1. Analysis of the Agriculture-Environment Nexus
Evolving concepts and approaches
Anna Tengberg &
Isabelle Batta-Torheim
Division of GEF Coordination
United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)
Thank you very much for the invitation to this workshop. In my presentation, I will talk about evolving concepts and approaches in the analysis of the Agriculture-Environment Nexus in land degradation. I have prepared this presentation in collaboration with my colleague Bell Batta Torheim. We both work in the division for Global Environment Facility co-ordination of the United Nations Environment Program, UNEP.

2. Overview of presentation
How to understand the agriculture-
environment nexus?
UNEP’s contribution towards conceptual
understanding:
PLEC - Agrodiversity
LUCID - Land-Use Change Analysis
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment - Ecosystem Services
Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands (LADA) Framework
The purpose of this presentation is to answer the question: How to understand the agriculture-environment nexus? My answer is based on UNEP’s contribution towards a conceptual understanding of this nexus through its development of several frameworks in projects that are implemented by UNEP and co-financed through the Global Environment Facility - GEF. The first framework that I will present is the one of the PLEC project, i.e. People, Land Management and Environmental Change, which used the concept Agrodiversity to understand the agriculture-environment nexus. Secondly, I will present the land-use change analysis of the LUCID project. Thereafter, I will outline how the concept of Ecosystem Services that was developed by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment can be used to understand the agriculture-environment nexus. Finally, I will present the framework of LADA – Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands, which is an on-going project that uses the DPSIR: Driving Force – Pressures –State – Impact – Response Framework.

3. Agriculture & environment
Conflict approach
Agricultural activities lead to environmental degradation
Environmental conservation prevent agricultural activity
Synergy approach
- Promotion of environmentally friendly agricultural practises.
But very first, just a brief note on the relationship between agriculture and environment. Basically, there are two approaches to this relationship. The conflict approach assumes that there is a conflict between agriculture and environment in at least two ways: (1) Agricultural activities lead to environmental degradation. This is for example the case when forest is being cleared for cultivation. (2) Another conflicting side with the agriculture and environment relationship, is the cases where environmental conservation prevent agricultural activity. This is for example the case with protected areas where agriculture is prohibited.
Another approach to the relationship between agriculture and environment is assuming that the goals of environmental protection and agricultural activities can be achieved simultaneously, i.e. the synergy approach. One central goal of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and UNEP is to mainstream sustainable land management into sectors such as agriculture and forestry, thus assuming that synergies are possible.
The different frameworks that I will now present highlight different aspects of the relationship between agriculture and the environment, including climate change and how to understand this relationship.

4. People, Land Management and Environmental Change (PLEC)
Global project with UN University as
Executing Agency that received GEF funding
from
Main objective: to develop sustainable and participatory approaches to biodiversity management and conservation based on farmers’ technologies and knowledge within agricultural systems at the community and landscape levels.
My first example is the People, Land Management and Environmental Change Project, PLEC for short. This was a global project with UN University as the Executing Agency. The project started in the early 1990s, but received GEF funding from The main objective was to develop sustainable and participatory approaches to biodiversity management and conservation based on farmers’ technologies and knowledge within agricultural systems at the community and landscape levels.

5. PLEC
PLEC piloted approaches for conservation of biodiversity in the agricultural production landscape
Developed a replicable methodology to allow locally adapted solutions to biodiversity and land management emerge and be taken up by scientists and policy makers
Developed the concept of ‘agrodiversity’ – related to the SRL framework
PLEC adopted a synergy approach and piloted approaches for conservation of biodiversity in the agricultural production landscape. Initially, PLEC was a research project focusing on methods of farmers’ management of their resources, especially biodiversity resources. The research revealed soon that a minority of farmers, managed their resources better than others and thus gained greater production while at the same time they were conserving or creating biodiversity and reducing environmental degradation. PLEC referred to these farmers as ‘expert farmers’.
Based on the expertise of these expert farmers, PLEC developed a replicable methodology to allow locally adapted solutions to biodiversity and land management emerge and be taken up by scientists and policy makers. The concept of agrodiversity was central in this work. Agrodiversity is largely a response of resource-poor farmers to inherent spatial and temporal environmental variability.

