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Central Asia is projected to experience a significant climate change, combined with increased weather volatility. Agriculture is a key economic sector and a major source of livelihoods for Central Asia's predominantly rural population, especially for the poor. Agricultural production, being sensitive to weather shocks and climate volatility, may suffer from climate change if no adaptive actions are taken. Taking these into account, the present study seeks to estimate the potential economic impacts of climate change on Central Asia's agriculture and rural livelihoods, as well as to identify factors catalyzing or constraining adaptation to climate change. Weather shocks could potentially affect the supply of agricultural commodities and their prices. In this thesis, the effects of weather shocks on agricultural commodity prices in Central Asia are studied at the provincial scale using monthly data for the period of 2000-2010. The study analyses the idiosyncratic components of the variables using feasible generalized least squares (FGLS) panel regression in the presence of cross-sectional dependence and serial autocorrelation. The analysis indicates that negative shocks, involving lower than usual temperatures and precipitation amounts, could lead to higher wheat prices in the region. Lower availability of irrigation water may encourage irrigation-dependent countries in the region to aggressively raise wheat stocks to face expected supply shortfalls, thus leading to higher regional wheat prices. This effect could be further aggravated by negative impacts of lower irrigation water availability on wheat yields. The estimates of the aggregate impacts of climate change on Central Asian agriculture range between +1.21% to -1.43% of net crop production revenues by 2040. The absolute monetary impact is not negligible, ranging from + 180 mln USD annually in the optimistic scenario, to – 210 mln USD annually in the pessimistic scenario relative to 2010 levels, where optimistic and pessimistic scenarios are defined to correspond to B1 (lowest future emission trajectory) and A1FI (highest future emission trajectory) scenarios by IPCC (2007), respectively. As a key conclusion, agricultural producers operating in inherently stressed environments, such as in Central Asia, may have relatively more experience to dynamically adapt to erratic and changing environments. The analysis of the nationally representative household surveys using quantile regressions with and without instrumentalizing for endogeneity between consumption and production decisions within the framework of agricultural household model confirms that poorer households are more vulnerable to the impacts of weather and climate shocks with every 1% decrease in the level of their farming profits being likely to lead to 0.52% decrease in their food expenses. A similar decrease for the richest 10% of households would translate to only 0.39% decrease in food consumption. The models also show that the profit effect of potato prices seems to be quite important especially for the poorest farmers. Many farmers in Central Asia are already engaged in ex post adaptation to the changing climate; however, further Government support is needed for pro-active ex ante actions. A vital mechanism for achieving this purpose is through increasing farmers' resilience and adaptive capacities to withstand current and future shocks, both expected and uncertain. The analysis shows that key policy actions to achieve this in the region are through: i) increasing awareness of agricultural producers about climate change impacts and adaptation technologies; and ii) improving rural financial intermediation. The key general message of the adaptation analysis in this study is that most institutional and technological options suggested as measures to adapt to climate change in the region are strongly needed for regional development even with perfect climate change mitigation. ; Klimaschwankungen und -veränderung in Zentralasien: Wirtschaftliche Auswirkungen und Anpassungsmöglichkeiten Zentralasien wird den Vorhersagen zufolge signifikante Klimaveränderungen gekoppelt mit erhöhten Klimaschwankungen erleben. Die Landwirtschaft ist ein wichtiger Wirtschaftszweig und eine wichtige Lebensgrundlage für die überwiegend ländliche Bevölkerung Zentralasiens, vor allem für die Armen. Die