https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.2307%2F3343168.pdf

Development as Freedom

Increasing population and consumption are placing unprecedented demands on agriculture and natural resources. Today, approximately a billion people are chronically malnourished while our agricultural systems are concurrently degrading land, water, biodiversity and climate on a global scale. To meet the world's future food security and sustainability needs, food production must grow substantially while, at the same time, agriculture's environmental footprint must shrink dramatically. Here we analyse solutions to this dilemma, showing that tremendous progress could be made by halting agricultural expansion, closing 'yield gaps' on underperforming lands, increasing cropping efficiency, shifting diets and reducing waste. Together, these strategies could double food production while greatly reducing the environmental impacts of agriculture.

https://escholarship.org/content/qt6xw5g085/qt6xw5g085.pdf?t=ovfwpc

Solutions for a cultivated planet

The management and conservation of the world's oceans require synthesis of spatial data on the distribution and intensity of human activities and the overlap of their impacts on marine ecosystems. We developed an ecosystem-specific, multiscale spatial model to synthesize 17 global data sets of anthropogenic drivers of ecological change for 20 marine ecosystems. Our analysis indicates that no area is unaffected by human influence and that a large fraction (41%) is strongly affected by multiple drivers. However, large areas of relatively little human impact remain, particularly near the poles. The analytical process and resulting maps provide flexible tools for regional and global efforts to allocate conservation resources; to implement ecosystem-based management; and to inform marine spatial planning, education, and basic research.

/pdf/a-global-map-of-human-impact-on-marine-ecosystems-1r5xgg00oe.pdf

A Global Map of Human Impact on Marine Ecosystems

The most unique feature of Earth is the existence of life, and the most extraordinary feature of life is its diversity. Approximately 9 million types of plants, animals, protists and fungi inhabit the Earth. So, too, do 7 billion people. Two decades ago, at the first Earth Summit, the vast majority of the world's nations declared that human actions were dismantling the Earth's ecosystems, eliminating genes, species and biological traits at an alarming rate. This observation led to the question of how such loss of biological diversity will alter the functioning of ecosystems and their ability to provide society with the goods and services needed to prosper.

/pdf/biodiversity-loss-and-its-impact-on-humanity-2d0fgc88mg.pdf

Biodiversity loss and its impact on humanity

Food production requires application of fertilizers containing phosphorus, nitrogen and potassium on agricultural fields in order to sustain crop yields. However modern agriculture is dependent on phosphorus derived from phosphate rock, which is a non-renewable resource and current global reserves may be depleted in 50–100 years. While phosphorus demand is projected to increase, the expected global peak in phosphorus production is predicted to occur around 2030. The exact timing of peak phosphorus production might be disputed, however it is widely acknowledged within the fertilizer industry that the quality of remaining phosphate rock is decreasing and production costs are increasing. Yet future access to phosphorus receives little or no international attention. This paper puts forward the case for including long-term phosphorus scarcity on the priority agenda for global food security. Opportunities for recovering phosphorus and reducing demand are also addressed together with institutional challenges.

/pdf/the-story-of-phosphorus-global-food-security-and-food-for-189ky5hvd6.pdf

The story of phosphorus: Global food security and food for thought

In order to analyze, understand and finally prescribe policies related to the management and use of natural renewable resources, the decision making framework should ideally be informed by adequate knowledge of the interactions between economics and ecology. Analysis done on the basis of an over-emphasis on either ecological or economic variables can only give a partial and in many cases erroneous understanding of the problem of the management and use of renewable resources. However, for various reasons, the integration of ecological and economic sciences has been slow. Many explanations can be given for this inertia but inter-disciplinary communication problems plus the lack of quantitative tools must definitely come on top of the list. This chapter addresses the limitations in the quantitative tools which would facilitate integration of economic and ecological issues and puts forward a programming platform which will hopefully accelerate the integration process.

Anantha Kumar Duraiappah

Papers

Formulating and Solving Non-Linear Integrated Ecological-Economic Models Using GAMS