6. Elements of Agrodiversity
This slide provides an overview of the elements of the Agrodiversity concept. Agrodiversity captures the interlinkages between the environment, both natural and modified, and agricultural activities typically found in small-scale farming systems in developing countries. It is also related to development issues such as demography, macro-economy and livelihoods.
In more detail, the different elements of agrodiversity are:
Agrobiodiversity which means the diversity of useful plants in managed ecosystems. It refers to all crops and other plants used by or useful to people.
The term Management diversity includes all methods of managing the land, water and biota for crop production and maintaining soil fertility and structure. Local knowledge, constantly modified by new information, is the foundation of the management diversity.
Organisational diversity is often called the socio-economic aspects of agriculture and includes diversity in the manner in which farms are owned and operated and in the use of resource endowments and the farm workforce. Elements include labour, household size, the differing resource endowments of households, and reliance on off-farm employment. Also included are age group and gender relations in farm work, differences between farmers in access to land etc. Organisational diversity thus embraces management of all resources, including land, crops, labour, capital and all other inputs. Farmers with different resource endowments organise differently in accordance with their specific circumstances.
All these three elements belong to a modified environment. Biophysical diversity is part of the natural environment and refers to soil characteristics and their qualities and the biodiversity of natural plant life and the faunal and microbial biota. It takes account of both physical and chemical aspects of the soil, surface and near-surface physical and biological processes, and hydrology. Climatic variability and change, including macroclimate and microclimate, are also part of the natural environmental factors that affect farm management outcomes.
So, Agrodiversity is the sum of all these elements and can be defined as “ the dynamic variation in cropping systems, outputs and management practice that occurs within and between agroecosystems. It arises from bio-physical differences, and from the many and changing ways in which farmers manage diverse genetic resources and natural variability, and organise their management in dynamic social and economic contexts”.

7. Landscape rehabilitation demonstration at Ogotana
PLEC - PNG
The PLEC sites were in countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America and the project sites were selected based on the particular agrodiversity conditions found in those areas.
Examples of how agrodiversity can improve resilience in the face of land degradation and climate change can be found within each of the principal elements of agrodiversity. Here is an example of landscape rehabilitation demonstration at Ogotna in Papua New Guinea.
To ensure farmers’ cooperation in agrodiversity management, it is necessary to seek ways of linking conservation with development. This synergistic approach adopted by PLEC was successful in combining the local agenda of sustainable rural livelihoods with the global agenda of environmental conservation, i.e. combating land degradation and preserving biodiversity.
Before 2000
After 2002

8. Land Use Change, Impacts and Dynamics (LUCID)
Regional project in Uganda, Kenya and
Tanzania with International Livestock
Research Institute (ILRI) as Executing
Agency that received GEF funding from
Main objective: To analyse new and existing data to improve the understanding of the linkages between the processes of change in biodiversity, land degradation and land use
The Land Use Change, Impacts and Dynamics Project, LUCID for short, is my second example of how to understand the agriculture-environment nexus. LUCID is a network of scientists at leading national and international institutions who have been studying land use change in East Africa and its implications for land degradation, biodiversity, and climate change for many years. LUCID received GEF funding from 2001 to 2004 and the International Livestock Research Institute was the executing agency. The main objective was to analyse new and existing data concerning the linkages between the processes of change in biodiversity, land degradation and land use in order to design a guide on how to use land use change analysis to identify spatial and temporal trends, and linkages, of change in biodiversity and land degradation.

9. The tool: spatial and temporal analysis of land-use change over the last 50 years
An important tool for LUCID was the use of spatial and temporal analysis of land use change over the last 50 years in project sites in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. Brown is here illustrating bush while yellow is farm land. It is a clear change from 1958, when the first image is taken to 2001, where large areas of bush have been replaced by farmed land. This indicates a conflict between agriculture and environment as the former has expanded at the cost of the latter. Based on the several case studies, which have been presented in almost 50 working papers, LUCID developed a model for Land Use Change, which I will now show to you.

