The new site follows the CIARD manifesto to establish a ‘knowledge commons on agricultural research for development’.  Through making content accessible, developing capacities and advocating better investments, the initiative helps to disseminate agricultural knowledge in order that it may be put to use locally, nationally and globally.

On the new CIARD site, users are offered various tools:

• Evaluate their information management practices against a checklist of good practices,
• share and follow pathways towards better accessibility of information,
• contribute case studies, and
• participate in CIARD’s activities and join the network.

Users can also record their information sources or services in the CIARD ring; a portal that facilitates the sharing of sources of agriculture-related information around the world.

The new site can be viewed in English, French and Spanish and is coordinated by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Global Forum for Agricultural Research (GFAR).

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High soil salinity is a major environmental issue whose effects can cause difficulties for farmers growing crops in salt-affected areas. Most crops do not grow well on soils that contain salts and subsequently farmers lose large amounts of yield.

The CSIRO research team used traditional breeding techniques, involving molecular markers, to introduce salt tolerant genes into durum wheat lines. The salt tolerant genes work by limiting the passage of sodium from the roots to the shoots of the plant, preventing its passage to the leaves where it can be toxic to the plant.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, 17 million hectares of durum wheat are cultivated worldwide, with 60 per cent of cultivation taking place in developing counties in regions including the Middle East, North Africa, Latin America and central India.

This new variety will allow wheat farmers to cope with high salinity levels in the soil and achieve higher yields of their crop. The scientists have said they will make the enhanced durum wheat freely available to the developing world.

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Farming First calls on governments to enable agricultural innovation and empower farmers to safeguard the world’s biodiversity while increasing global food production.

Sustainable agricultural production needs to be achieved through both accelerated research programmes and broader uptake of existing technologies by farmers.   Public-private partnerships are key to identifying and addressing these innovation gaps as well as disseminating effective agricultural tools and technologies to farmers.

Ajay Vashee, President of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP) says:

Government leaders need to recognise how interconnected agriculture and biodiversity protection are. Today’s farmers are the true stewards of our global ecosystem.

The twin challenge of conserving ecosystems while ensuring future food security means that the role of the farmer is more crucial than ever. With 2.3 billion more mouths to feed by 2050, food production must increase by 70 per cent, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation, despite the threats of climate change and limited availability of natural resources.

Like biodiversity, agriculture benefits from fertile soils, fresh water and natural predators, and farmers can also play a role in maintaining natural habitats and other ecosystem services.

Luc Maene, Director General of the International Fertilizer Industry Assocation says:

Farmers around the world are facing competing pressures to grow more food while preserving the world’s biodiversity.  To succeed, agriculture and biodiversity conservation efforts must walk hand in hand.

The Farming First coalition supports the following principles for protecting biodiversity through agriculture:

• Safeguarding natural resources through sustainable agricultural practices such as sustainable use of land, water and energy resources, conservation agriculture, cultivation of local species and giving value to marginal areas such as wetlands and forests.

• Sharing knowledge of agriculture’s role in preserving biodiversity through stewardship programmes for farmers and government mechanisms for incentivising biodiversity-friendly practices.

• Building local access to agricultural tools and infrastructure which help protect biodiversity, such as multi-cropping systems or crop rotation, without jeopardising agricultural production.

• Protecting harvests by building storage facilities and transport mechanisms, whilst providing support to farmers in managing weather variations and minimising the amount of yield lost to prevent further expansion in land used for agriculture.

• Enabling access to markets via payment incentives for ecosystem services, such as carbon sequestration, reforestation, measures against desertification and other sustainable land management practices as well as developing and supporting markets for underutilised local species which encourage local biodiversity.

• Prioritising research imperatives by addressing both farmers’ needs and the specificities of local ecosystems as well as factoring in farmers’ local expertise and providing resources such as seed banks.

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In a Reuters article, Leslie Lipper, FAO economist and co-author of the report said that financing remains a major hurdle to greater implementation:

“A key part of the problem is a lack of financing.  If adopted by farmers, many of these practices make them better off, but in the short run they may face reduced income,” Lipper said, using the example of removing cattle to allow grasslands to recover.

