Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Water-Energy-Food Tradeoffs
Scientific approaches to implementing the nexus—Examples from the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems (WLE)
Andrew Noble, Director WLE
Acknowledgements to Stuart Carlson and the Milwaukee Journal
Sentinel
Why CGIAR WLE?
Correlation of food and energy prices – and rising
Ringler, et al., 2014 in press
Why CGIAR WLE?
South Asia
SSA LAC MENA East Asia OECD0
102030405060708090
100
0
1000
2000
3000
4000
5000
6000
7000
8000
9000
Access to sanitation (%) Access to food (%) Energy use (kwh/cap)
Access to sanitation (%) Energy use (kwh/cap)Share of non-malnourished children (%)
The poorest have limited access to water, food and modern forms of energy
Source: WDI 2011 and IFPRI IMPACT
Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Global Risks Report 2014, World Economic
Forum
‘Water crisis’ is the third highest
global risk
..extreme weather, climate change and
biodiversity loss also very high
. . . WHERE? Targeted interventions in 9 focal and 4 priority focal regions
Where we work
Example 1: Andean BasinsRewarding the value of Ecosystem Services provided by upstream Farmers …
My farm participates in the
Management of the Reventazon
River Watershed (ICE)
For better hydropower outcomes
Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Example 2: Aral Sea Basin Groundwater irrigation (GWI) has higher energy and water
use efficiency compared to traditional Lift Irrigation (LI)
Crop Water productivity, kg/m3
Energy productivity (kg/Kwh)
LI GWI LI GWI
Cotton 0.19 0.21 0.25 2.10
Vegetables 0.59 1.00 1.65 7.93
Maize for silage 1.99 1.46 2.61 14.17
Sorghum 0.55 1.66 1.54 3.30
Alfalfa 0.59 0.78 0.78 1.56
Apricots 0.16 0.51 0.44 4.92
Grapevines 0.11 0.70 0.15 1.37
GW irrigation
• Agricultural growth in West Bengal had slumped by more than half
• Research identified that a major obstacle to agricultural productivity was getting access to groundwater
• New policies recommended by IWMI were adopted to reduce ‘red-tape’ and improve groundwater access for smallholder farmers.
• The policy change could benefit more than 5.6 million smallholders
Example 3: West Bengal – easing regulatory and pricing barriers
Source: Aditi Mukherji
Example 4: Global: Water PollutionAgricultural N emissions increase by 47-61% between 2003 and 2050 and
emissions of P by 6-20%, depending on climate change scenario; Improved nutrient use efficiency and RRR can substantially reduce but not reverse
increases in N & P emissions
N emissions from agriculture, 2050, baseline
Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Using business models to turn waste into an asset
• Solid waste and fecal sludge composting in Asia and Africa could save billions of US$ per year, assuming a market for only 25% of the urban organic waste.
• Greenhouse gas emissions could be reduced to up to 13 million tons CO2-e per year.
Fortifier
WithFortifier
Without Fortifier
Turning septage into Fertilizer
WLE’s research and projects are at the heart of the nexus thinking
WLE brings together the research power of 11 CGIAR centres and the FAO along with hundreds of regional and local partners to:
• Look beyond the farm-level to sustainable development within global ecosystems at different scales
• Foster innovative thinking on agriculture, natural resources management, gender and poverty alleviation
• Support big, bold solutions to difficult problems through out-of-box thinking and multidisciplinary approaches.
Uniting agriculture and nature for poverty reduction
Thank You
wle.cgiar.org
wle.cgiar.org/
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