1.1. Scope and Limitations
1.2. Justification
1.3. Previous Studies that have Recommended Soil and Water Aspects of NRM Research
1.4. Task Force Reports
1.5. The IFPRI Initiative: A 2020 Vision for Food, Agriculture, and the Environment
Sustainable food security through the alleviation of poverty and protection of the environment are the overarching concerns of the CGIAR (see A Vision for the CGIAR: Sustainable Agriculture for Food Secure World. Ministerial-level Meeting, Lucerne, February 1995). The CGIAR traditionally has contributed to poverty alleviation by focusing on agricultural productivity enhancement, which can directly and indirectly contribute to creating food security for the poor.
In pursuit of this research, the System has considered the natural resources base, but mainly in terms of on-site interactions at the field level. This work is essential to success in developing Sustainable agriculture, although increasingly much of it can be done by NARS partners. At the same time, however, research related to environment and natural resources needs to be strengthened, particularly in terms of the off-site impacts of agriculture on the environment and environmental constraints to agriculture due to natural resources degradation.
This study considers existing natural resources management (NRM) research in the System as a baseline for assessing what new, promising areas need to be considered, and how the different NRM research activities in the System might be adjusted and better linked and coordinated. Different approaches currently are being proposed and implemented. The cost-effectiveness and rationale for the different approaches have not been adequately assessed, nor has the potential effectiveness of their proposed forms of interaction. Thus, a number of questions remain, e.g., how do the Systemwide initiatives based on the ecoregional approach relate to the new Soil, Water, Nutrient Management Systemwide Initiative? Are systemwide, disciplinary focused consortia the way to organize natural resources management related research in the System? To what extent does the System now cover the key priority topics that need to be addressed? How should the System relate to other international centres, national research groups in developed countries, and NARS in the area of natural resources management research?
The CGIAR System fairly recently has studied in some depth certain of the relevant natural resources management issues associated with the CGIAR System, including those related to forestry, agroforestry, fisheries, and most recently conservation of genetic resources in the System. 8 Thus, TAC decided to focus the present study on soil and water aspects of natural resources management, bringing other topics mentioned above into the present study only as needed to emphasize various linkages with the central focus of the study.
8 Report of the TAC Panel on Fisheries Research. TAC Secretariat, 1990. FAO, Rome.
Report of the TAC Panel on Forestry Research. TAC Secretariat, 1990. FAO, Rome.
Expansion of the CGIAR System. TAC Secretariat, 1992. FAO, Rome.
Review of CGIAR Priorities and Strategies. TAC Secretariat, 1994. FAO, Rome.
Stripe Study of Genetic Resources in the CGIAR. TAC Secretariat, 1994. FAO, Rome.
The study has two further components. First, a review paper on the subject of natural resources management research (from both biophysical and socioeconomic perspectives) was prepared by outside consultants (TAC 1995a, op. cit). Second, an inventory of ongoing work in the CGIAR Centres was undertaken (TAC 1995b, op. cit). The background documents (available separately) provided a significant input into this overview "priorities and strategies" paper.
It should be noted that TAC is discussing in this paper research to support improved natural resources management, not just research on how to manage those resources, although management research is part of the total package required. 9 Thus, also of relevance is traditional soils research, research on terrestrial and aquatic biodiversity, policy and economics research, plant protection, pest management research, and so forth. Moreover, natural resources such as water should be seen not just as production factors or commodities, but also as living environments and habitats (see section 2.3.1.).
9 TAC uses the term "management research" in the more practical sense of management being a means to an end, or the process of "doing things".
It should also be noted that the concept of an integrated natural resources management (INRM) framework, introduced in a later section, is just that - a framework within which one can identify and link the specific research on soils, water, flora, fauna, policy and so forth, needed to guide improved management of land use units, which may be watersheds, farms or fields, or other defined units. The framework provides a linking mechanism, and a mechanism for ordering and prioritizing research, not a research paradigm as such.
Specific catchment area studies carried out by hydrologists fit within an INRM or watershed management framework, in the same way that IPM, irrigation management, soil conservation, watershed management, fit within the framework.
