Fodder: The FCRN Newsletter
We send out a weekly newsletter which provides an essential round-up of food sustainability-relevant publications, articles, jobs and events. Sign up to receive it, or better still join as an FCRN member and connect with our diverse network of members.
Research library
Journals and Journal Articles
This paper, published in the journal Science, aims to establish a detailed “roadmap” for meeting the Paris climate goal. It provides not only a scenario for the CO2 emissions reductions needed but places attention on the many different policy actions needed to stay below 2°C warming. One of three main focus areas is agriculture and land use related emissions.
A common hypothesis used to link declining human health to environmental outcomes predicts that illness will reduce human populations or harvest effort, thus benefitting the environment. When investigating the behaviour of fishers around Lake Victoria in Kenya, this research found little evidence that illness reduced fishing effort to indirectly benefit the environment. Instead, ill fishers shifted their fishing methods – using more illegal methods concentrated in inshore areas, that are less physically demanding but environmentally destructive.
This research brings together data from 389 field trials to determine how the root and shoot biomass, and carbon (C) stocks of major crops correlate to soil C in different environmental conditions. The analysis found all crops allocated more C to their shoots than roots. The greatest C allocation to roots was in grasses (which also had the highest plant biomass production).
Reports
This report on organic agriculture and climate change was commissioned by the IFOAM-EU Group and researched and written by FiBL (Research Institute of Organic Agriculture). It highlights organic agriculture’s potential to mitigate and adapt to climate change and underlines the importance of adopting a systemic approach - one which encompasses consumption - to reducing all the environmental impacts of agriculture.
Books
This book explores the potential benefits of Multifunctional Agriculture to the social, economic and environmental sustainability of tropical agriculture and its potential to deliver the new Sustainable Development Goals.
Member research
This paper reviews the current literature addressing food refrigeration from a sustainability perspective and identifies a number of large and important gaps for future research.
News
What is the latest science on soil's ability to pull carbon pollution out of the atmosphere? Breakthrough Strategies hosted a webinar on April 24 on the Technical Potential of Soil Carbon Sequestration. It featured three of the world’s leading experts on strategies for drawing carbon pollution out of the atmosphere and storing it in soils: Keith Paustian, Jean-François Soussana, and Eric Toensmeier.
Opportunities
This PhD Fellowship is a joint research project between Teagasc, Moorepark and Wageningen University (WU). The student will be based at the Teagasc Research Centre at Moorepark Fermoy in Cork, Ireland and will be registered at WU.
It is vital for the sustainability of the food-production systems that the amount of water used in agricultural production systems are quantified, optimised and managed responsibly. To date there has been no programme of research in this area in the Irish pig sector. Understanding water consumption hot-spots and usage patterns on modern commercial pig production systems, through detailed auditing of water usage, will inform guidelines for best-practice water consumption. The development of predictive models to quantify the water footprints of Irish pork production and the development of on-farm and system level water use optimisation algorithms will provide invaluable and novel information to the pig industry. Additionally, identification of on-farm factors which can affect usage will help understanding of direct water consumption, and consequently development of holistic best-practice guidelines for water consumption. The student will be required to undertake periods of trial work at commercial pig farms, taught course work at the university, and laboratory work at other locations if deemed necessary during the project.
The studentship is for 4 years and an allowance of €22,000 per annum is available, which is intended to cover both student maintenance and university fees. The Fellowship will start as soon as possible after 1st of October when the most suitable candidate is appointed.
You can find more information about this opportunity and how to apply here.
Events
Compassion in World Farming and WWF jointly invite registrations to The Extinction and livestock international conference: Moving to a flourishing food system for wildlife, farm animals and us. The conference will examine how we can transform our global food and farming systems to work for people, the planet and animals. It will bring together diverse interests – conservation & livestock production, land & water use, the environment & climate change, ethics & economics, healthy & sustainable diets, food security, food business – and act as a catalyst for future collaboration and solution development.
The programme
5 October 2017 - Day One – issues and impact
An evening networking event will focus on future foods.
6 October 2017 - Day Two – practical and policy solutions
Key speakers already confirmed include: award-winning author, Dr Carl Safina; World Food Prize winner, Hans Herren and Dr Hilal Elver, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food.
Read more about the conference here.
The 2017 conference theme is ‘Ecosystem-based adaptation’ and will examine the benefits and challenges of incorporating natural resources and ecosystems into climate adaptation work.
Field visits that take place over three days before the conference from 23-25 June give delegates the chance to understand the realities of community-based adaptation on the ground. They will highlight community efforts around the key determinants of community resilience: access to food, water, energy and healthcare.
As a field visit attendee, you will have the opportunity to see a range of projects that demonstrate how local people adapt to climate change and are working with their local ecosystems. For example, you could see how small-scale farmers are mimicking nature and increasing diversity on their farms to mitigate food insecurity. Another project you may get to visit shows how training communities in tourism has helped to protect wetlands and decrease poaching in the area.
You can find more information about these projects and others you might experience on a CBA field visit at the IIED website. Read more about the conference itself here.
Register via Eventbrite – the deadline to register for field trips is 14 May.