Potential as a Transferable Model

According to Costa et al, “Brazil was the first country in the world to implement a National Policy for Agroecology and Organic Production”. It is therefore worthy of notice that the Policy has been widely implemented in the country, succeeding as a good example of a multi-sectoral public policy, despite the challenges it still faces. Furthermore, PNAPO has served as inspiration for Brazilian States (such as Minas Gerais, Rio Grande do Sul, Goiás, São Paulo and Amazonas), the Federal District and Municipalities to elaborate their own state and municipal policies, following the guidelines of the National Policy and adapting them to their own realities and necessities. Hence PNAPO is likely suitable to be transferred to other situations.

Indeed, there were many exchanges with other Latin American countries, thanks to (and within) REAF – Rede Especializada da Agricultura Familiar. Within this context, a number of the strategies, initiatives and programmes set out by and developed under the umbrella of the PNAPO, such as the Segunda Água Programme and the public calls for ATER, are highly transferable to other countries with common characteristics and issues, with emphasis to those from the global south with large agricultural areas.

In particular, Brazil’s National School Feeding Programme has been recognized by various actors (UNDP, WFP, FAO) and has spiked interest from governments in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

Potential as a Transferable Model

Funds have been secured to apply the TEEBAgriFood Evaluation Framework in various contexts at the country level in Brazil, China, Colombia, Ethiopia, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, Senegal, Tanzania and Thailand. Across Senegal, Tanzania, Ethiopia and Ghana, the application will feature a regional narrative with national case study examples on agricultural systems, practices, products, and policy scenarios, with the overall aim of contributing to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and a wide range of SDGs. In Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, and Thailand, the application of the TEEBAgriFood Initiative aims to protect biodiversity and contribute to a more sustainable agriculture and food sector with a view to moving towards a level playing field by avoiding unfair competition through low environmental standards.

  • With the support of donors and through the take up by governments, private sector etc., the TEEBAgriFood Initiative will unfold its full impact.

The foundations of the work plan will be based on an internationally agreed methodological framework, introduced in the G8+5 context by the EU, addressing the economics of ecosystems and biodiversity. It will bring together governments, business and other key stakeholders from civil society to implement activities aimed at influencing decisions and behaviours in participating countries. It will be the first time that the methodological framework developed by TEEB will be applied to an industrial sector (the agri-business sector) across the entire value chain of that sector, assessing scenarios with a view to promote change.

Development of TEEBAgriFood

TEEB, known for its pioneering research on the economic values of nature in 2010, brought together more than 150 experts from 33 countries to deliver a strong and urgent message to the global community on the need for a transformation of our agriculture and food systems that is sustainable, equitable, and healthy. The TEEBAgriFood initiative brings together scientists, economists, policymakers, business leaders, and farmers’ organizations to agree on how to frame, undertake and use holistic evaluations of agricultural systems, practices, products, and policy scenarios against a comprehensive range of impacts and dependencies across food value chains.

TEEBAgriFood is hosted by The Economics of the Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) Office at the United Nations Environment Programme (UN Environment). The Global Alliance for the Future of Food, the European Commission, and the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation support the initiative.

As a result of interdisciplinary collaboration, TEEBAgriFood goes beyond the original TEEB in that it seeks to be inclusive of externalities that are not typically included in environmental economics. This includes the social externalities, cultural externalities and health-related externalities of food systems, both negative and positive  (the stocks of eco-agri-food systems comprise four different “capitals” – produced capital, natural capital, human capital and social capital – which underpin a variety of flows encompassing production and consumption activity, ecosystem services, purchased inputs and residual flows).

TEEBAgriFood’s Evaluation Framework and methodologies

TEEBAgriFood’s Evaluation Framework answers the question: What should we evaluate about food systems? And TEEBAgriFood’s methodologies answer the question: How should we do these evaluations? TEEBAgriFood illustrates five families of applications to compare: (a) different policy scenarios; (b) different farming typologies; (c) different food and beverage products; (d) different diets/ food plates; and (e) adjusted versus conventional national or sectoral accounts.

TEEBAgriFood gives ten examples showing how to apply this framework and methodologies for various types of evaluations. One of them is, for example, a study in New Zealand of 15 conventional and 14 organic fields that valued 12 ecosystem  services  and found both crops as well as other ecosystem services to be higher in the organic fields.

The TEEBAgriFood evaluation framework provides a structure and an overview of what should be included in the analysis. However, methods of valuation depend on the values to be assessed, availability of data, and the purpose of the analysis. Ideally one should be able to say with some confidence what are the externalities associated with each euro or dollar spent on a given kind of food, produced, distributed and disposed of in a given way. The application of the framework requires an interdisciplinary approach, where all relevant stakeholders, including policy-makers, businesses, and citizens, understand and identify questions that are to be answered by a valuation exercise. Therefore, stakeholder engagement across sectors is critical to the effective application of TEEBAgriFood in specific contexts and policy arenas.

Objectives

TEEBAgriFood is a systems approach for bringing together the various disciplines and perspectives related to agriculture and food, a framework for evaluation that supports the comprehensive, universal and inclusive assessment of eco-agri-food systems, a set of methodologies and tools for the measurement of positive and negative externalities, and a theory of change to help integrate TEEBAgriFood into the wide landscape of platforms and initiatives, like the SDGs, that are tackling these complex issues. It therefore plays a crucial role in the transformation of food and agriculture systems.

