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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
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The perils of depending on food imports: UN Foundation chief
We all know there's a global food crisis due to the impact of shortages of Russian and Ukrainian grain, fertilizers, and fuel. But UN Foundation chief Elizabeth Cousens thinks high prices are hurting some countries even more.
Take for instance Yemen, which imports 90% of its food and is thus highly vulnerable to any external shocks.
While addressing famine is the top priority, Cousens says in a Global Stage livestream conversation that the long-term plan should be "laying the foundation for a much more resilient, equitable food system."
Her two dream goals: sustainable agriculture and reducing food import dependence.
António Guterres: the world won’t have enough food in 2023 without Russian fertilizer
The UN- and Turkey-brokered deal with Russia to unblock Ukrainian grain exports stuck at Black Sea ports was a big success for the United Nations — and for Secretary-General António Guterres.
Look, he recalls he told Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky: this is a dramatic situation caused by the war because it is threatening the living conditions of most of the world.
The UN chief tells Ian Bremmer on GZERO World that we need to find a way for Ukraine to ship its grain; and the UN hopes to negotiate with the US, the EU, and others to get some exemptions from Western sanctions against Russia so Moscow is able to export the food and fertilizer that the world needs right now.
Guterres says that this year we have enough food. But we may not in 2023 if we don't fix the fertilizer market soon.
Watch the GZERO World episode: How a war-distracted world staves off irreversible damage
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Innovation: cause for optimism amid the global food crisis
How long will food prices keep rising? Will food itself become scarce? There's a lot of doom and gloom these days about the global food crisis, made even worse by Russia's war in Ukraine.
But there are some reasons to be hopeful, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation CEO Mark Suzman said during a livestream conversation about the global food crisis hosted by GZERO Media in partnership with the organization he leads.
The Gates Foundation, he explained, has long been investing in innovations that can massively increase productivity by smallholder farmers across the developing world. Think drought-tolerant seeds or flood-resistant rice.
What's more, new tools like apps to customize fertilizer use and digitally map soil are becoming available to smallholders in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The goal is to double smallholder productivity.
Still, Suzman points out, none of that will matter without investing more in climate adaptation — especially better use of water.
A tractor applies nitrogen-based fertilizer to a wheat field in Germany.
Fertil(izer) ground for a global crisis
We've written about how the war between sunflower superpowers and major grain exporters Russia and Ukraine is already fueling a global food price crisis.
But there's a related catastrophe in the works for not only farmers but everyone around the world: a war-linked shortage of fertilizer from Russia and its top ally Belarus.
Modern agriculture relies on the widespread use of fertilizer to maximize crop yields. Very few parts of the world have soil that’s fertile enough to plant without a chemical pick-me-up. Having less Russian and Belarusian fertilizer on the market will soon mean many countries won’t be able to grow as much food — and the food they do produce will get a lot more expensive.
Global fertilizer prices were already soaring before Russia invaded Ukraine due to a pandemic-induced surge in the cost of natural gas, a key raw material for nitrogen-based fertilizer. But the war has made things much worse by creating uncertainty over exactly how much fertilizer can be sourced in the immediate future from Russia and Belarus.
Although current Western sanctions against both countries exclude fertilizer (except the EU’s on Belarusian potash), Russia has responded with export bans to "unfriendly" nations as payback for the sanctions. What's more, traders are wary of making big purchases amid the rapidly changing sanctions regime, while many shipping firms are avoiding the Black Sea, the main transport route for this commodity.
A fertilizer price crisis is a less immediate but equally serious threat to food security than tight grain stocks because it'll limit the global capacity to fill that gap with other staples, such as corn, rice, or soybeans in the medium term.
Farmers worldwide are dealing with the problem in different ways. Some are making do with manure. Others are hoarding supply for 2023, which will further increase prices. One fertilizer maker predicts that global crop yields could decline by as much as 50% next harvest.
This crisis is coming to a head in agricultural powerhouse Brazil, the world’s biggest importer of fertilizer, almost one-quarter of which comes from Russia and Belarus. The shortages are driving up costs for Brazilian farmers and food prices for all Brazilians.
And, of course, it’s gotten political: President Jair Bolsonaro now wants to mine potash in protected indigenous lands, but even if he gets his way it’s unlikely to fill the short-term supply gap.
There’s a Brazil-Russia angle too. Bolsonaro — a longtime Vladimir Putin fanboy — reluctantly condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine but refused to back Western sanctions against Moscow. Still, the effect of Brazil’s dependence on Russian fertilizer on food inflation puts the incumbent in a tricky spot just months before the October presidential election, and Bolsonaro is already polling behind former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
"Foreign policy does not affect Bolsonaro’s popularity and odds of re-election. Inflation surely does," says Eurasia Group’s Marcelo Alvarenga. "Food inflation will likely pressure Bolsonaro, but he has very few options to intervene."
Brazil is just the tip of the iceberg. Many countries that were already food-insecure before the war in Ukraine get almost all their fertilizer from Russia and Belarus. Without it, some might face famine because smallholder farms can't produce enough food to make up for the shortfall with just organic compost.
This includes several nations in sub-Saharan Africa, but also parts of the former Soviet Union, such as Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Moldova. Putin has already weaponized Russian oil and gas to get what he wants from Europe, so perhaps fertilizer could be the next ace up his sleeve.
There is one country that could pick up the slack: China, the world’s top producer and second-largest exporter of fertilizer. The problem is that Beijing started curbing fertilizer exports in October to sustain food production for domestic needs amid strict COVID-19 restrictions. Don't count on the Chinese to resume selling to the world as much as they did before as long as Xi Jinping's zero-COVID policy remains in place.
"Rising fertilizer costs are a big issue," says Eurasia Group analyst Peter Ceretti. "We may end up with lower yields in the next harvest if a lot of farmers can't afford fertilizer and must use less of it this year."