On the horns of the food-energy- climate change trilemma: … · 2018-08-14 · climate change • 1970-1985. Oil crises, energy security and Pro-Alcool programmes for bio-ethanol

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Read the research @ cresi.essex.ac.uk Join the conversation @ cresi.wordpress.com

On the horns of the food-energy-

climate change trilemma:

Towards a socio-economic analysis

Professor Mark Harvey

National Chengchi University, Taipei

May 26, 2014

http://cresi.essex.ac.uk

http://cresi.wordpress.com

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Interactions between socio-economies and

natural resource environments

• Climate change and finitudes of resources: the importance of land and food

• A neo-Polanyian analytical framework: political economies IN natural resource environments

• The Very Long View and the Long View: Ruddiman and Pomeranz

• The natural science ‘anthropogenic’ representation of the contemporary food-energy-climate change trilemma

• Towards a sociogenic analysis of emergent sustainability crises (finitudes, climate change, biodiversity……)

• The Brazilian trajectory – a Much Shorter View

• CHINA – the emergent sustainability crisis

• The politico-economic challenges



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A neo-Polanyian approach

Economy

SOCIETY

LAWCULTURE

POLITY

NATURE

SOCIETY



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From anthropogenesis to sociogenesis of

sustainability crises

• Limits to Growth versus “limitless innovation”.

– “Planetary boundaries” and “stabilisation wedges”

• The reductionist conception of neoliberalist

capitalism (political ecology, resource

geography). Commodification of nature,

marketisation, deregulation.

• Multiple politico-economic trajectories in different

resource environments



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The Very Long View

The significance of agricultural societies



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The domestication of crops



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The Long View

The “Great Divergence” (Pomeranz)

• Finitudes of land and energy resources in 18th century Europe, South East Asia and China

• The European (English) and American great escape: the growth of colonial plantation economies.

• Land under cultivation expanded by 466% between 1760 and 1890 (Meyer and Turner, 1992). (North America:6,000%)

• The 30 million ‘ghost acres’ of land resources available to English exploitation.

• The industrial revolution: coal + cotton + sugar

• The distinctive North European trilemma trajectory, involving food, energy, and generation of climate change



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Revisiting the industrial revolution

• Finite resources: wood, peat, coal, land….

• Burning coal PLUS Land Use Change

+



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CLIMATE

CHANGE



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THE CONTEMPORARY TRILEMMA:

INTERLOCKING CRISES –

UNPRECEDENTED HISTORICAL CIRCUMSTANCES

LAND

USEPetro-chemical

resource

depletion

Biomass

for energy

and

materials Global

Climate

Change

Increased

energy and

materials

demand

Increased

and

changing

food

demand

Harvey, M.

and Pilgrim,

S. 2011, Food

Policy Journal



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Different socio-economies generate different trilemmas

GHG emissions

from

Source: UN Emissions

Gap Report, 2012



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Flaring of gas from shale and tight oil

reserves, 2013

USA: a political economy dominated by energy security.

No consensus on climate change mitigation. Huge internal

inequalities in carbon footprint between rich and poor

Over 80% of

GHG emissions

from

Energy consumption

Industry

Transport



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The Brazilian trajectory

Responding to energy finitudes – then

climate change• 1970-1985. Oil crises, energy security and Pro-Alcool programmes for bio-

ethanol from sugarcane.

• Stalling growth of biofuels under Washington Consensus 1985-2000

• 2000- Energy security, plus climate change mitigation – the Flex-Fuel Vehicle and biodiesel. Sustainability and quality certification for international markets.

• With hydroelectric power, Brazil has 29% renewable energy, compared with world average of 11%

• Renewables for energy security, drawing on natural environmental resources of sun, rain and land.

• Politically driven reconfiguration of the Brazilian economy of energy.

THE WORLD’S GREENEST ECONOMY?? Exploiting new oil fields?



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Brazil – sugarcane ethanol

Stagnation and

reduction of subsidies

for ethanolProAlcool

I

20%

mandate

ProAlcoòl

II

100%

Ethanol

cars

Fuel Price

De-

regulation

The FFV

BoomMajor coordinating for (partially)

state-owned Petrobras



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Brazilian Trajectory: emergent sustainability

crises• World’s largest exporter of poultry, red meat, coffee and sugar;

second largest exporter of soya and soya oil; third largest exporter of corn (maize)

• The “arc of fire” replaced by Zero Deforestation Policy, REDD+, and IBAMA: “Tropical Keynesianism?” (Hecht, 2011).

• Roundtables on Sustainable Soy, The ‘Soy Moratorium’, Better Sugar Initiative.

– But NO sustainability regulation for meat or poultry.

• Crises of land use change driven by global food demand

• Crises of energy resources from hydroelectric power

• Threats to GHG emissions, biodiversity, human displacement

• Distinctive political responses to Brazilian trilemma challenges in a distinctive environmental resource context.



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The China-Brazil Soy Commodity Complex

A MAJOR TRILEMMA TWIST: COMBINING TRAJECTORIES



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China invests $7.5 billion in Brazilian Soy



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The emergent sustainability crisis in China

• Immediate pollution (air, WATER): long-term climate change (20-30% of arable land contaminated, FAO 2013)

• Market and subsidy driven unsustainable intensification (fertilizers, pesticides….).Food security and the market growth model. Politics driving the market, market driving the politics?

• Finite resources of poor quality land (low per capita agricultural land, (China 0.08 pc, UK 0.10, US 0.5, Brazil 0.37)

• Fragmentation of land tenure, the Household Responsibility System (0.5 hectares to 1.5 hectares)

• Socially unsustainable transformation of rural population through urban migration – yet short term stabilisation.

• Barriers to scaling up, regulation, education, innovation..

A DISTINCTIVE SOCIOECONOMY-NATURE

INTERACTION DYNAMIC LEADING TO CRISIS



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Visions of the

emergent sustainability

crisis

Source: Zhang et al. 2013 Nature



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Politico-economic challenges in natural

environmental contexts

• Situating diverse economic trajectories in space and time in their natural environmental contexts (The Very Long, the Long, and the Much Shorter Views)

• Understanding the political dynamics of socio-economic trajectories

• Understanding the different dynamics of the three poles of the trilemma.

• Responding to food demand, and the new competition for land.

• Food or energy security versus climate change mitigation.

• The role of the state in different political economies.



On the horns of the food-energy- climate change trilemma: … · 2018-08-14 · climate change • 1970-1985. Oil crises, energy security and Pro-Alcool programmes for bio-ethanol

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