TEEB has three core principles:

  • Recognizing that the externalities of human behaviour on ecosystems, landscapes, species and other aspects of biodiversity is a feature of all human societies and communities.
  • Valuing these externalities in economic terms is often useful for policy-makers and business stakeholders in reaching decisions.
  • Managing the externalities involves the introduction of mechanisms that incorporate the values of ecosystems into decision-making through incentives and price signals.

Dedicated to uncovering the hidden costs and benefits, i.e. the negative as well as the positive externalities of agriculture and food, the beneficiaries of TEEBAgriFood are diverse, ranging from consumers to smallholder farmers. Stakeholders are policymakers, researchers, farmers, consumers, businesses, investors, the funding and donor communities.

Involve host communities

Communities must be involved in planning and implementation when net positive impact activities might affect their daily lives or livelihoods. Land tenure aspects need to be addressed from the start, satisfying different stakeholder expectations and ensuring long-term sustainability.

 

The wider landscape and community needs and aspirations, along with national and regional conservation priorities must all be addressed within a company’s biodiversity management plan.

A communication and engagement strategy will help ensure that all land users, landowners and government authorities understand the biodiversity management plan and have the opportunity to air concerns and contribute to its development.

Approaches should be developed collaboratively, including input from communities, planning and operational teams, to ensure that plans are practical and properly resourced. NGOs must fully understand the operating environment of a business to identify strategies that have the best chance of success.

Pilot new approaches

New biodiversity net gain approaches need to be trialled and lessons communicated before rolling-out to other units within a company or promoted publicly. Establishing a community of practice to share lessons and address common challenges across the business or sector should facilitate wider implementation.

 

Testing the approach at several sites  allows potential challenges to be addressed and the approach adapted early in the development of the programme. Once a project is implemented, regular ‘health checks’ should be carried out on sites to check progress and maintain momentum.

Although it is not desirable that a programme relies on a single champion to succeed, it may be necessary to identify one person or group who can persuade their company to follow the BNG course and provide the stimulus until the approach is more firmly embedded.

 

Allow for adaptation to special circumstances: Site-level challenges must be properly considered, especially given the vastly different natural, social and policy environments in which companies operate.

Corporate commitment and resourcing

Biodiversity net gain efforts often rely on a champion. This may be a company’s chief executive committed to using the approach. But if that person moves on, such commitment can be lost or superseded by other priorities. Therefore, biodiversity net gain must be embedded into a company’s mindset at all levels. Corporate implementation, communications and resourcing are critical and need to be framed within existing management, budgeting and reporting systems. An integrated approach to risk management is needed, meaning the environmental, community and social teams should work with core business staff to share expertise and understanding to help develop action plans that are holistic and resilient.

Providing adequate finance, personnel and guidance is critical to biodiversity net gain initiatives. It is important to develop tools for easy implementation that embed such an approach into corporate recording and long-term planning. 

 

When part of a regulatory and/or lender requirement, initiatives are more sustainable especially when embedded into wider plans and the arrangements are negotiated with local communities and regulatory authorities. Regulations and lender conditions are often strong motivators for maintaining the BNG approach.

 

Building trust and developing relationships between the company, NGOs, government and communities takes time but is critical to success.

 

Evidence of the ‘business case’ for biodiversity net gain needs to be clear – whether it is driven by public demand, regulation or stakeholder expectations. A strong business case will help lock-in long-term commitment to the cost of implementing an initiative.

Conservation fund

As a strategy of connection and contribution of the citizenship, because in the first edition (2013) We were able to finance all expenses, a conservation fund was generated from the collection of the cost of the registration of the event, the fund was delivered to the Promoter Group CPY and it was invested in conservation actions and sustainable use of the territory, with the fund was bought trap cameras for monitoring biodiversity.
This proposal was not sustainable for following editions, due to the considerable increase of the participation and the associated costs, currently we use the fee of the registrations to complete the event financing.

Have an emblematic conservation project in the region.
Having achieved the total financing of the initiative in its first year.
To have a permanent governance space (Cooperation System and CPY promoter group)

It is necessary to devote greater effort to the raising of economic resources to maintain the conservation fund.
To allocate the money raised in local projects, helps to strengthen the relationship between the promoter group and the community.
Having an external institution that helps finance 100% of the event, allows the creation of the conservation fund.

Conservation of marine biodiversity

The network of marine areas of responsible fishing today brings together more than 11 marine territorial areas and 2 in the process of being recognized, which provide protection to marine species through a responsible fishing effort. The areas protect biodiversity in the Pacific and Caribbean of Costa Rica. Citizen science and participatory research exercises have been developed that demonstrate the biological benefits of these types of marine areas under shared governance models.

Union between marine territories and responsible fishing.

Definition of forms of shared governance for decision making.

Joint work plans

Best practices

Citizen science and participatory research

Integration of traditional and scientific knowledge

Marine conservation occurs with the broad participation of small-scale fishing stakeholders.

Without this participation, marine conservation will not be a reality; small-scale fishing is an enormous potential for marine conservation.

There are concrete examples where artisanal fishermen are a potential for conservation and not a threat, it is important to disseminate them.

Participatory research allows immediate actions to be taken in favor of marine ecosystems.