Transcript Food System Vulnerability - Global Environmental Change and

Vulnerability of Food Systems
to GEC
Vulnerabilitygeneral definition
• Vulnerability implies HARM or a negative
consequence from which is difficult to
recover
• Is a function of exposure to hazards,
sensitivity AND coping capacity (internal
and external)
• Arises from multiple stresses
• Is the result of a process
• Is dynamic and differential
GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL
CHANGE (GEC)
Change in type, frequency &
magnitude of environmental
threats
Capacity to
cope with
&/or
recover
from GEC
FOOD SYSTEM
SECURITY / VULNERABILITY
SOCIETAL CHANGE
Change in institutions,
resource accessibility,
economic conditions, etc.
Exposure
to GEC
GECAFS perspective: MULTIPLE stressors
produce vulnerabilities that are multidimensional
Currency
Fluctuations
Economic Recession
Water Pollution
FOOD
UTILISATION
FOOD
ACCESS
Floods, Droughts
Political Unrest
FOOD
AVAILABILITY
HIV-AIDS
War
Climate Change
Change in Trading Agreements
Social or biophysical
vulnerability?
• Social: Vulnerability is socially
determined and is a function of access
to assets or resources, diversity of
options, institutional, policy and market
structures
• Biophysical: depends upon
understanding of ecosystems
– Ecologists (ala Holling) mention wealth and
diversity, connections/ controllability,
adaptive capacity
Adaptive capacity
• Social = ability or capacity or opportunity to
modify processes or characteristics so as to
better cope with existing or anticipated
external stresses
– Function of assets and access to them
• Ecological = resilience =
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How much shock system can take without change
Ability to self-organize
Ability to adapt and learn
Often function of slow variables, such as reservoirs
of nutrients, ecosystem diversity or heterogeneity
Food systems
• are social and ecological, or ‘coupled’
systems
– Theoretically appealing, but how to describe in
practice?
• Environmental management is function of
social, political and institutional
mechanisms.
• Look at the potential hazards from GEC in
the context of socio-economic change
The Main Elements of Food Systems:
Drivers, Activities, Outcomes
GEC DRIVERS
Changes in:
Land cover & soils, Atmospheric
Comp., Climate variability & means,
Water availability & quality,
Nutrient availability & cycling,
Biodiversity, Sea currents
& salinity,Sea level
‘Natural’
DRIVERS
e.g. Volcanoes
Solar cycles
Producing
Processing & Packaging
Distributing & Retailing
Consuming
Food System OUTCOMES
DRIVERS
Interactions
Socioeconomic
DRIVERS
Changes in:
Demography, Economics,
Socio-political context,
Cultural context
Science & Technology
Food System ACTIVITIES
Contributing to: Food Security, Environmental
Security, and other societal interests
Food
Food
Utilisation Availability
Wider Societal
Interests
relate to Food Systems
• Food Security
• Environment Security
• Other Securities
Social
Interests
Food
Access
Environm.
Security
Vulnerability of IGP food systems
• Function of:
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The vulnerable parameter
Stress
Exposure
Sensitivity
Coping capacity or resilience
In context of multiple stressors
Note time and scale
Logic of why vulnerable (process) – recent history!
Exercise
• In the same groups as yesterday (sites
1, 2, 3 and 4, 5) identify five to eight
food system outcome determinants (or
activities) that are vulnerable to GECinduced changes in water availability
– Explain WHY!
Exercise – part 2
• Identify five food system outcome
determinants (or activities) that have
adaptive capacity in the face of GECinduced changes to water availability
– Explain WHY!
Space and time
• Why an issue for vulnerability?
– DIFFERENTIAL and DYNAMIC
• Stress can be chronic, cumulative or one time
• Different locations experience the stress
differently
• How to capture this?
– Define who, where and when
• What tools do we have for this?
Ludihana, Central Punjab, India:
wheat and rice predominate, slow to
stagnant productivity growth, groundwater
dependent, lots of investment, high income
levels, functional policy support.
GECAFS Research Sites
in the IGP
Ruhani Basin, Terai of Nepal:
Gujarat, Punjab,
Pakistan:
rice preferred, transition zone, seasonal
flooding, out-migration, sharecropping
dominates, urbanization increasing.
wheat dominates, food selfsufficient, mixed irrigation,
high level of infrastructure,
moderate income, policies
function somewhat.
Vaisahali District, Bihar, India:
rice preferred, low infrastructure
investment, flooding, low income
levels, out migration, little government
policy support.
Greater Faridpur, Bangladesh:
rice dominates, flooding and concern over
salt water intrusion, low income levels,
government institutions fail.
Tools for space/ time
• Map ‘hot spots’
– Ecological
– Social?
– With GIS layers can show multiple impacts
and differentials
• Time?
– Need historical maps, calendars, etc.
• Causal maps of vulnerability?
– Problem trees? Spider grams?
Quantifying vulnerability:
indicators
• Indicators are often proxies for what we
cannot measure directly
• What data can we find to represent the
vulnerability of the food system
parameters we have identified?
– Focus on processes
– Go through our tables
• Correlations or significant relationships?
Examples of indicators of
vulnerability
• Webhe etal look at three components of
adaptive capacity:
– Access to resources
– Flexibility
– Stability
• For each context, determine indicators
Examples of indicators of
vulnerability
• Adger et al: set of indicators to evaluate
national level vulnerability to climate
change
Poverty and vulnerability
• Relationship is much debated in the social
literature
– Poverty not the same as vulnerability but can
contribute to it (or vice versa)
• BFP specifically interested in poverty
reduction
• What can we say for the specific food
systems we have described for the IGP?
Poverty vs vulnerability in IGP
food systems
FS
parameter
How
Is poverty
Is the
vulnerable involved in
parameter
to GEC?
vulnerability? related to
vul?
Which concept is more useful?
• Poverty
• Vulnerability