landwirtschaftliche Produktion, die anfällig für Wetterextreme und Klimaschwankungen ist, kann durch den Klimawandel beeinträchtigt werden, z.T. mit gravierenden Folgen für die Lebensgrundlage im ländlichen Raum in vielen Teilen der Region, wenn keine adaptive Maßnahmen ergriffen werden. Dies berücksichtigend versucht die vorliegende Studie, die möglichen wirtschaftlichen Auswirkungen des Klimawandels auf die Landwirtschaft und ländliche Lebensgrundlage Zentralasiens zu bewerten sowie die Faktoren, die die Anpassung an den Klimawandel katalysieren oder einschränken, zu identifizieren. Wetterextreme könnten potenziell die Versorgung mit landwirtschaftlichen Rohstoffen und deren Preise beeinträchtigen. In dieser Arbeit werden die Auswirkungen von Wetterextremen auf landwirtschaftliche Rohstoffpreise in Zentralasien auf Provinzebene mit monatlichen Daten für den Zeitraum von 2000-2010 untersucht. Die Studie verwendet eine innovative Schätzmethode, bei der die idiosynkratischen Komponenten der Variablen mit Verallgemeinerte Kleinste-Quadrate-Modelle (FGLS) Panelregression bei Querschnittsabhängigkeit und serieller Autokorrelation analysiert werden. Die Analyse zeigt, negative Extreme, die niedrigere Temperaturen und Niederschlagsmengen als üblich bedeuten, könnten günstige Bedingungen für höhere Weizenpreise in der Region hervorrufen. Eine geringere Verfügbarkeit von Bewässerungwasser kann die Länder in der Region, die vom Bewässerungswasser abhängig sind, dazu animiere, die Weizenbestände aggressiv zu erhöhen, um die zu erwartenden Engpässen abzupuffern, was zu höheren regionalen Weizenpreisen führen würde. Dieser Effekt könnte zusätzlich verschärft werden durch die negativen Auswirkungen geringerer Wasserverfügbarkeit auf die Weizenerträge. Die Schätzungen der aggregierten Auswirkungen des Klimawandels auf die zentralasiatische Landwirtschaft schwanken von +1,21% bis -1,43% des Nettoumsatzes für Getreideproduktion im Jahr 2040. Die absoluten monetären Auswirkungen sind nicht unerheblich, sie können von +180 Millionen USD jährlich im optimistischen Szenario bis hin zu -210 Millionen USD jährlich im pessimistischen Szenario gegenüber dem Niveau von 2010 variieren, entsprechend den optimistischen und pessimistischen Szenarien B1 (niedrigste zukünftige Emissionskurve) bzw. A1FI (höchste zukünftige Emissionskurve) des IPCC (2007). Als zentrales Ergebnis ist festzustellen, dass die landwirtschaftlichen Produzenten, die in derart inhärent unsicheren Umgebungen operieren, erfahrener sind, sich dynamisch an eine unregelmäßige und sich verändernde Umwelt anzupassen. Die Analyse von national repräsentative Haushaltsbefragungen unter Verwendung von Quantilregressionen mit und ohne Instrumentalisierung für Endogenität zwischen Konsum- und Produktionsentscheidungen im Rahmen des landwirtschaftlichen Haushalts-Modells bestätigt, dass ärmere Haushalte anfälliger sind für die Auswirkungen von Wetter- und Klimaextrema. Ein 1%er Rückgang des Niveaus ihrer landwirtschaftlichen Gewinne führt möglicherweise zu einem Rückgang von 0,52% der Verpflegungskosten, während ein ähnlicher Rückgang für die reichsten 10% der Haushalte nur zu einem Rückgang von 0,39% der Nahrungsaufnahme führen würde. Die Modelle zeigen auch, die Gewinnwirkung der Kartoffelpreise scheint vor allem für die ärmsten Bauern wichtig zu sein. Viele Bauern in Zentralasien sind bereits mit der ex-post-Anpassung an den Klimawandel beschäftigt; weitere Unterstützung seitens der Regierung ist jedoch für pro-aktive ex-ante-Maßnahmen. Ein wichtiger Mechanismus für die Erreichung dieses Ziels ist die Erhöhung der Widerstandsfähigkeit der Landwirte und deren Anpassungsfähigkeit an aktuelle und zukünftige, sowohl vorhersehbare als auch ungewisse Extrema. Die Analyse zeigt die folgenden wichtigsten politischen Maßnahmen auf, um dieses in der Region zu erreichen: i) das Bewusstsein der landwirtschaftlichen Produzenten hinsichtlich der Auswirkungen des Klimawandels und Anpassungtechnologien zu erhöhen; und ii) die Verbesserung der ländlichen Kredit- und Versicherungsvermittlung. Die Schlüsselbotschaft der Anpassungsanalyse dieser Studie ist, dass die meisten institutionellen und technologischen Möglichkeiten, die als Maßnahmen zur Anpassung an den Klimawandel in der Region vorgeschlagen werden, dringend erforderlich sind für regionale Entwicklung auch bei vollständiger Verringerung des Klimawandels.

