not only did the Food Price Index of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization reach an all-time high, fertiliser and energy prices leapt up across the world, too – with the well-documented consequences for food production and supply in many countries, above all in those of the Global South. That the wheat price has now, some 15 months later, returned to its pre-war level – despite the war’s going on and the Ukrainian grain exports having collapsed – shows that the world markets seem to be more resilient than expected.

In this edition, our authors take a look at the complex relations which – alongside the obvious shocks and crises – are behind price formation on the international agrifood markets. They analyse what triggered the major food price spikes in past years and how the food crises then and today differ from each other. Special attention is given to the role of speculation and the growing corporate concentration in the food chain, be it the seeds, farming machinery, agrochemicals or commodity trade sector.

Historically, there has been a pronounced correlation between international food and fertiliser prices. Our authors show what long-term fertilisation strategies could look like – strategies that make farmers and the economies independent of price developments on the international fertiliser markets and above all enhance the yields and labour productivity of smallholders.

 

 

 

 

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Focus 1/2023: Energy – time for change

In addition to causing anxiety over global food security, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has put the issue of energy security right at the top of the political agenda. In combination with a fear of supply bottlenecks, the dramatic fossil fuel price hikes have given new impetus to a transition to low-carbon energy sources – which is urgently needed anyway given global warming. In November last year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) announced that overall capacity of renewables is to almost double world-wide in the coming five years. Then these “clean” energy carriers could replace coal as the biggest source of electricity generation. From 2022 to 2027, the IEA is reckoning with power produced from renewable sources amounting to 2,400 gigawatts (GW) – a volume corresponding to China’s total power generating capacity. China, the USA and India are set to be the biggest drivers of renewable energy development, the IEA continues. And they are precisely the countries responsible for the largest shares world-wide of CO₂ emissions (China: 33 %; USA: 13 %; India: 7 %). The latest edition takes a look at this change in global energy flows, the challenges which are currently emerging for Africa in particular in the energy sector and the role which the Global North plays in this context.

 

 

 

 

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Focus 4/2022: Financing sustainable agri-food systems

Not only since the UN Food Systems Summit in September 2021 has the urgent need for a transformation of our agri-food systems been beyond question if SDG 2 – ending hunger and malnutrition in all its forms by 2030 – is not to get completely out of reach. However, the current world-wide bleak economic prospects are certainly not making the mobilisation of the resources this essentially requires any easier.

Alongside budget constraints, financial institutions sticking to their old patterns of behaviour are responsible for the urgently needed investments in the sustainable transformation of our agri-food systems having either failed to materialise or not being on target. Wrong incentives, not considering externalities in setting food and agricultural prices, lobbyism and not adequately prioritising the money available are further reasons. This edition shows you the approaches which science and development cooperation, financial institutions and the private sector regard as having proven promising in rebuilding our agri-food systems in line with the Agenda 2030 and making them resilient in the long term.

 

 

 

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Focus 3/2022: Rural development in times of pandemics 

For merely three years, the corona pandemic has held sway of our lives, with what are now more than 6.5 million deaths reported globally and millions of people who have fallen into poverty. Following the outbreak of the pandemic, the global economy fell into its deepest recession since World War II. Over 90 per cent of economies saw their gross domestic product fall, by a global average of 3.3 per cent in 2020.

Extensive macroeconomic relief measures helped the world economy to achieve a slight recovery in 2021. However, this positive trend has again been nullified by the impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The World Bank estimates that global growth, still at 5.7 per cent in 2021, will have dropped to 2.9 per cent by the end of the year.

Even though we are not yet able to assess the long-term impacts of the pandemic today, insights so far paint a rather sobering picture. Existing social and economic inequalities have become further aggravated, and the world’s goal of ending hunger and poverty is getting further and further out of reach.

 

 

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Focus 2/2022: Healthy soil – healthy people – healthy planet

We cannot live without healthy soil and land. It is on these resources that we produce most of our food and build our homes. We need them to provide clean water and precious plant nutrients, to conserve biological diversity and to cope with climate change. And they form the basis for the livelihoods of millions of people. But despite such known facts, these valuable resources are in a dire state. A third of all soils world-wide are already degraded, and each year, further huge expanses of fertile land go lost.

We know that the only way to reverse this trend is with a paradigm shift – away from a resource-intensive mode of production and towards a resource-friendly mode considering the planetary boundaries while placing our global agricultural and food systems on sustainable foundations. Our authors and interview partners share examples of global and national initiatives and policies as well as research insights and practical examples addressing this topic with you.

 

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