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How can we produce more food for the world, sustainably?
A carcass lies on a grassland in Oendor-Bayan county in central Mongolia, 03/29/2000
Mongolians are reeling as their herds starve
Mongolia’s government is scrambling as catastrophic weather is killing animals so quickly that a quarter of the national herd may starve. Thousands of families face destitution after losing nearly all their livestock, which drives 80% of the country’s agricultural output and 11% of GDP.
What’s the problem? A nasty weather phenomenon known as dzud or “disaster,” a combination of dry summers and harsh winter storms that create layers of ice on the ground. Arid conditions leave animals underfed going into winter, and then they can’t crack through the rock-hard ice to forage. The resulting images are heartbreaking: lifeless, emaciated sheep, yaks, camels, and horses stacked high on pickup trucks for disposal.
Dzuds are nothing new, but scientists say climate change has made them more frequent. Six of the last 10 years have seen the dzud phenomenon in Mongolia, and this winter saw the heaviest snowfall since 1975. The government predicts that nearly 15 million animals may die in a country with just 3.3 million people.
What can be done? International aid has been grossly inadequate, with even a modest $5.5 million appeal from the Red Cross in March going 80% unfulfilled. The ancient lifestyles of the steppe may need to change permanently, as overreliance on herding has accelerated desertification, which worsens the dzud. Ulaanbaatar aims to expand the rich minerals sector as a more stable and sustainable economic pillar.Feral pigs, like these shown in Florida, are alarmingly growing in number in Canada.
‘Super pigs’ threaten Upper Midwest
America faces an invasion unlike any other – and it’s a “super pig” problem. The invasive swillers have adapted to survive cold climes, and they’ve been thriving in Canada and some US states. The trouble is, these piggies breed at a higher-than-normal rate, and a whole lot of the 600-pounders threaten to trot south.
The pigs pose multiple threats to local lands, including the spread of disease to both humans and other animals — a feral pig even killed a woman in Texas, and they’ve been known to bite East Coast farmers – as well as crop destruction to the tune of more than $2.5 billion worth a year.
Fighting super swine. The USDA is on the lookout for boars invading Montana and North Dakota from the Canadian prairies, and it works to track wild swine throughout the US. With the Canadian invasion looming, Minnesota lawmakers proposed a bill to centralize the reporting and responsibility for dealing with the hogs within a single agency. Connecticut state legislators, meanwhile, may create a task force to focus on the roaming livestock.
But whatever measures these states adopt, culling the population will be tough. The pigs are hard to track and reproduce so rapidly that one expert noted you could kill 65% of them and their count would still grow.Farmers stage a Delhi Chalo march over various demands, at the Punjab-Haryana Shambhu border, near Ambala on Tuesday.
Could farming protests hurt Modi at the polls?
Thousands of farmers are marching toward New Delhi to demand better prices for their crops, but police are trying to keep them out of the capital by barricading access to the city, firing tear gas, and making arrests.
The unrest comes just months before the general election in which Prime Minister Narendra Modi is predicted to win a third term.
A repeat of 2021? Amid the deadly surge of COVID-19 in 2020, farmers camped out for over a year, demanding that the government revoke new agricultural laws aimed at modernizing the farming industry. The protests, which gained international attention (and a tweet from Rihanna), ended after the government agreed to repeal them.
But farmers from Haryana and Punjab say the demands — including minimum support prices, doubling income, and loan waivers — have yet to be met two years on. Over 200 participating farmer unions announced a rural strike for Friday, during which no agricultural activities will occur.
High stakes. The Modi administration has faced limited challenges to appease the majority of voters. But the farming bloc (approximately 60% of the population works in agriculture), which contributes 18% to the country’s GDP and to which Modi yielded last time, may command more of his attention.
Traffic jam from French farmer protests.
Why European farmers are furious
Farmers are flocking to Paris in response to the new Prime Minister Gabriel Attal’s agricultural policy announcement. And they aren’t coming to say merci.
They are demanding fairer prices for produce, the continuation of subsidies on gasoline, and financial aid for organic farmers.
