Technology adoption fromproduction to processing to distribution should be considered given that it hasminimal contribution to climate change.
Adaptation and mitigation measures forclimate change are essential. Enhancing post harvesting processing to highervalue added products should also be considered. Inputs in the form of compostcan be utilized thus integrated farm management is applied. Efficientresource use is a key to sustainability. The goal of sustainable agriculture is to reducewaste thus maximize profit. Based on the study of Altieri and Toledo 2011, the spread of local agroecologicalinnovations whether the potential is scaled up to reach all the small farmersof a region depends on the capacity of organizations and various actorsinvolved in agroecological revolution.
Through their access to information, farmerscan gain agroecological knowledge regarding government services, solidarity markets, land, seeds, etc.Agroecological alternatives that suit the needs of small-scale producersand the low-income non-farming population should be constructed. It should opposecorporate control over production and consumption. Rural social movements should focus onrestoring local food systems. The direct involvement of farmers and scientistsis important in formulating research agenda.
This will motivate farmers toactively participate in technological innovation and dissemination. Scientistsand researchers can facilitate in incorporating indigenous knowledge systems toscientific knowledge system.Theanalyses of Tilma (2011), agricultural intensi?cation through technologyadaptation and transfer and enhancement of soil fertility in poorer nationswould greatly reduce these yield gaps. Sustainable agriculture provides a moreequitable global food supply, and greatly decrease the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions. Destruction of habitat isreduced which can also reduce species extinction brought about by landclearing. If environmental impacts will be smaller, the evaluations of Tilma(2011) states that there will be a 100% increase from 2005 to 2050 in globalcrop production. This is feasible ifthere are alternative pathways of global agricultural development that willreap environmental bene?ts.Signi?cantinvestments in poorer nations is needed.
This include innovative adaptation oftechnologies to new soil types, climates, and pests as well as newinfrastructure In Zimbabwe, forinstance, ?eld trials on >1,200 farms showed that technology transfer(farmer education) and intensi?cation increased the yield of maize.How to increase crops’ nitrogen uptake and use efficiency is also animportant research because nitrogenous compounds in fertilizers contribute towaterway eutrophication and GHG emissions. “There is a critical need to getbeyond popular biases against the use of agricultural biotechnology and developforward-looking regulatory frameworks based on scientific evidence.” ( Federoffet. al. ,2017) Escalatingcrop demand has corresponding impacts that will depend on the trajectory along which globalagriculture develops. The minimization of the GHG impacts of agriculture and the preservation of global biodiversitymay well hinge on this trajectory.
“Adoption and technology transfers to under yieldingnations, enhances their soil fertility, employs more ef?cient nutrient useworldwide, and minimizes land clearing. This provides a promising path to moreenvironmentally sustainable agricultural intensi?cation and more equitableglobal food supplies (Tilma,2011).International concerns with regard to food security have shifted in thelast three decades. In the 1960’s and early 1970’s, with rising world gainprices, fears arose that the world would not run out of food in the near futureas its population grew even larger.
Major improvements in the agriculturalproductivity, particularly the impact of “Green Revolution” on wheat and rice, haveremoved that fear despite a population that increased from 1.6 billion in 1900to 6.1 billion by 2000. Today, the expectation is that new advances inagriculture, particularly in biotechnology, will increase agriculturalproductivity sufficiently to feed a world population. The performance of crops, wild species, livestock and aquatic resourcesunder stress depends on the inherent genetic capacity and on the wholeagroecosystems in which they are managed.
For that reason, any serious effortto increase resilience of developing country agriculture in the face of climatechange must involve the adoption of stress tolerant crop varieties and animalbreeds as well as a more prudent management of crops, animals and naturalresources that sustain their production while providing other vital servicesfor people and the environment.In the advent of climate change, plant breeders should more emphasis ondevelopment of drought and flood resistant crops. Research is needed to definethe current limits to these resistances and the possibility of manipulationthrough modern genetic techniques.
Both crop architecture and physiology may begenetically altered to adapt to warmer and submerged environmental conditions.At the regional level, those charged with planning for resource allocationincluding land, air and water, and agricultural development should take climatechange into account. In some regions, it may be appropriate to take a secondlook at traditional technologies on crops as a way to cope with climate change.In coastal areas, agricultural land may be flooded or salinized; in continentalinteriors and other locations, droughts may increase.
These eventualities canbe dealt with more easily if anticipated. Federoff et. al. (2017) stated that recent reports on food securityemphasize the gains that can be made by bringing existing food sciencetechnology and agronomic technologyand “know how technology” to people whodo not yet have it.
This requiresbuilding local educational, food processing capability, storage capacity, andother aspects of agribusiness, and also technical, and research capacity, as well as rural transportation and water andcommunications infrastructure.Thesearch for viable and sustainable solutions to address the challenges of an emergingdrought/drylands and flood prone areas in the Philippines should bring intofocus a diverse range of approaches and development options, one of which isaccess to and use of knowledge, science and technology and innovation.Potential strategies and likely determinants of success and failure with regardto this challenge are summarized below:- Innovate and adapt the best practices ondrought/dryland and deepwater farming experience by other countries especially technologies developed- Improve knowledge of drought/drylands andwetlands and the indigenous communities including traditional agriculturalpractices- Improve research-extension-farmer(community ) linkages and cooperation- Integrate traditional knowledge withinnovative technology- Improve stake holders participation inresearch ,training and extension, awareness and education programs (e.
g. gender,youth, indigenous communities) and create an institution and capabilitybuilding in anticipation of a “clear and present danger” of a fast changing agriculturallandscape. Today, for theagricultural sector to remain knowledgeable, competitive and accurate, accessto as much organized information as possible is a necessity including theadoption of space technologies as part of new generation of tools which helpscientists and decision makers obtain and handle the required information.Information about availability and status of natural resources will no doubtincrease considerably with the availability of satellite imagery. Scientistsand policy makers should recognize the merits of space technologies foranalyzing the wide range of climatic and land use data for strategic planningand generating tactical maps to reverse the trend of environmental degradationand declining assets and achieve sustainable development. To be effective,strategies to increase agricultural production must be supported by soundgovernment policies and an improved flow of information among farmers,scientists and policy makers.
Enhance local capacitybuilding by means of tailor made short training courses for senior decisionmakers and intermediate duration for technical experts/analysts to train themhow to integrate the use of space technologies. Close cooperation on researchand development, education and training will be the key to success indeveloping global information networks and redressing current imbalancesbetween North and South in access to databases, ICT (Information andCommunication Technology) and decision support tools for managing Earthresources and environment and ensuring sustainability. The success or failureof space technology is mainly attributed to the organization’s inherentreceptivity and its ability to sustain development of these new innovations. The capability of spacetechnologies to provide vital inputs towards achieving food and environmentalsecurity, government should embarked upon a program to adopt to his technologyin the Local Government Unit (LGU) level. The application of space technologiescombined with bio-physical, socio-economic, and demographic and technologicalinputs to rapidly initiate sustainable and integrated strategies across thecountry for increasing agricultural productivity is no mote an option but hasbecome the most important imperative if we have to avoid large scale starvationand poverty of people in the coming decades. Using space technologies andmodelling tools as a decision support system in agriculture and naturalresources and local governance is no longer a luxury for scientists and policymakers but a necessity.
Economic Dimension
