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A comprehensive global plan for sustainable food and agriculture
will have to wait, according to observers summing up the COP26
climate summit outcomes.
European think tank E3G criticized
governments' failure to achieve a plan for the sustainable
agriculture sector despite the claim by the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that significant
progress had been made, and blamed slow progress on public
sensitivity around land ownership and farm subsidies.
Agriculture accounts for 23% of anthropogenic GHG emissions in
the form of potent nitrous oxide from soils, fertilizers, and
manure, as well as methane from livestock and paddy rice
cultivation.
UN groups are already trying to deal with the livestock problem,
thanks to the Koronivia Joint Working Group on Agriculture which
was launched in 2017.
This continued at COP26, where governments came to conclusions
on three topics within the Koronivia road map to decarbonise
agriculture: sustainable manure management, livestock management,
and food security implications of climate change.
The governments are expected to reach decisions related to soil
management and animal proteins next year at COP27, said E3G.
So far, emissions from livestock are consumption-based emissions
that are not counted in the road map, said Brent Loken, global lead
food scientist for NGO Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).
What is more, none of the 16 nationally determined contributions
(NDCs) submitted by the richest nations include specific targets
for their agricultural sectors, according to ESG investor
network FAIRR Initiative. The UN Environment Programme acknowledged
countries' food sector targets were weak in a January paper.
"The NDCs are a strategic opportunity to integrate countries'
climate-related targets with food systems, across government
policies and programs," wrote the Executive Director of the Global
Alliance for the Future of Food Ruth Richardson in a blog last week.
WWF's Food Practice Leader João Campari said that, despite a
review of country targets, the draft COP26 agreement contributed
nothing on food sector emissions. "We simply can't achieve 1.5C
without food systems transformation," he tweeted on 10 November.
But other policies, such as the launch of the Global Methane Pledge by the US
and EU, might get the ball moving on livestock emissions if they
are classed as significant sources of methane.
E3G critique
At COP26, 134 countries pledged to stop deforestation for 91% of
the world's forests (including Brazil, China, Russia, and
Indonesia) through the Glasgow Leaders' Declaration on
Forests and Land Use on 2 November.
The NGO World Economic Forum (WEF) will create a fund so 100
million farmers can use lower-emissions agricultural technologies
by 2030, a fact that E3G listed as a concrete deliverable on
agriculture.
But E3G said that the summit's Nature and Land Use Day on 6
November "saw agriculture and land use overshadowed by forestry"
and pointed out significant loopholes in the deforestation
pledge.
It praised three pledges which will see investment in more
climate-friendly agricultural innovations. It also noted
declarations of €1.7 billion to support forest tenure rights of
indigenous peoples, and pledges by 16 ministries of agriculture to
consider public policy reform.
But it slammed all the pledges and commitments for lacking
concrete delivery plans for creating national legislation, and for
potentially overlapping. "What is needed now are the corresponding
policy shifts to turn pledges into concrete actions," said E3G.
The livestock question remains a major sticking point. "Nobody
talked about livestock and dairy, despite references in the
Koronivia draft conclusions. The issue is live and unanswered,"
said the think tank.
E3G encouraged the continued work of those developing the
Koronivia road map as well as the work of the UK's Cabinet Office,
which campaigned on issues like indigenous peoples' use of forests
and natural land financing during the UK's COP presidency.
Carbon market impacts agriculture
Many expect to see more agricultural land used as carbon sinks
as a result of climate efforts, for example through the COP26 Article 6 agreement on carbon
markets. But this too prompts concerns.
IHS Markit analysts note that already energy
companies seeking to create carbon offsets for climate targets use
so-called Nature-Based Solutions. These include projects such as
forestry, soil carbon, wetland restoration—as well as newer
concepts such as biochar.
Many government policies acknowledge the importance of such
carbon sinks, and net-zero ambitions have further heightened their
prominence, the analysts said.
For example, in July 2021, the European Commission
proposed a "Fit for 55" policy package that would set targets
for net natural carbon removals for EU member states that compel
them to raise the carbon sink capacity of their forests and lands.
Likewise, President Joe Biden's executive order to tackle the
climate crisis pledges to use agriculture and reforestation in the
US.