Tractors have blocked main roads across the country and encircled Paris, cutting off access to the city’s two airports and the region’s main fresh food market at Rungis, which supplies 60% of the French capital’s fresh food. They have pledged to stay put until Thursday, when French President Emmanuel Macron will join European leaders in Brussels to discuss the EU budget and meet with European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, to address the agricultural crisis.
The agricultural crisis is an EU wide problem. Farmers in neighboring Belgium have also set up barricades on main highways, including into the capital, Brussels. Meanwhile, hundreds of German farmers are blocking key ports like Hamburg, one of the busiest European hubs for container shipping.
In 2023, farmer protests against environmental regulations were seen from Spain to the Netherlands. Both Germany and France’s protests were fueled over plans to discontinue gasoline subsidies because of their environmental impact. To farmers, paying for their pollution is too much with higher energy and fertilizer prices from the Ukraine war cutting into their bottom lines.
Ahead of the EU parliament elections this summer, far right and populist parties are flocking to show their support for the protests. From the AfD in Germany to Marine Le Pen in France, right-wingers are courting voters with agrarian populism, fueled by farmers feeling undervalued and overburdened by rules made by political elites, European institutions, and city dwellers who eat their food without understanding what it takes to grow it.
COP28: Why farmers need to be front and center in climate talks
Agriculture is the foundation of human civilization, the economic activity that makes every other endeavor possible. But historically, says International Fertilizer Association Director General Alzbeta Klein, the subject hasn't received attention in climate talks.
"It took us 23 climate conferences to start thinking about agriculture," she said during a GZERO Live event organized by the Sustainability Leaders Council, a partnership between Eurasia Group, GZERO Media, and Suntory. "The problem is that we don't know how to feed ourselves without a huge impact on the environment."
The good news is, leaders are catching on to the notion that a holistic approach is the only way forward.
Watch the full livestream conversation: The global water crisis and the path to a sustainable future
- Controversies at COP28 and the future of climate change ›
- COP28 climate talks complicated by UAE oil deals ›
- Hunger Pains: The growing global food crisis ›
- Who's to blame for sky-high food prices? ›
- Hunger Pains: The Growing Global Food Crisis - GZERO Media ›
- COP28’s challenge: growing problems, shrinking credibility ›
Water is food, so use solutions to conserve water, says expert Alzbeta Klein
"We often say water is life," says Alzbeta Klein, Director General of the International Fertilizer Association. "And I'd like to add to it: water is food." She spoke at a GZERO Live event organized by the Sustainability Leaders Council, a partnership between Eurasia Group, GZERO Media, and Suntory, exploring the emerging issue of water insecurity.
Some 90% of the world's freshwater is used to grow food, meaning that every single drop that can be saved through more efficient uses of water and fertilizer in farming represents one step closer to ensuring all human beings have safe, fresh water to drink.
Watch the full livestream conversation: The global water crisis and the path to a sustainable future
Ukraine-EU farm export dispute: Are there any consequences?
Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden, shares his perspective on European politics - this week from the airport in Madrid.
What are the consequence of the dispute now between Ukraine and the European Union on farm exports?
It is not really a dispute with the European Union because the commission has said that farm exports are okay. But then suddenly Poland has an election, and Slovakia which has election and Hungary, which has own policy, said, “No, no, we don't allow these particular grain exports from Ukraine because our farmers don't like it.” That runs totally contrary to the common trade policy that the European Union is running, runs totally contrary to the solidarity with Ukraine and support to Ukraine that we have all agreed on. So yeah, we'll see what happens. It’s a serious question.
What's the issue of using Catalan language in the European Parliament and the European Union as well?
Well, this is part of the efforts here in Spain to set up the new government. I mean, the socialists who have a very, very difficult position on negotiating with the Catalan separatists and the Catalan separatists, among other demands, are demanding that both Catalan and the Galician and Basque language should be official languages in the European Union. This brings up a huge number of issues, apart from making the European Union even more of a Tower of Babel than it is at the moment. The cost of translating every single speech, every single document, every single thing into the three languages brings immense costs, immense complexity. So expect the other European governments to say, “Hmm, we've listened to the demand. Let's ask the lawyers. Let's have a working group and let's do nothing.”