As crop straw and firewood are generated as by-products of food production systems, they are perceived to be sustainable energy sources that do not threaten food security by Chinese government for a long time. However, the time spent on collecting straw and firewood may create a burden on rural household, as it could reduce the available labor inputs for agricultural production, which in turn, possibly brings negative impact on food security. Building on an integrated agriculture-energy production system, a Symmetric Normalized Quadratic (SNQ) multi-output profit function (which includes labor allocations as quasi-fixed factors) is estimated to investigate the impacts of traditional biomass energy use on agricultural production in this paper. The negative signs of the calculated cross-price elasticities of supply (agricultural products and biomass energy) confirm that the relationship between biomass collection and agricultural production is competition. Moreover, the cross-price elasticities of biomass collection with respect to inputs are positive, implying that indirect link between biomass collection and agricultural production perhaps lies in household consumption decisions. The important implication of this study is that potential policy interventions for developing biomass energy in rural China could aim at enhancing food security by improving household motivation of engaging in agricultural production and slowing down the competition between biomass collection and agricultural production. It is suggested that government should attach more importance to simultaneously promote the prices of agricultural products and control the prices of intermediate inputs.

Achievement of Sustainable Development Goals critically depends on well-functioning food systems which can provide sufficient and healthy food for all in an environmentally sustainable, economically viable and socially equitable manner. However, current food systems are failing on all of these dimensions. In fact, food systems are generating substantial amounts of environmental, health-related, social, and economic externalities negatively affecting the well-being of present and future generations of people, particularly that of the poorest and most vulnerable. True cost accounting approaches, a research frontier in sustainability sciences, seek to comprehensively measure these so far unaccounted externalities from food systems to propose solutions for addressing their negative social welfare effects. Contributing to discussions on true costs of food, this paper traces the environmental costs of ecosystems degradation due to cropland expansion during the period of 2001 to 2009 at the global level. The results show that cropland expansion caused by growing food demands has led to the degradation of 511 million hectares of higher value forest, woodland, shrubland and grassland ecosystems globally, with the total economic costs equaling 435 billion U.S. dollars. This means that each year the global community is incurring 54 billion U.S. dollars of externality costs from food systems because of cropland expansion alone. Addressing this problem requires a flexible government regulation combining incentive mechanisms such as payments for ecosystem services and carbon pricing, with legislative deterrents, e. g., environmentally friendly cadastral planning, fines, and taxes. Current research on true cost accounting is primarily focused on identifying the extent of externalities from food systems. However, knowledge does not always automatically translate into action. The key impetus for future actions for true pricing of food would come from closing knowledge gaps on transaction costs for the implementation of true pricing and the development of innovative solutions for reducing them.

Achievement of Sustainable Development Goals critically depends on well-functioning food systems which can provide sufficient and healthy food for all in an environmentally sustainable, economically viable and socially equitable manner. However, current food systems are failing on all of these dimensions. In fact, food systems are generating substantial amounts of environmental, health-related, social, and economic externalities negatively affecting the well-being of present and future generations of people, particularly that of the poorest and most vulnerable. True cost accounting approaches, a research frontier in sustainability sciences, seek to comprehensively measure these so far unaccounted externalities from food systems to propose solutions for addressing their negative social welfare effects. Contributing to discussions on true costs of food, this paper traces the environmental costs of ecosystems degradation due to cropland expansion during the period of 2001 to 2009 at the global level. The results show that cropland expansion caused by growing food demands has led to the degradation of 511 million hectares of higher value forest, woodland, shrubland and grassland ecosystems globally, with the total economic costs equaling 435 billion U.S. dollars. This means that each year the global community is incurring 54 billion U.S. dollars of externality costs from food systems because of cropland expansion alone. Addressing this problem requires a flexible government regulation combining incentive mechanisms such as payments for ecosystem services and carbon pricing, with legislative deterrents, e. g., environmentally friendly cadastral planning, fines, and taxes. Current research on true cost accounting is primarily focused on identifying the extent of externalities from food systems. However, knowledge does not always automatically translate into action. The key impetus for future actions for true pricing of food would come from closing knowledge gaps on transaction costs for the implementation of true ...