10. Land-Use Change Model
This model of Land-use change suggest that in pastoral areas without cultivation, the sequence of land changes as a result of land-use change is as follows: woodlands are transformed to bush land, which then become grassland with today provide pasture for livestock.
In wetter, cultivated areas, LUCID came up with a more complicated model. In the process from changes in land cover from forest to grassland, a subsequent change in land-use takes place from grazing to cultivation. The land can be used intensively through either high-intensity grazing, intensive mono cropping or intensive mixed cropping. The different land uses have different impacts on the environment. However, the results of intensive land use is negative on the environment with degraded ecosystems (e.g. reduced species numbers and plant cover), eroded soils, depleted soil nutrients, loss of native species and poor crop productivity.

11. Understanding the agriculture-environment nexus with LUCID
The most significant land use changes in East Africa were:
an expansion of cropping into grazing areas, particularly in the semi-arid and sub-humid areas
an expansion of rainfed and irrigated agriculture in wetlands or along streams especially in semi-arid areas
a reduction in size of many woodlands and forests on land that is not protected
an intensification of land use in areas already under crops in the more humid areas
Many linkages between land use change, biodiversity loss and land degradation that could have direct impact and influence on national and regional policies targeting natural resources management, conservation, poverty reduction and economic development programmes.
It has always been obvious that major changes in land use produce changes in the plants and animals that inhabit the land. However, the nature of these changes in biodiversity and their extent, have not been well-documented in East Africa before LUCID undertook its studies.
The LUCID framework integrates ecological, socio-economic and land use data and theory. The principal findings of LUCID are the expansion of farming, grazing and settlements at the expense of native vegetation over the last 20 years, and the loss of biodiversity and plant cover accompanying the loss of native vegetation due to cultivation and overgrazing, leading to the destruction of habitats, with particular consequences for large mammals, and local extinction and possible feedbacks on the local and regional climate.
LUCID identified several other key findings on linkages of land use change, biodiversity loss and land degradation that could have direct impact and influence on national and regional policies targeting natural resources management, conservation, poverty reduction and economic development programmes.

12. Role of climate data
Land use and cover also influenced by rainfall variability and trends
Research on the impact of climate change on land use and land cover has been initiated as a result of the LUCID results: Climate-Land Interaction Project (CLIP) in East Africa
The LUCID project did not explicitly analyse the links between land-use change, land degradation and climate change. However, the project found that there was a concern in the region with climate change, and a perception that extreme weather events, such as droughts and floods were becoming more frequent.
Therefore research on regional climate change trends was found to be urgently needed. ILRI and its partners have therefore initiated a follow up project to LUCID that is studying this issue together with research institutions in the region as well as in the U.S. It is called the Climate Land Interaction Project (CLIP) and also includes development of regional atmospheric models for East Africa. It is funded by the U.S. National Science foundation.

13. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
Global project with UNEP and World Fish
Centre as Executing Agencies and World
Resource Institute, UNDP and the World Bank
were among the partner. The assessment
received GEF funding from
Main objective:
To contribute to improved
decision-making concerning ecosystem
management and human well-being, and to
build capacity for scientific assessments of this
kind.
My third example, is the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, which was a UNEP led global project with many partners, including World Fish Centre, World Resource Institute, UNDP and the World Bank amongst others. The project received GEF funding from The main objective was to contribute to improved decision-making concerning ecosystem management and human well-being, and to build capacity for scientific assessments of this kind.

14. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
More than 1300 authors from almost 100 countries involved.
Focused on ecosystem services, how changes in these services have affected human well-being and consequences for people in the future.
Potential responses at local, national and global levels identified.
The assessment focused on ecosystem services, which are the benefits people obtain from ecosystems, like food, water and climate regulations, and how these services have affected human well-being and how such changes may affect people in the future.
It also focused on the responses that might be adopted at local, national, or global scales to improve ecosystem management and contribute to human well-being and alleviate poverty.

