Conventional agriculture encompasses 50 per cent of the world’s habitable land, leading to negative effects on biodiversity, including declines in species richness and heightened threat of extinction. Biodiversity loss accelerated by agricultural systems threatens 85 per cent of plant, animal and subterranean species already at risk of extinction, negatively impacting habitats and faraway ecosystems. Though conventional agriculture’s negative impact on biodiversity has long been noted, there’s limited knowledge on the factors that perpetuate its continuation and actions that can restore biodiversity without compromising food security. This article highlights some structural factors that contribute to biodiversity loss and have prevailed since the first Conference of Parties (COP) on Biological Diversity in 1994. It emphasises leveraging COP 16 to shift diets and scale up nature-friendly solutions.
Is the cheaper food narrative a valid reason for biodiversity loss?
A key characteristic of current food systems is the emphasis on productivity gains and cheaper food while ignoring the environmental costs of unsustainable production. This is reinforced by channelling financial incentives- in the form of subsidies, cheap credit, minimum pricing, and low tariffs- to conventional farmers. Within this paradigm, the true cost of food is unknown, but the FAO estimates hidden costs of over 10 trillion dollars with environmental damages accounting for 20 percent (approximately 2 trillion dollars). New forest ecosystems are converted into farmland or existing agricultural lands are intensively farmed, leading to severe environmental damage. Farmland expansion degrades natural habitats and disrupts forest biomes. At the same time, agricultural intensification pushes ecosystems beyond their natural productive capacity leading to a vicious cycle of further intensification reliant on synthetic amendments. As a result, animal breeding and feeding grounds are lost and native plant species are unable to sufficiently thrive.
Intuitively, land use conversion for food production is a natural consequence of sustaining a growing global population and making food cheap is key to ensuring food security. However, when this logic interacts with the global capitalist system, it drives competition and encourages unsustainable farming practices focused on financial gains. This competition prioritizes production efficiency, leading to the dominance of a few monoculture commodity crops grown in specialized regions. The effect of this is convergence of diets with some nutritious crops becoming less available and expensive and increased hidden hunger due to nutrient deficiencies despite high caloric intake.
The dangers of a singular vision of economic growth
The current push for agricultural commercialization in Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa seeks to transform smallholder farmers – traditionally seen as environmental stewards- into capitalist actors driven by economic gain. The promise of integrating these farmers into global markets, has been sold as a silver bullet to poverty reduction and economic transformation. However, proponents often overlook the negative impact of farm management practices including tilling, removal of native species and synthetic input use that are crucial to productivity-oriented monocultures. In the process, ecosystem provisioning services are lost, including naturally occurring foods that supplement local diets. Ideologically orientated institutions including the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) have been recently criticized for the unbalanced nature of their initiatives, contributing to biodiversity loss. In Latin America, economic gain motives have encouraged unsustainable practices in soy, beef and oil palm production leading to the loss of 42 million hectares of forest cover and related biodiversity.
Unsubstantiated optimism. Will innovation resolve the biodiversity dilemma?
Despite historical doomsday predictions of human and ecological catastrophe, human ingenuity has been crucial to averting global crises. While studying population increases and the rate of food production based on natural soil fertility limits, Thomas Malthus (an 18th century economist and demographer) predicted a near-apocalyptic situation in which population growth outstripped food supply, leading to poverty and famine. This was averted by innovations for raising productivity to meet growing food needs.
Productivity raising interventions (Green Revolution technologies) were used in South and Southeast Asia between 1965-1990, aiming to attain economic growth and reduce poverty, hunger and malnutrition. Yet, as many are now aware, not much “green” is left within this revolution, resulting in degraded forests, overworked soils, synthetic input dependence, native species extinction and diminished and polluted water sources.
Generally, evidence of human ability to restore nature and biodiversity is scarce, and innovations to reverse biodiversity loss are few with little impact. Without groundbreaking and truly transformative discoveries, it may be difficult for humanity to resolve the biodiversity crisis through innovation alone.
What now? – Accelerate implementation of nature-friendly solutions
Accelerating action on biodiversity protection and restoration will require dietary shifts such as transitioning to alternative proteins to reduce the impact of intensive animal production on biodiverse ecosystems. Strengthening local food systems is also crucial, focusing on crops suited to specific regions, rather than the current dependence on a few global commodities like corn, rice and wheat. Additionally, reviving indigenous crops and reducing food waste can ease pressure on forest conversion and land intensification.
Further efforts are needed to protect natural ecosystems and allocate land for rewilding and biodiversity restoration, as nature has a remarkable capacity to regenerate. However, implementing these measures can be challenging, since decisions on land conservation are often made within the context of shifting national political ideologies.
Again, urgent action is required to scale-up nature-friendly farming methods- such as agroecology, agroforestry, crop rotations and zero-tillage- that align production with nature’s beneficial functions of biological control, pollination and nutrient cycling. Complementing these systems with a broader utilization of bio-inputs can further reduce agriculture’s negative impacts on biodiversity.
Moving ahead
The story of agrifood systems has two clear sides; its valuable contributions to food production and economic growth and, its harmful impact on natural ecosystems. Both are true, yet humanity now has a unique opportunity to take action that increases synergies between agriculture and biodiversity, creating a net positive biodiversity contribution. The upcoming COP 16 must move beyond usual political lobbying and empty promises, focusing instead on practical lessons to scale up nature-friendly production models including frameworks to strength conservation enforcement capacities and policy measures to incentivize sustainable agriculture transitions.