As an additional point, it should be noted that a parallel concept lies behind the TAC's use of the ecoregional approach to research. The term ecoregional research is not used. Rather the concept of approach refers to research that supports alleviation of poverty, food security, and environmental protection within specific agroecologies regionally defined (Gryseels and Kassam 1994). 10 Thus, the ecoregional concept provides a framework within which to organize research for a given region that has sufficiently homogeneous agroecological characteristics.
10 Gryseels, G. and A. Kassam (1994). Characterization and implementation of the CGIAR ecoregional concept. Paper prepared for the IFPRI Ecoregional/2020 Vision Workshop, 7-9 November, 1994, Airlie Conference Centre, Virginia, U.S.A.
There is an increased awareness of the need to pursue more sustainable, less environmentally damaging development. This need is particularly relevant and important for agriculture, which is widely believed to be a major source of land and water degradation in developing countries. There is ample visual evidence of the impacts of slash and burn farming on tropical deforestation, and of deterioration due to overstocking of a significant portion of the world's grazing lands (which has exposed their soils to the danger of increased rates of wind and water erosion).
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Agricultural impact on water supplies About 70 percent of water withdrawals worldwide is by agriculture. In both Asia and Africa, it is over 85 percent (World Resources Institute, 1994. World Resources, 1994-95). |
The off-site or downstream effects of developing country agriculture have not been measured adequately, though it is known from research in developed countries that they may be more costly and serious than on-site effects. One of the major downstream effects is on the adequacy and safety of household water supplies. About one billion of the world's people already are without clean drinking water. Millions of children die in their early years from waterborne diseases.
Another source of concern about current agricultural practices is the growing evidence from field experiments of trends in the condition of soil and water resources that, if not controlled or reversed, are likely to have a higher cost in the future. Many cultivated soils are becoming increasingly deficient in essential plant nutrients from cropping for decades without replenishment, and their physical condition has deteriorated. The declining quantity and quality of water resources, and waterborne diseases, in many parts of the world are an important issue for irrigated agriculture. For example, deteriorating water quality is now an issue for some of the most productive rice-growing areas of Asia. Fisheries also suffer through loss of aquatic productivity due to habitat modification and pollution, and the negative impact of irrigation on human diseases and health has become a source of concern in all developing regions.
At the same time, agricultural output is itself impacted significantly by land and water degradation and deterioration of watersheds protecting agricultural investments such as irrigation systems, e.g., through erosion that leads to silting up of irrigation reservoirs, loss of topsoil and nutrients, inadequate water supplies through drawdown of groundwater by other users, flooding due to misuse of land upstream, salinization, etc. The CGIAR System has been addressing some of these issues more intensively in more recent years. It also has broadened out to include natural resources issues related to forestry and fisheries, as well as increased emphasis on conservation of genetic resources. Many of the positive impacts of the System's research on the sustainability of development and the protection of the environment have been significant (see box), but have not been adequately communicated to the global community.
Surprisingly, although these symptoms of soil and water degradation have been apparent and well publicised for some time past, there is remarkably little hard evidence that such degradation has had any major effect on global food production so far. At least, the losses from natural resources degradation appear to have been greatly outweighed by gains from technological innovation and increased use of inputs such as fertilisers and irrigation water. Whether or not this will continue to be so into the next century, is difficult to say. The contradictions between the economic and biophysical evidence have to be of major concern for the CGIAR, with its focus on food security, and their resolution presents a major challenge to soil and water scientists working in and with the System (see Recommendation 1, 4.1. Criteria for Assessing the Relative Importance of the Substance of Proposals for INRM Research in the CGIAR System).
At the same time, there is a growing feeling that the CGIAR Centres have not paid adequate attention to many of the problems that now are of central concern. Centres need to pay more explicit attention to natural resources management (NRM) and sustainability of the environment on which all agriculture, forestry and fisheries depend. This study provides a strategic view of why and how such increased emphasis might be given to NRM research in the CGIAR System.