15. Ecosystem Services Approach
Bridge between Environment and Human Well-being:
Provisioning Services - food, freshwater, fuel,...
Regulating Services - climate and water regulation,...
Cultural Services - spiritual and religious benefits,…
Supporting Services - soil formation, nutrient cycling, ...
The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment based it work on the Ecosystem Services Approach. This approach is bridging environment and human well-being and is therefore a valuable framework for analyzing and acting on the linkages between people and their environment.
The Assessment is operating with different categories of ecosystem services:
Provisioning Services, which are products obtained from ecosystem such as food, fresh water, fuel wood, fiber, biochemicals and genetic resources.
The Regulating Services are benefits obtained from regulation of ecosystem processes including climate regulation, disease regulation, water regulation, water purification and pollination.
The Cultural Services are non-material benefits obtained from ecosystems, and refers for example to spiritual and religious benefits, educational benefits or cultural heritage.
The Supporting Services are services that are necessary for the production of all other ecosystem services such as soil formation, nutrient cycling and primary production.
Changes in these services are driven by direct and indirect driving forces and these changes have consequences for human well-being as illustrated here [next slide]:

16. The indirect drivers of change , which include changes in demography, economy, socio political context, science and technology as well as culture and religion, influence the direct drivers of change and also affect human well-being. The direct drivers of change of ecosystem services can be changes in local land use and cover, species introduction or removal and climate change. Also the direct drivers of change influence human well-being. Human well-being and poverty reduction is measured in terms of basic material for a good life, health, social relations, security and freedom of choice and action. The degree of human well-being is influencing the indirect drivers of change, but is affected by all the three other components in this model.
How can the ecosystem services approach help us understand the agriculture-environment nexus? In one way, you can say that agricultural activities are captured in the box of direct drivers of change. For example, changes in local land use and cover are often associated with agriculture. From another perspective, agriculture could be seen as part of human well-being as it provides basic material for a good life, which is highly influenced by ecosystem services. To what degree your harvest will be good depends on water, climate, and nutrient cycling.

17. Tool for decision-makers
Identify options that can better achieve core human development and sustainability goals
Better understand the trade-offs involved in decisions concerning the environment
This assessment framework is a tool for decision-makers to understanding the agriculture-environment nexus as it offers a mechanism for decision-makers to:
Identify options that can better achieve core human development and sustainability goals. All decision-makers must balance economic growth and social development with the need for environmental conservation. In cases of conflict between agriculture and environment, this framework can assist the analysis of consequences of different choices, so that development does not happen without coordianted planning at national level, as seems to have been the case in East Africa over the last 50 years, as documented by LUCID.
The assessment framework also help decision-makers to better understand the trade-offs involved in decisions concerning the environment. Progress towards for example increasing food production has often been at the cost of progress toward other objectives such as conserving biological diversity or improving water quality. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment complements sectoral assessments with information on the full impact of potential policy choices across sectors and stakeholders. A country can increase food supply by converting a forest to agriculture, but in so doing it decreases the supply of services that might be of equal or greater importance, such as clean water, timber, ecotourism destinations, or flood regulation and drought control.

18. Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands (LADA)
Global project with UNEP as GEF Implementing Agency and FAO as Executing Agency.GEF funding from
Main objective:
to assess causes, status and impact of land degradation in drylands in order to improve decision making for sustainable development in drylands at:
local
national,
sub-regional and
global levels.
My last example, the Land Degradation Assessment in Drylands, LADA in short, builds on the recommendations of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment for new and reliable data on the extent and impacts of desertification.
LADA is a global project with FAO as the Executing Agency. It is an on-going project that receives GEF funding from 2006 to The main objective of LADA is to assess causes, status and impact of land degradation in drylands in order to improve decision making for sustainable development in drylands at local, national, sub-regional and global levels.

19. LADA initiatives in Drylands
LADA will do a global assessment of the extent and magnitude of land degradation using data derived from remote sensing and climate data to produce maps of changes in NDVI and rain-use efficiency over the past 20 years.
It will also work with six pilot countries to develop tools and methods for nation-level assessment. These countries are South Africa, Senegal and Tunisia in Africa, Argentina and Cuba in Latin America and the Caribbean and China in Asia.
In addition, a number of other countries and regions, such as Central Asia, have also adopted the LADA methodology.

