March, 23 2011, 09:46am EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
For interviews and review copies: Janeen Madan, jmadan@worldwatch.org, (+1) 202-452-1999 x514
For copies outside of USA, Canada & India: Gudrun Freese, gudrun.freese@earthscan.co.uk, (+44) 207 841 1930
A "Revolution of Greens" and Innovations in Local, Diversified Food Production Needed to Curb Food Price Crisis
Worldwatch Institute's Nourishing the Planet team highlights need for innovations in indigenous vegetable production to improve food security and raise incomes in the long term
WASHINGTON
Food prices have soared to record highs and are projected to increase further in the coming decade, pushing millions of people into hunger and fueling political unrest around the world. The Worldwatch Institute's recently released report, State of the World 2011: Innovations that Nourish the Planet, shows that diversifying food production to include local and indigenous vegetables can help communities boost their self-sufficiency and protect vulnerable populations from price shocks.
"The solutions to the price crisis won't necessarily come from producing more food, but from listening to farmers, investing in indigenous vegetables, and changing how foods are processed and marketed," said Danielle Nierenberg, co-director of Worldwatch's Nourishing the Planet project (www.NourishingthePlanet.org).
Over a 15-month period, researchers with Nourishing the Planet traveled to 25 countries in sub-Saharan Africa highlighting stories of hope and success in agriculture. The project's on-the-ground research unearthed hundreds of environmentally sustainable solutions for reducing hunger and poverty. "The project aims to create a roadmap for the funding and donor community to ensure that agricultural funding is directed to projects that really work," said Brian Halweil, Nourishing the Planet co-director.
Mainstream agricultural approaches have tended to focus on a handful of staple crops, such as rice, wheat, and maize, and to promote the use of expensive, high-tech inputs, creating an unsustainable and vulnerable food system. Last year's drought in Russia that damaged a third of the country's wheat harvest, together with widespread flooding in Pakistan and Australia, caused price shocks around the world. Skyrocketing food prices are especially destabilizing in poor, import-dependent countries such as those in Africa, where households spend up to 80 percent of their income on food. In Egypt, the world's leading wheat importer, a 70 percent rise in wheat prices helped trigger the recent wave of protests that swept the country. Subsequent unrest across the region is raising fears about global instability.
Investing in agricultural development, especially indigenous vegetable crops, could help feed communities in Africa and worldwide, boosting their resilience to price shocks while helping farmers protect biodiversity and mitigate the impacts of climate change. "There is no other single sector of the global economy that is so central to meeting the needs of the nearly 7 billion people on the planet, while also protecting the health of the environment," said Worldwatch President Christopher Flavin.
Food security is not only about the quantity of food we eat, but also about the quality and diversity of food sources. In contrast to the staple grains that receive disproportionate attention from development aid, vegetables can offer a sustainable solution for a diverse and balanced diet. Growing vegetables can help address the "hidden hunger" of micronutrient deficiencies that affects some 1 billion people worldwide, and also brings multiple benefits for farmers."Vegetables have shorter cycles, are faster-growing than cereal crops, and require little space," says Abdou Tenkouano, director of AVRDC-The World Vegetable Center's Regional Center for Africa and State of the World 2011 contributing author.
The small-scale "revolution of greens" that is currently underway in Africa deserves greater attention from the global funding and donor communities. Researchers, nongovernmental organizations, and farmers across the continent are rediscovering traditional diets, improving the availability of nutritious indigenous vegetables (such as moringa and lablab), and reigniting interest in traditional vegetable dishes.
Nourishing the Planet's on-the-ground research offers three major policy recommendations to boost worldwide interest in and availability of indigenous vegetable varieties:
Listen to farmers. Organizations like AVRDC and the International Development Research Centre hold periodic workshops and field days, bringing together farmers, consumers, businesses, and communities to identify varieties of onion, tomato, eggplant, and okra that grow the best, taste the best, and perform best at local markets. This helps researchers develop more nutritious and locally adapted varieties that enhance and complement specific food preparations.
Get seeds to farmers. The seeds of preferred vegetable varieties are being made more widely available in Africa and elsewhere. Better seeds mean more vitamins in the food, better-tasting food, and ultimately less hunger and malnutrition. After scientists at AVRDC developed two higher-yielding tomato varieties with thicker skins-making them less vulnerable to pests and damage-farmers growing these varieties raised their incomes by 40 percent.
Take advantage of what's local. As the impacts of climate change become more evident, indigenous vegetables that have been neglected for decades are regaining attention because of their tolerance to drought and resistance to pests. Researchers have developed improved varieties of amaranth, African eggplant, African nightshade, and cowpea that are now widely available in many parts of Africa. In Uganda, Project DISC (Developing Innovations in School Cultivation), supported by Slow Food International, is reigniting an interest in these foods by teaching students how to grow and cook indigenous vegetables.