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CGIAR Contributions to Sustainability Examples of the contributions of the CGIAR System's research to environmental protection and sustainability of development range far and wide. Some examples include the following: * crop improvement on favourable sites has contributed to a reduction in the need to put fragile, marginal lands into production (in India an additional 40M ha. would have had to have been farmed in order to supply the same level of food supply); * the System has been a major contributor to protection and conservation of genetic diversity; * the centres have made an outstanding contribution to the knowledge base required to make agriculture more sustainable. The mechanisms underlying plant resistance to drought and to many pests and diseases are better understood. * long term research has clarified rangeland dynamics, providing clear evidence that "desertification" is primarily related to climatic variability; people and livestock have little influence over such variability. |
Some aspects of NRM have been on the System's agenda from the very beginning. Water management and irrigation issues were discussed regularly by TAC from 1971 to 1978, and reports were prepared for the Committee, including one on the importance of waterlogging, salinity and sometimes alkalinity as constraints to irrigated crop production, and the other on plant nutrition and soil constraints. In 1979, TAC recommended to the Bellagio Group that water management research be supported if additional funding were to become available. With regard to plant nutrition and soil constraints, TAC recommended that Centres should pay more direct attention to research on soil fertility.
The broader subject of NRM has been under review in the CGIAR for at least ten years. It featured prominently in the review of CGIAR Priorities and Future Strategies presented to the Group in November 1985. Emphasis was placed on enhancing sustainable agriculture through natural resources conservation and management, and TAC recommended that the proportion of total CGIAR expenditure in this category be increased from 7% to 13%. A TAC paper dealing specifically with sustainability issues was published in 1988.
TAC's examination of NRM issues continued with the preparation in 1990 of a TAC Working Document (TAC 1990) 11. While the primary purpose was to assess the programmes of the non-associated Centres IBSRAM, IFDC, IIMI, and ICRAF, the document also listed some gaps and overlaps in NRM research in the CGIAR and the non-associated centres (NACs). Watershed management was identified as a topic neglected by both the CGIAR Centres and the NACs.
11 TAC (1990). The Role of the CGIAR in Natural Resource Conservation and Management. TAC Secretariat. FAO, Rome.
The TAC 1990 report on Expansion of the CGIAR also concluded that the past neglect of research on NRM must be addressed, and added that a high priority should be given to both technical and socioeconomic aspects of sustainability. There was a compelling case for strengthening both applied and strategic research on soil conservation and management in the System. Less attention seems to have been given in that study to water resource issues, except for irrigation management and aquatic resources management (IIMI and ICLARM became CGIAR Centres). Even then, the term irrigation management was used more narrowly than the term soil and water management.
Other important references to NRM in the Expansion Study included the identification of a lack of a clear global responsibility for strategic research on NRM as a shortcoming of the CGIAR. In addition, more intensive policy research was needed to assess the underlying causes of environmental degradation processes and the potential for reducing them through policy reforms.
Also in the Expansion Study, TAC coined the term ecoregional for agroecological zones regionally defined. The ecoregional approach was proposed to: (1) achieve sustainable improvements in agricultural production by balancing commodity improvement with increased research on NRM, (2) rationalize relationships between CGIAR Centres and NARS, and (3) provide an effective linkage with the global research community (Gryseels and Kassam 1994, op. cit.).
Later, and primarily as a follow-up to UNCED and Agenda 21, the CGIAR established a Task Force which reported to MTM'94. It proposed seven topics for special concentration of CGIAR effort: five dealing with marginal and degraded lands, and others on conservation of genetic resources and integrated pest management. Further work was proposed on the use of geographical information systems by the IARCs. At MTM'94, members of the Group also discussed a position paper prepared for IBSRAM on soil water and nutrient management research.
Two important soil and water aspects of natural resource management (SW/NRM) research appear to have received inadequate attention in previous studies. First, some important aspects of water research seem to have been overlooked - property rights and problems of access to a fugitive resource; effects of upstream land management on water supplies for agriculture; effects of agricultural land use on downstream users of water, and degradation of irrigated soils.
Second, important factors in the implementation of SW/NRM research appear to have been neglected. These include the definition of criteria for choosing between the CGIAR's new priorities in NRM research and more traditional lines of soil and water research, and of mechanisms for linking different forms of soil and water research, including socioeconomic with biophysical research.
