OECD Green Talks LIVE: Towards Sustainable Land Use
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This document summarizes a presentation on aligning biodiversity, climate, and food policies through sustainable land use. It discusses how human activity affects two-thirds of global land and reviews international commitments related to these issues. Case studies from six countries analyze how national strategies address policy coherence, institutional coordination, and policy instruments. Key recommendations include developing targets and indicators for national strategies, strengthening cross-sector collaboration, assessing support across ecosystem services, and improving data to inform balanced, context-specific policy mixes.
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OECD Green Talks LIVE: Towards Sustainable Land Use
- 1. Towards Sustainable Land Use Aligning Biodiversity, Climate and Food Policies Will Symes OECD Environment Directorate Green Talks Live 18 February, 2020 @OECD_ENV #GreenTalks
- 2. Human use affects nearly two-thirds of global ice-free land surface 2 Global land use – Context Source: IPCC (2019) Climate Change and Land https://www.visualcapitalist.com/impact-on-climate-change-and-land-use/ Intensive pasture 2%Used savannahs & scrublands 16% Extensive pasture 19% Plantation forest 2% Other land (e.g. barren) 12% Forested ecosystems 9%Unforested ecosystems 7% Cropland 12% Forests managed for timber and other uses 20% Infrastructure (e.g. cities) 1%
- 3. Sustainable land use essential for achieving: – Paris Agreement – Aichi Targets under UN Convention on Biological Diversity – Sustainable Development Goals – UN Convention to Combat Desertification – New York Declaration on Forests and Bonn Challenge – Convention on Migratory Species – Ramsar Convention 3 International environmental commitments
- 4. 4 International environmental commitments SDG 7 Clean Energy SDG 6 Clean Water SDG 15 Life on Land SDG 13 Climate Action SDG 2 Zero Hunger SDG 1, 10 SDG 10, 12, 17 SDG 7 SDG 1, 3, 8 SDG 1, 7, 11, 14 Food vs Fuel Competition for water and pollution from it Intensification, expansion, impacts on biodiversity Increased agricultural production can increase GHG emissions (directly, indirectly Reduce pollution Changing precipitation patterns Pressures on biodiversity Interaction between goals complicated, therefore aligned policy making essential
- 5. 5 What does the report cover? Insights from 6 case study countries: – Brazil, France, Ireland, Indonesia, Mexico and New Zealand Three areas of analysis: – National strategies and action plans – Institutional co-ordination and coherence – Policy instruments
- 6. 6 Agriculture and land use in the case studies • Emissions from agriculture and land use (2014) • Contribution to GDP (2014) -40 -20 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 Brazil France Indonesia Mexico Ireland New Zealand OECD average %ofTotalEmissionsExcludingLULUCF LULUCF Agriculture 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 Brazil France Indonesia Mexico Ireland New Zealand OECD average %ofDomesticGDP Agriculture Forests
- 7. • Approximately 30% of agricultural output is lost or wasted each year – 4.4GtCO2e per year – 1.4 billion ha of agricultural land – USD 963 billion per year 7 Food loss and waste (FLW)
- 8. NATIONAL STRATEGIES AND ACTION PLANS 8
- 9. • Prominence of nexus issues and degree of coherence varies substantially • Strategies and action plans rarely acknowledge the trade-offs between different goals and policies 9 Coherence across national strategies and plans – Key findings
- 10. • Few strategies/plans contain specific targets with quantifiable goals hampering aligned policy making • Even fewer refer to indicators to monitor progress 10 Coherence across national strategies and plans – Key findings
- 11. • Engage a range of relevant stakeholder, both state and non-state in the creation of national strategies and plans • Include targets that are specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, and time-bound (SMART) and quantitative indicators 11 Coherence across national strategies and plans – Recommendations
- 13. • Land-use governance is fragmented, between sectoral ministries and different levels of government • Significant impact of multi- lateral agreements or actions on national institutional setups (e.g. for SDGs) 13 Institutional co-ordination – Key findings
- 14. • Strengthen institutional co-ordination, both horizontally and vertically through: – Creation of specific bodies to co-ordinate policy making – Dedicated mechanisms for institutional co- ordination – Sub-national representation of national level institutions 14 Institutional co-ordination – Recommendations
- 16. 16 Policy instruments – Key findings • Clear and secure land tenure are essential prerequisites • Negative externalities of land-use tend to be under- priced or un-priced • Effective policy mixes are context specific, governments require broad toolkit of policy instruments
- 17. • Significant support available to food production but not other ecosystem services • Information and data on food loss and waste missing at policy relevant scales, therefore tracking progress is difficult • Impacts of international trade on land use not well quantified 17 Policy instruments – Key findings
- 18. • Better data needed to inform policy making (e.g. spatial data, LCA for trade) • Reassess the balance of support between the relevant ecosystem services from land (e.g. food, carbon, biodiversity, water) • Monitor and enforce regulations in a consistent and regular manner 18 Policy instruments – Recommendations
- 19. Thank you for joining the discussion! Will.Symes@oecd.org Katia.Karousakis@oecd.org Jane.Ellis@oecd.org oe.cd/s-land-use
Editor's Notes
- Good afternoon Welcome to webinar on our newly released report Towards Sustainable Land Use: Aligning biodiversity, climate and food policies The first question is why look at land use…
- The current global land use system is unsustainable. Around 70% of the worlds ice free land surface is affected by humans. With significant impacts to biodiversity, with IPBES estimating 25% of animal and plant species now face extinction in the coming decades, They are significant to climate change with the IPCCC estimates 23% of global GHG emissions come from Agriculture forestry and other land use, And to society, with land degradation now affecting the well-being of 3.2 billion people globally and costing the economy an estimated 10.6 trillion dollars a year.
