Forum Origin, Diversity and territories 2022
What strategies for the sustainability of localized agri-food systems in the face of the climate crisis?
The latest IPCC assessment report (August 2021) draws on the latest scientific knowledge to demonstrate that the anthropogenic contribution to the dynamics of climate change is no longer in doubt and that there is an urgent need for action at all spatial scales. However, it is clear that compliance with the Paris Agreements will be hard to achieve, as this issue is not often at the centre of political agendas.
The agricultural sector is one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gases (GHG). These emissions have been increasing steadily since the 1960s, coinciding with globalisation and the progression of the productivist paradigm based on the specialisation of territories and farms. The damaging effects of this paradigm are visible. They contribute, among other things, to the dramatic collapse of biodiversity and the irreversible degradation of natural resources on a global scale.
Moreover, agri-food systems are closely linked to ecosystem health. The degradation of agro-ecosystems plays a role in the increased prevalence of pandemics and antibiotic resistance, as recalled in 2021 by 16 leaders of French research organisations, brought together in the National Research Alliance for the Environment (AllEnvi). The Covid-19 pandemic is taking place against the backdrop of a global ecological crisis, which makes it impossible to avoid the question, which is well known elsewhere, of the responsibility of humans for the health of ecosystems and the feedback loop between ecosystem and human health. The “OneHealth” approach was introduced about 20 years ago and opens up the prospect of a systemic understanding of the challenges of ecosystem viability at the intersection of human, animal and natural resource health.
The seriousness of the current crises demands that we overcome disciplinary divisions and barriers. In the territories, rural communities and scientists are concerned by some key questions: how can the resilience of agri-food systems be strengthened in the face of accelerating climate change? What means and practices can be used to correct or reduce the impacts of climate change on localised food systems? How can territories better anticipate or correct food production and consumption impacts on the climate? What is the role of origin-linked quality chains in these territorial strategies? How do territorialised value chains integrate climate change into long-term production and commercial strategies?
Ideas are teeming for reinventing agriculture that fits within the planet’s limits. Promising avenues are emerging and asserting themselves, such as agroecology, territorial approaches to agriculture and food, and the vitality and respect of biological and cultural diversity.
Among them, it is recognised that differentiation strategies through quality linked to the origin, driven by the actors of the commodity chains and reinforced by public policies, play, under certain conditions, a crucial role in the ecological transition of agricultural producers and their commodity chain partners in rural communities. At the local level, new forms of governance are emerging in response to the needs of communities that are taking responsibility and defining strategies to reduce damage to natural resources and GHG emissions.
The issue of climate change is crucial for the viability of all territories, whether they have urban, rural or mountain components. The appropriation of governance by rural communities leads to a search for local food sovereignty. Like the State or the market, at the interface between local and global dynamics, the territory asserts itself as a reference framework for renewed and sustainable development trajectories, including at scales that can involve territorial actors in broader, sometimes global, initiatives.
Some territories, particularly in the mountains, are convincing examples of sustainable management of local resources and know-how. Mountain agroecosystems are natural open-air resilience laboratories and are of interest to the scientific world because of their prominent role in conserving the natural, cultural and technical heritage of particularly vulnerable environments. On the fringes of global productivist logic, mountains reinvent themselves to exist and adapt to global pressures by making the most of their assets and local singularities. The United Nations recognises these singularities and has proclaimed 2022 “the International Year of Sustainable Development in Mountains”. In this context, the ODT Forum community will underline in 2022 the importance of mountain territories by focusing its attention mainly, but not exclusively, on mountain territories and their agri-food chains, also due to the involvement of its partners (academics, politicians, researchers and local actors) in the European project MOVING[1] (H2020).
The ODT Forum 2022 aims to open up arenas for debate on the issue of global ecosystem health, policy solutions for sustainable transition at different territorial scales and the future roles of food systems. The ODT Forum community will gather around these themes in the town of Saignelégier, in the heart of the canton of Jura in Switzerland. Saignelégier is the capital of the Franches-Montagnes plateau, a mountainous area located at an altitude of over 1000 m on a karst plateau, characterised by agricultural activities that shape the landscape and interfere with the natural environment of permanent pastures and woodlands. The Franches-Montagnes are a land of deep agricultural, food and gastronomic traditions, internationally recognised, and watchmaking know-how classified as World Heritage by UNESCO.
The “International Mountain Conference” will open this year’s ODT Forum, with ten field visits in the morning and a plenary session in the afternoon. The objective of this international mountain conference is to give the floor to personalities from all continents to bring a global perspective to the functioning of localised agri-food systems and the innovative approaches developed by mountain communities in the face of the climate crisis.
The following two days of the ODT Forum will address the theme in 5 workshops with complementary angles.
- A first workshop will focus on the impacts of differentiation strategies on the sustainability and resilience of territories to climate change. It will be a place to share and discuss sustainability and agroecology assessment work applied to GI chains and other quality signs or differentiation approaches.
- A second workshop will focus on research on mountain territories, particularly affected by climate change. This workshop will discuss, among other things, the technological and governance tools to be implemented to develop new localised economies and make mountain regions attractive.
- A third workshop will bring together researchers, experts and practitioners on the theme of “OneHealth” global health of ecosystems, animals and human populations and strategies to restore or improve it.
- A fourth workshop will take stock of the resilience strategies of territories focused on the search for food sovereignty, sometimes to achieve food autonomy. The workshop will address the challenges, constraints and opportunities related to the relocation of production, consumption trends and the transition to a responsible diet.
- A final workshop will focus on the role of public policies in the agro-ecological transition of territories in the global context, focusing on soil in climate policy and the need to better connect agricultural policy, including quality signs with rural development policy.
A shorter event (half-day conference and one day of visits) will be organised on the same theme in December 2022 at the Ecole Supérieure d’Agriculture d’Angers (ESA), in partnership with them and the Region. It will be a pre-event to the ODT 2023 Forum, which will take place in Angers on the initiative of the managers of the Master Food Identity, which ESA coordinates.
[1] MOVING (H2020) – https://www.moving-h2020.eu/