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Stakeholders across the food supply chain need to be more open to experimenting with and adopting sustainable farming techniques and practices, writes Robin Saroks.
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It is no secret that farmers and the agricultural sector currently face a huge number of overlapping environmental crises.
Changing temperatures, increasingly extreme weather events, and accelerating natural disasters are threatening crop yields, soil health, growing season length, and general productivity.
These changes will inevitably have significant economic implications for individual farmers and the industry as a whole, a reality compounded by the needs of a growing global population that must be fed.
Farms and agriculture are an essential part of the broader climate change solution, but they are also part of the problem.
The agricultural industry is a major cause of habitat destruction and groundwater pollution, in addition to increased deforestation related to field creation and grazing.
But the most pressing issue is agriculture's role in greenhouse gas emissions. Food production accounts for approximately 31% of total greenhouse gas emissions, and 70% of food production-related emissions occur at the farm level. This makes farmers essential to reduction efforts.
The question is not whether it is possible to make agriculture sustainable. Soil is one of the most effective natural carbon sinks on earth. Greenhouse gas reduction technologies and protocols are more sophisticated and standardized than ever before.
The real question is how to convince farmers to adopt these techniques and tactics.
Farmers need a good reason to change their management practices
Farmers, like other people, are rational economic agents. They are not willing to make small changes or major overhauls of their work or field just for idealistic or altruistic reasons.
In other words, farmers cannot be expected to make changes simply out of goodwill or simply on their own initiative.
They need real financial incentives, comprehensive information, and reliable scientific support.
Above all, financial incentives are the most important factor. Connecting our contribution to the planet with increased profit margins should be our first strategy.
For example, produce grown more sustainably can become a premium product and command a higher price.
Adopting sustainable practices will not only enable your transition, but also increase your access to green-focused lenders and loans that support your day-to-day operations.
Carbon credits are also relevant, and the right partnerships can provide offsetting benefits.
Benefits need to be demonstrated directly
They also need to be reassured about how sustainable methods and technologies can be adopted and implemented seamlessly.
Although using agricultural land as a soil sink has no inherently negative impact on crop yields or available growing space, there are always risks associated with improper implementation.
At the very least, implementation needs to be convenient, and farmers need to be convinced of both short-term and long-term benefits.
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Part of that comes down to proving that crop yields don't decline, but that sustainable practices keep the land arable for years and even generations to come. There is also an argument that it can be done.
But the only way to convince farmers of the economic benefits is to get on-the-ground implementation support where they are: on the farm.
Field demonstrations in each region will be critical to show that these changes not only work, but that the required technology is positively useful and not overly complex.
All method changes have an aspect of trial and error, and farmers need to feel supported throughout the process, not just on day one. Farmers must be made to feel that their needs are listened to, supported, and have a real economic benefit.
Above all, it must be felt that the benefits outweigh the risks, namely the risk of incorrect introduction of know-how, the risk of losing the crop or the risk of economic uncertainty throughout this process.
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This is where carbon credits come into play.
One of the best tools at our disposal is carbon credits. Admittedly, carbon credits have received their fair share of bad publicity in recent years, with related projects failing to realize their full potential due to unreliable baselines and inadequate planning, or actually showing the correct amount of carbon. It may not be possible to isolate the ratio.
In some cases, forests used as carbon offset measures were felled at the same time as the project ended.
However, that is changing with new standardization efforts, and carbon credits could play an important role in bridging the gap between the current situation and full decarbonization.
Carbon credits essentially act as a trade-off. Companies buy carbon credits that allow them to produce a certain amount of emissions, and the revenue from the process that creates those emissions flows to farms that act as carbon sinks and offset their emissions.
In short, carbon credits provide substantial financial incentives to farms and are linked to the dissemination of sustainability know-how and certainty of implementation.
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Carbon credits are ready to implement and are relatively easy to implement. It's not hard to imagine carbon credits being the first domino to encourage farmers to try soil sequestration and carbon offset techniques. Carbon credits, when used in conjunction with new agroforestry techniques, can also reverse the negative effects of deforestation.
Farmers are key here, but they are just one part of the entire ecosystem of experts needed to make sustainable agriculture the norm. Stakeholders across the food supply chain need to become more open to experimenting with and implementing sustainable agricultural technologies and practices.
This requires collaboration between scientists, agronomists, economists, bankers and field machine manufacturers.
Technology, finance, science and education will need to work together to not only make carbon credits work, but to make carbon credits the beginning of a larger effort. In other words, first convince the farmers, then save the planet.
Robin Saluoks is the co-founder and CEO of eAgronom.
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