- Land use is central to achieved many international commitments, such as the Paris agreement. Likely to become more important over time as many of the scenarios for limiting climate change to below 2 and 1.5 degrees assume a large growth in bioenergy: up to 600 million ha predominately from pasture and crop land. However, 2nd and 3rd generation biofuel likely to have lower impacts. Land use change is the primary driver of biodiversity decline since 1970 as identified by IPBES, hence transition to sustainable land use is key for meeting the Aichi targets and the new framework to be agreed at CBD COP 15. And of course the SDGs, specifically 15 life of land, 2, 6, 7 and 13 on hunger, water, energy and climate Also impacts other sdgs on poverty, health, economic growth and the oceans. Many more that are not mentioned here such as UNCCD, Bonn challenge, new York declaration on forets, CMS and Ramsar conventions Addressing these issue is a complicated challenge, with multiple interactions, synergies and trade-off that all need to be managed. And how countries do that effectively is the central question of the report. Talk about trade offs and synergies, e.g. food production and intensification, forests for carbon and biodiversity etc.
- To try and answer this question, we looked at 6 case study countries [CLICK] Brazil, France, Ireland, Indonesia, Mexico and New Zealand. Large agricultural and forestry sectors, globally important biodiversity 3 points of analysis [CLICK] National strategies and action plans, Institutional co-ordination and coherence, And policy instruments. Within these 3 areas across 6 countries we looked at policy making relevant to land use including policies related to biodiversity, climate, development, agriculture, food waste and international trade
- Large relative and absolute emissions from agriculture and forestry Important economic sectors, making aligned policy making an environmental and economic imperative.
- FLW is a major environmental issue that leads to an estimated 30% of all agricultural production being lost each year. The numbers associated with the FLW are staggering….. Reducing food loss and waste represent a clear opportunity to reduce emissions, reduce the pressure on land and save money (economic and environmental rationle) FLW generally occurs at different stages of the food system, (while these distinctions have be criticised they still serve as a useful guide): “production, processing” handing and storage and distribution/consumption
- Firstly, let us consider the national strategies and action plans, MEA, such as NDCs and NBSAPs, and sector level national plans, with relevance to land-use, such as agriculture, forestry and development [CLICK]
- The degree to which key land-use issues are considered in strategies and action plans is highly variable. Forestry, agriculture and climate change were considered in the NBSAPs, in many cases associated with specific targets but, fewer countries had targets associated with ecosystems, agriculture and forestry in their NDC and Low emissions development strategies. Different levels of guidance in paris agreement and CBD No mention of trade-off and synergies despite specific mention in MEAs such as CBD (climate) and SDG 17.14 (coherent policy making for sustainable development)
- Secondly very few national plans and strategies have quantified targets accompanied by indicators for areas relevant to land-use, making to challenging to identify a clear end point and consequently the policy interventions needed to achieve this. (Conversely trade policies often include specific targets for growth, often in agricultural products e.g. Ireland, Indonesia and Brazil) Even fewer have indicators which can make it difficult to understand where countries are going and how far along that path they are.