State of the World 2011: Innovations that Nourish the Planet is accompanied by informational materials including briefing documents, summaries, an innovations database, videos, and podcasts, all available at www.NourishingthePlanet.org. The project's findings are being disseminated to a wide range of agricultural stakeholders, including government ministries, agricultural policymakers, and farmer and community networks, as well as the increasingly influential nongovernmental environmental and development communities
The Worldwatch Institute was a globally focused environmental research organization based in Washington, D.C., founded by Lester R. Brown. Worldwatch was named as one of the top ten sustainable development research organizations by Globescan Survey of Sustainability Experts. Brown left to found the Earth Policy Institute in 2000. The Institute was wound up in 2017, after publication of its last State of the World Report. Worldwatch.org was unreachable from mid-2019.
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Commissioner Geoffrey Starks joined Rosenworcel and Gomez to launch the rulemaking process last year and finalize the policy change on Thursday. Commissioner Brendan Carr and Nathan Simington both aligned with the powerful telecom industry by opposing the effort to prevent internet service providers from blocking, throttling, or engaging in paid prioritization of lawful online content.
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"The FCC's vote today returns the internet to the American people."
Free Press co-CEO Craig Aaron declared that "everyone should celebrate today's FCC vote."
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Aaron praised Rosenworcel and her staff for leading the restoration effort, as well as Starks and Gomez for working with her to reverse the Trump FCC's move and ensure "that the agency can once again protect internet users whenever big phone and cable companies like AT&T, Comcast, Spectrum, and Verizon attempt to harm them."
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Michael Copps, a former FCC commissioner and current Common Cause special adviser, was similarly enthusiastic, saying that "if I weren't out of the country today, I would be personally at the FCC jumping up and down, saluting the majority for reinstituting the network neutrality rules that were so foolishly eliminated by the previous commission."
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The vote notably comes during an election year—and as Democratic President Joe Biden, a net neutrality supporter, is gearing up for a November rematch against Trump.
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Jenna Leventoff, senior policy counsel at the ACLU, also piled on the praise, proclaiming that "today marks the last day that internet service providers can continue to put profit over people."
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While several environmental groups and climate advocates praised the new rules, others pointed out that they still exclude emissions from existing gas-powered plants, which are currently the nation's leading source of electricity. A rule on these plants has been pushed into the future, likely until after the November election, which means they may not be regulated for years if pro-fossil fuel Republican Donald Trump retakes the White House.
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The effect of the rule would be to force coal plants to either cease operations or find a way to remove their emissions with carbon, capture, and storage technology, according to the AP.
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Sunrise Movement communications director Stevie O'Hanlon called the regulations a "game-changer."
"These regulations are the kind of bold action that young people have been fighting for," O'Hanlon added. "President Biden must continue moving us toward ending the fossil fuel era: It's what science demands and what young people want to see from him."
The Biden administration has promised to eliminate power sector emissions by 2035; the new regulations, along with the Inflation Reduction Act, put the U.S. on course to slash those emissions by 75% by that date, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.
"The age of unbridled climate pollution from power plants is over," NRDC president and CEO Manish Bapna said in a statement. "These standards cut carbon emissions, at last, from the single largest industrial source. They fit hand-in-glove with the clean energy incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act to make sure we cut our carbon footprint. They will reduce other dangerous pollutants that foul the air we breathe and threaten our health."
"Congressional Republicans are already parroting the oil and gas lobby's talking points criticizing the rules."
Beyond fossil fuel control, the other three rules would strengthen toxic metals standards by 67% and mercury standards by 70%, cut coal wastewater pollution by more than 660 million pounds per year, and establish for the first time regulations on the disposal of coal ash in certain areas.
"The suite of power plant rules announced by EPA Administrator Regan represents a significant step forward in the fight for ambitious climate action and environmental justice," Chitra Kumar, the managing director of UCS' Climate and Energy Program, said in a statement. "Together, these rules help address a long-standing legacy of public health and environmental harms stemming from coal-fired power plants that scientific studies show have disproportionately hurt communities of color and low-income communities."
However, the groups also said the administration must move to regulate existing gas plants.
UCS' McNamara said that "as critical as these carbon rules are, the agency's job is not yet done."
"EPA must tackle carbon emissions from existing gas-fired power plants—soon to be the largest source of power sector carbon emissions—and it must look beyond carbon to reckon with the full suite of health-harming pollution these plants disproportionately and inequitably force on the communities that surround them," McNamara added. "When all the heavy costs of fossil fuel-fired power plants are tallied, it's unequivocally clear that clean energy presents the just and necessary path ahead."
NRDC's Bapna agreed, saying, "Existing gas-fired power plants are massive carbon emitters. They kick out other dangerous pollution that most hurts low-income communities and people of color. The EPA must cut all of that pollution—and soon—in a way that confronts the climate crisis and protects frontline communities."
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"Congressional Republicans are already parroting the oil and gas lobby's talking points criticizing the rules," Sunrise's O'Hanlon said. "They're making clear whose side they are on. They'd rather please the oil and gas CEOs who back their campaign than save tens of thousands of lives."
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