20. LADA GLOBAL (GLADA) COUNTRY LGP GLC Physiography BASE MAP NATL. EXPERT
FARMING SYSTEMS
BASE MAP
NATL. EXPERT
KNOWLEDGE
Attribute
information
VALIDATION
NATIONAL DATA
GLOBAL STRATIFICATION
NATIONAL STRATIFICATION
NDVI
RAINFALL
GLC2000
SUB-NATL. ATTRIBUTES
INDICATORS
GLCN – LC CHANGE
LD HOT/BRIGHT SPOTS
(SI - STATUS/TREND) QM
AREA CHARACTERIZATION
(DP-R)
BASELINE
This is an illustration of the overall LADA project scheme with assessments taking place at different levels and where the DPSIR framework will be used for validation.
LOCAL AREAS
HOT/BRIGHT SPOTS
INDICATORS
NDVI VALIDATION – VSA – PA
DPSIR FRAMEWORK VALIDATION
GLOBAL ACTION PLAN

21. DPSIR Framework with LADA ……… INDICATORS
Macro economic policies
Land policies
Conservation and rehabilitation
Monitoring and early warning systems
Commitment to international conventions
Investments in land water resources
Incidence of poverty
Over-intensification LU
Farm size and land tenure status
Population density
Road Market access
Occurrence of conflicts
Protected areas
Climate change
DRIVING
FORCES
RESPONSES
Direct PRESSURES
Aridity index evolution
Groundwater level
Rainfall variability
Soil Contamination
Soil Fertility
Soil Health
Soil Loss
Soil Moisture
Soil Salinity
Vegetation activity/biodiversity
Water availability
Water salinity
IMPACTS
Natural Disasters/Calamities
Cultivated Sloping land
Land cover/land use change
Soil nutrient balance
Soil Sealing
Livestock pressure/Stocking rates
Emission of contaminating substances
Water consumption
Incidence of Poverty
Land productivity decline
Habitat destruction and loss of biodiversity
Population size and migration
Off-site impacts
For integration of different types of land degradation indicators, LADA will use the Driving-Force, Pressure, State, Impact and Response framework, which is already in wide use in e.g. the EU and UN.
The DPSIR framework will be used for integration of data from the local to the global level. However, one of the weaknesses with the framework is that it does not consider interactions between variables in each box and LADA will therefore try to come up with aggregated indicators. LADA has reduced the key set of indicators from the original 120 to 20-30, as illustrated in this slide, but this is still work in progress.
STATE

22. Conclusions
When analyzing the agriculture-environment nexus, different scales as well as different users require different models and approaches
Local level: Development of “win-win” land management technologies and approaches that improve rural livelihoods while conserving the environment, e.g. the agrodiversity approach, SRL, etc.
National and Regional level: Influencing decision-makers by linking human well-being with environmental change, e.g. land-use change analysis, MA, DPSIR
Global level: Integration of information at different scales and across sectors, e.g. MA, DPSIR
Climate change considerations need to be better integrated into existing models and frameworks for analysis of the agriculture-environment nexus
The theoretical frameworks I have just presented are helping us to understand the agriculture-environment nexus in different ways and has shown that different scales of analysis requires different models and approaches.
At the local level it is crucial to develop ‘win-win’ land management technologies and approaches that improve rural livelihoods while at the same time conserving the environment. The Agrodiversity approach of PLEC is an example in this regard.
At the national and regional level an important goal with the analysis is to influence policy and decisions makes, which can be done by linking human well-being with environmental change. For this purpose land-use change analysis, the Ecosystem Services Approach and the Driving Force-Pressures-State-Impact-Respond framework can be used.
To gain a global overview of environmental changes brought about by agriculture, integration of information at different scales and across sectors is essential and here both the MA and DPSIR framework can be used depending on the nature of the data and the target audience.
It is also important to consider the potential value of all ecosystem services. Traditionally, decision-makers only used to care about provisioning services of ecosystems, such as production of food and fuel. However, for a long-term sustainable management of natural resources, regulating, supporting and cultural services of ecosystems should also be part of the equation.

23. Thank you for your attention