In this paper, we adapt a new conceptual framework for the assessment of the economics of land degradation and sustainable land management to the Baltic region. The findings show that the problem of land degradation in the countries of the region is quite substantial, manifesting itself through reductions in the provision of land ecosystem services. Using a benefit transfer approach, the total economic value of these losses due to land degradation is estimated to be about 9 billion USD annually. On the other hand, we find that every dollar invested into restoring the degraded land ecosystems may return about 3 dollars in social gains after a 6-year period following the re-establishment of the higher value biome, making actions to address land degradation in the region both environmentally valuable and economically attractive.

AbstractAgricultural land use in watersheds for food and biofuels production presents several challenges within the Water-Energy-Food (WEF) nexus at the local and global scales. Firstly, high global energy prices may lead to increasing demand for bio-energy crops, thereby intensifying the competition for arable land and water with food crops. There may be potential net welfare benefits from bio-energy development in terms of poverty reduction, higher agricultural household incomes, and lower greenhouse gas emissions. However, so far, there has been little quantitative research evaluating and communicating the nexus synergies and trade-offs. Another challenge is that differentiation of gender roles in the nexus trade-offs and synergies is mostly overlooked. This results in marginalisation of mostly the female gender in land use decisions. Therefore, there is a need for quantitative evidence-based research and incentive frameworks for governing the nexus to ensure the continuity and progress in global and local food supply and bio-energy development, while maintaining the sustainability of the watershed ecological services.

This volume deals with land degradation, which is occurring in almost all terrestrial biomes and agro-ecologies, in both low and high income countries and is stretching to about 30% of the total global land area. About three billion people reside in these degraded lands. However, the impact of land degradation is especially severe on livelihoods of the poor who heavily depend on natural resources. The annual global cost of land degradation due to land use and cover change (LUCC) and lower cropland and rangeland productivity is estimated to be about 300 billion USD. Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) accounts for the largest share (22%) of the total global cost of land degradation. Only about 38% of the cost of land degradation due to LUCC - which accounts for 78% of the US$300 billion loss - is borne by land users and the remaining share (62%) is borne by consumers of ecosystem services off the farm. The results in this volume indicate that reversing land degradation trends makes both economic sense, and has multiple social and environmental benefits. On average, one US dollar investment into restoration of degraded land returns five US dollars. The findings of the country case studies call for increased investments into the rehabilitation and restoration of degraded lands, including through such institutional and policy measures as strengthening community participation for sustainable land management, enhancing government effectiveness and rule of law, improving access to markets and rural services, and securing land tenure. The assessment in this volume has been conducted at a time when there is an elevated interest in private land investments and when global efforts to achieve sustainable development objectives have intensified. In this regard, the results of this volume can contribute significantly to the ongoing policy debate and efforts to design strategies for achieving sustainable development goals and related efforts to address land degradation and halt biodiversity loss

environmental economics; biodiversity; sustainable development

This volume deals with land degradation, which is occurring in almost all terrestrial biomes and agro-ecologies, in both low and high income countries and is stretching to about 30% of the total global land area. About three billion people reside in these degraded lands. However, the impact of land degradation is especially severe on livelihoods of the poor who heavily depend on natural resources. The annual global cost of land degradation due to land use and cover change (LUCC) and lower cropland and rangeland productivity is estimated to be about 300 billion USD. Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) accounts for the largest share (22%) of the total global cost of land degradation. Only about 38% of the cost of land degradation due to LUCC - which accounts for 78% of the US$300 billion loss - is borne by land users and the remaining share (62%) is borne by consumers of ecosystem services off the farm. The results in this volume indicate that reversing land degradation trends makes both economic sense, and has multiple social and environmental benefits. On average, one US dollar investment into restoration of degraded land returns five US dollars. The findings of the country case studies call for increased investments into the rehabilitation and restoration of degraded lands, including through such institutional and policy measures as strengthening community participation for sustainable land management, enhancing government effectiveness and rule of law, improving access to markets and rural services, and securing land tenure. The assessment in this volume has been conducted at a time when there is an elevated interest in private land investments and when global efforts to achieve sustainable development objectives have intensified. In this regard, the results of this volume can contribute significantly to the ongoing policy debate and efforts to design strategies for achieving sustainable development goals and related efforts to address land degradation and halt biodiversity loss.