In terms of contributions to greenhouse gas emissions, the report estimated that farms accounts for 10-12 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions directly.  It also estiamted that $210bn would be needed between now and 2050 to help farms upgrade sufficiently to meet future yield needs.

Developing countries could raise about $30bn annually toward this investment through carbon market financing.  Measuring such improvements to the carbon efficiency of farm production is currently being researched.

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Coinciding with the summit, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has launched 1BillionHungry.org, a petition to promote an end to hunger. The web site is premised on the fact that one billion people currently live in chronic hunger.

Jacques Diouf, the FAO Secretary-General, is recorded counting out the amount of time another child soemwhere in the world dies from hunger: 6 seconds.

To support the initiative, all you need to do is enter an e-mail address and your currently country location.

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The FAO has calculated that agriculture has grown by 3.5% in 2008, largely due to better policies and more uptake of new technologies such as drought-resistant rice.

Keith Wiebe, FAO’s Deputy Director of the Agricultural Development Economics division, said:

After a long period of neglect, the importance of agriculture is becoming more clear to all of us.  And that is resulting in improvements in some of the supporting services and infrastructure that are the real obstacle to improved growth in Africa.

Women are a key part of the agricultural workforce as they represent about 80% of those working in the sector.  They will be expected to double food production in order to feed an African population that is set to grow from 770 million in 2005 to over billion by mid-century.

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Global cereal demand must increase by about 50%, from 2.1 billion tonnes today to 3 billion tonnes by 205.  Over the same period, meat output must increase by almost 75% by 2050 to 470 million tonnes.

A massive 90% of the needed output is expected to come from higher yields, but the area of land under cultivation is also expected to grow by 120 million hectares.  These increases are most likely to occur in developing regions with large supplies of land per capita, such as sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America.

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“A dangerous mix of the global economic slowdown combined with stubbornly high food prices in many countries has pushed some 100 million more people than last year into chronic hunger and poverty,” said Jacques Diouf, Director-General of the FAO. “The silent hunger crisis — affecting one sixth of all of humanity — poses a serious risk for world peace and security.”

The report argues that the rise in hunger levels is largely the result of the global economic recession.  Fewer remittances are being received and international trade and investment have slowed down, affecting local economies in the developing world.

Sub-Saharan Africa has the most dense pockets of hunger in the world.  Many of the countries in this region have hunger levels of over 35% of their populations.  Areas of south Asia — notably India — also have high levels of food poverty.

To address these issues, the FAO and other UN agencies have called for a reinvigorated investment in agriculture, particularly in the poorest and most vulnerable regions.  Of these affected areas, Jacques Diouf of the FAO said that they “must be given the development, economic and policy tools required to boost their agricultural production and productivity.”

Kanayo F. Nwanze, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), also added:

Many of the world’s poor and hungry are smallholder farmers in developing countries. Yet they have the potential not only to meet their own needs but to boost food security and catalyse broader economic growth. To unleash this potential and reduce the number of hungry people in the world, governments, supported by the international community, need to protect core investments in agriculture so that smallholder farmers have access not only to seeds and fertilisers but to tailored technologies, infrastructure, rural finance, and markets.

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Global harvets of cereals, particularly wheat, are expected to decrease in 2009 by 3% of last year’s levels.  Much of this is the result of less planting in developed countries because of lower prices in these markets versus 2008.

47 of the 58 developing countries surveyed are actually facing higher prices than they did at the height of the global food crisis last July, and about 10 countries are facing the highest prices ever recorded for these staple crops.

Approximately 5 million Zimbabweans are currently facing serious food shortages.  In Somalia, this figure is estimated to be 3.2 million.

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He was joined by the Italian Agriculture Minister and a representative from the FAO in highlighting the need to address these food security and sustainability issues before they become even more serious.

The article also discusses how agriculture funding has not been prioritised compared with the subsideis given to the finance sector since last autumn:

Farmers from poor and rich countries alike want to get more funds for agriculture, saying the sector has been neglected since the economic crisis broke out…  Billions of dollars were poured out to prop up ailing banks, while funds are drying up to help the world’s almost 1 billion hungry, advocates for the poor say.

The G8 meeting takes place this weekend from 18-20 April.

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