Farming and Climate Change
as
patron of the sustainable food trust i’m
delighted
to be able to contribute to this
countdown to
cop 26 virtual tedx event
and to add my support alongside a
growing number of
food businesses ngos banks
investors and others to their work
in developing what has the potential to
become
an internationally harmonized framework
for measuring farm sustainability
mindful that this cop is being hosted
by the united kingdom in glasgow i can
only say how strongly
i hope it might come to be seen as a
landmark event
similar to the impact of cop 21
in paris back in 2016.
a turning point where world leaders came
together
and recognized the transformative
potential
of our agriculture forestry and food
systems
i say this because although the world’s
farms are currently a major contributor
to greenhouse gas emissions
and biodiversity loss since agriculture
has occupied an
ever greater proportion of all habitable
land area
if those same farms converted to
regenerative
and sustainable production methods they
could have the potential
to become a key part of the solution
by doing so they could help ensure the
planet remains habitable
for future generations
the belief that this could be possible
was
one of the major drivers which led me to
launch
my sustainable markets initiative at
davos
in 2020 and more recently
the terra carter project at the
beginning of 2021
both were based on my conviction
that only by harnessing the power of the
market to help
move towards net zero and reinstate the
lost biodiversity
will we be able to avert a catastrophic
ecological breakdown
of our planetary support systems in the
field of agriculture
and food of course the challenge is to
do this
whilst at the same time producing enough
nutrient-dense
food to feed the entire global
population
i i’m convinced from my own practical
experience with
organic and regenerative farming which
now spans
over 35 years that this could be
achievable
especially if at the same time we tackle
seriously the perverse situation
whereby in both the developed and
developing worlds
some 40 percent of food is wasted
annually
however the key to all this lies in
measurement
it should go without saying that you
cannot manage what you do not measure
but until now we have not established a
harmonized global framework
for measuring agricultural
sustainability from the farm up
this is why right from the beginning i
am so delighted to have been a supporter
of this important initiative
led by the sustainable food trust as a
participant
in farm trials on my farm at highgrove
in gloucestershire
on the sandringham estate in norfolk and
at my
foundation’s headquarters at dumfries
house in scotland
the development of a common global
language for measuring farm
sustainability
as we already have for accounting
protocols
will be absolutely crucial if we are to
mark our progress beyond cop26
in the countdown towards net zero or as
close to this
as we can get in relation to our food
production systems
this is why my sustainable markets
initiative has set up
expert and practitioner-led roundtable
discussion
and specifically a task force on land
use
agriculture and food which will be
adopting this framework
as a means of benchmarking agricultural
sustainability
and crucially exploring the whole issue
of accounting properly
for the real and often hidden
environmental costs of industrialized
agriculture
through the polluter pays principle
now i have long believed that in so many
ways the
private sector holds the key to help
deliver the change
and the solutions we need to achieve
this
with agriculture we also need a food
labeling system
which empowers citizens in their role as
consumers
to have the information they need to
make
informed decisions about purchasing food
products
whose supply chain genuinely reduces
emissions
and other forms of pollution protects
biodiversity
and improves public health all this
could be possible once we have a
harmonized means of measuring
farm sustainability at international
level
perhaps at long last we are beginning to
wake up to the reality that what we do
to nature
we in fact do to ourselves of course
we cannot escape the effect of our
impacts on the planet
because we are part of that system a
part of nature not apart from her
so measurement of the impacts of land
use
including forestry and agriculture and
connecting them to government policy
incentives
the investment community and
certification
from sustainability audits through to
food labeling systems
could be transformative
with this framework of measurement in
place
we might finally have the potential to
enable a global renaissance
of truly sustainable agriculture and
food production
i could only say i very much hope this
happens
not just because it would be a wonderful
legacy for the cop 26 event
but also because we have an absolute
responsibility
to the next generation to enable a shift
towards methods of food production which
are working in harmony with nature