- The report recommends Engaging a broad range of stakeholders in the creation of strategies and action plans ensures holistic view and important areas are not missed. e.g. the National planning framework for Ireland, which included both a cross ministerial steering committee and the national consultation process. The second recommendation to highlight from the report is [CLICK] Including SMART targets (specific, measurable, actionable, realistic and time-bound) in strategies and plans is key for enabling actors to identify an end goal and the policy interventions needed to achieve it. For example the NBSAPs of Brazil, Ireland, France and Indonesia include SM targets. [CLICK]
- Next we turn our attention to institutional co-ordination and coherence [CLICK]
- The report looks at institutional arrangements for policy creation and implementation around land use [CLICK] The first finding to highlight is that land use governance is always often split both horizontally between different national institutions and vertically, between national and sub-national institutions, which is particularly important in large decentralised countries such as Brazil and Indonesia. (For example various aspects of governance for the land-use nexus is split between at least 8 national ministries, 6 non-departmental bodies, the office of the president and provincial and municipal level governments.) While this split is understandable given the reliance of local governments on land-use for revenue generation, and often desirable, as it allows for the creation of context specific solution to the complicated issues that countries face. But it can create challenges for the implementation of policies, given the potential for over lapping institutional mandates and variation in priorities and capacities between different ministries and levels of government. [CLICK] Secondly MEAs have played an important role, in shaping the institutions for specific issues in certain countries. For example many countries have created specific institutions in response. [CLICK]
- The report recommends the horizontal and vertical coordination of institutions, and I will just highlight 3 potential mechanisms for achieving this are discussed. Firstly [CLICK] Creating a specific institution to help coordinate action and policy creation for a specific policy goal or set of goals. Often created in response to MEAs or other international commitments particularly cutting issues such as the SDGs and facilitated by leadership from the top such as the office of the president. Mexico for example has created the National council for the 2030 agenda to coordinate actions relating to the SDGs. [CLICK] Having dedicated institutions and mechanisms for coordination can also be effective. Indonesia, which faces considerable coordination challenges has both coordinating ministries, responsible for harmonising action between the line ministries on cross cutting issues, and there is a ministry of development planning (AKA Bappenas), which is responsible for creating national development plans and ensuring the interests of the other ministries are represented [CLICK] Finally having subnational representation of national level ministries is a good way of ensuring vertical coordination, and this is particularly important given the local nature of land use governance. [CLICK]
- Finally we will consider the policy instruments [CLICK]
- The report found Clear land tenure essential prerequisite for functional policies in land-use systems. No clear tenure hampers enforcement, who can do what is unknown Reduces incentives for sustainable activity, maximise returns and tenure claims in the short terms. Often results in forest clearing what the most effective policy mix will be in a given situation will be driven by the local enviro-socio-economic conditions, countries need a broad tool kit of policy instruments to balance different goals. [CLICK] the negative impacts of some land uses are often un or under priced. For example, despite the public health implications of pesticide use (as well as other impacts) only France and Mexico apply a risk based taxing approach to these chemicals, where tax rates increase with the environmental threat posed. [CLICK]
- Ecosystems provide a range of services to society, food production dominates government incentives with significant support for agriculture across all countries except new Zealand. There are many good reasons for supporting agriculture, but this support includes distortionary market price support, which can maintain unsustainable practices, and potentially environmentally harmful support, such as concessionary credit for commercial farms in Brazil, or subsidised electricity for water pumping in mexico. [click] While SDG 12.3 is to halve per capita global food waste data and information on food waste is incomplete, posing problems for targeting policy interventions and measuring progress. Some countries have well developed food waste strategies e.g. France (give examples) But progress is unclear [click] International trade has both positive and negative impacts on land use but they are difficult to quantify. And local and international impacts might be different.
- So what does the report recommend countries try to do Firstly.. [CLICK] Better data particularly spatial data are needed to inform policy making Big and open data approaches are becoming increasingly import to land-use. In fact many countries have embraced these approaches, with open spatial data platforms available in Indonesia (ONE map), Mexico and New Zealand. Further to understand how to manage the impacts of trade on land use the continued development and application of LCA techniques which capture all the impacts of products regardless of where there occur are important. [CLICK] Next countries can reassess the balance of support they are providing to different ecosystems services particularly those services beyond food production such as carbon sequestration, habitat provision and water quality. A good first step is the assessment and reform of environmentally harmful subisides. Some countries have already begun this process for example Indonesia has recently completed a G20 peer review of fossil fuel subsidies and france has already assessment of biodiversity harmful subisidies. Efforts are to be applauded, supported and intensified if land-use systems are to be made sustainable in the long term. [CLICK] Finally, and somewhat related to the first point, regulations regarding land use need to be consistently monitored and enforced. If environmental governance is weakened, for example due to shifting political priorities, previous gains can be reversed, with serious environmental consequences [CLICK]