While this TAC-led study of NRM research was in progress, the CGIAR established two Task Forces, one on sustainable agriculture and the other on ecoregional approaches to research. TAC was invited to attend the meetings of both Task Forces. The conclusions and recommendations/commentaries of the two reports have been taken fully into account in preparing this paper, including the recommended modes of implementation.
Thus, the first recommendation of the Sustainable Agriculture Task Force, in essence to develop programmes related to sustainability issues by adopting an interdisciplinary production-ecological approach which integrates productivity, environment and sustainability concerns, the fourth (to strengthen research on the socioeconomic basis of sustainability), and the eighth (to strengthen research into public policy aspects of NRM) are essential components of the integrated approach to NRM research that TAC recommends for the CGIAR.
Another recommendation from that Task Force, to consolidate soil, water and nutrient management research inside and outside the CGIAR into an integrated programme has also been recommended for support by the System, although TAC notes that further work is needed to explicitly consider the criteria proposed in this paper for use in choosing among the options for strengthening SW/NRM research in the System.
This study is in full agreement, as demonstrated by the Task Force, with the need and possibility to work in close connection with other organizations including NARS, advanced research organizations and specialized international agencies such as FAO, who have significant capacity and interest in NRM. Similarly, there is a need for the individual Centres and the CGIAR System as a whole, as opposed to individual research workers, to participate in professional networks that could allow the CGIAR to make a more effective contribution to Agenda 21.
Recommendations from the Sustainable Agriculture Task Force to strengthen other CGIAR activities related to sustainability, including the management of consortia and networks, relate to topics that are part of TAC's ongoing agenda for implementing Systemwide initiatives and programmes. Planning is also underway for a study on the relative priorities that should be given to issues and opportunities associated with marginal and degraded lands.
TAC offers two observations on the recommendation to earmark an increasing proportion of CGIAR funding for sustainability-related research: (1) This will certainly be examined thoroughly during 1996 as part of the priorities and strategies process for future MTPs, and (2) No specific reasoning is given in support of the statement in the text that the proportion of funds for activities directly related to sustainability be increased gradually to around 30% of total CGIAR funding.
The aspect of the report of the Task Force on Ecoregional Approaches that is most relevant to the present study is the statement that the Task Force views the ecoregional approach as an effective research process for identifying and characterizing current and future problems of resource degradation and their human causes, and for linking relevant component, commodity and policy research for their solution. This too is consistent with an integrated NRM approach.
The CGIAR ministerial meeting held at Lucerne in February 1995 also dealt with issues covered by this study. The CGIAR was, amongst other things, urged to concentrate on protecting the environment and to address more forcefully the issues of water scarcity and soil and nutrient management.
A careful and detailed analysis of the evidence on the effects of degradation of soil and water resources has been undertaken as part of the IFPRI Initiative, and documented in a number of draft papers by Sara Scherr and her colleagues and in the publication Population and Food in the Early Twenty-first Century: Meeting Future Food Demand of an Increasing Population, edited by N. Islam. In this publication, the highly contradictory nature of the available evidence is reflected in the almost diametrically opposed views on future supplies of land and water for world agriculture in the papers by P. Crosson and by L.R. Brown, and in the way that degradation issues are dealt with in the three studies of the outlook for world food supplies into the next century.
In the FAO study, the effects of existing degradation are included in the production models, because they are reflected in the base year yields and fertiliser response ratios (World Agriculture: Towards 2010. An FAO Study, p. 354), but no specific allowance is made for the future. This implies that the proportional loss of productivity is not expected to grow during the period covered (to the year 2010), though there are many cautions in the text. The World Grains Model used by the World Bank does not appear to make any explicit assumptions about future trends in natural resource degradation, though it is stated that crop yields are influenced by land quality. Presumably, the implicit assumption is the same as FAO's.
IFPRI did not judge the data to be sufficiently reliable to include natural resource degradation as a variable in its basic IFPTSIM model, but a scenario is presented for a 25 percent reduction in yield growth rate, which it is postulated could arise with continued decline in investments in agricultural development or accelerated degradation of the resource base. This assumption leads to a general contraction of food output.
