1. Resilience Thinking and the
Sustainability of Agricultural Systems
Christo Fabricius & Brian Walker

2. Structure of our presentation

3. 1. Our numbers and global Co2
“We can no longer assume that our collective actions will not trigger tipping points as
environmental thresholds are breached, risking irreversible damage to both
ecosystems and human communities”. Ban Ki-moon High-Level Panel on Global
Sustainability
400 ppm?
219 000 new people every day

4. 2. Uneven distribution of per capita food production
Changes in per capita food production, 1960-2010.
From Pretty et al 2011 International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability 9

5. The crisis of African food security
Changes in net per capita agricultural production in Africa (1960 = 100%)
From Pretty et al 2011 International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability 9

6. 6. Population growth
Sub-Saharan Africa
Global Harvest Initiative 2012

7. Per capita GDP
Per capita GDP
FoodconsumptionFoodexpenditureshare
The relation between GDP and
a) food consumption and
(b) food as a share of total
expenditure
a
b
3. Uneven income
distribution: a driver of
food consumption and
affordability
From Cirera & Masset 2010 Phil
Trans Royal Soc 365

8. 4. Global demand for meat & fuel
Foley 2013 in litt
* People are moving ‘up the food chain’
* Tug of war between car owners, meat eaters and the world’s poor

9. Biofuels: the big unknown
Hervé et al. 2011 in Economic Effects of Biofuel Production. Intech

10. Land and water availability
From Rulli et al in press, PNAS
• Ground water and soil depletion in many ‘grabbing’ countries
• Cheap land in Africa; failed states, weak land rights

11. • 66 countries are not self-sufficient
- land or water constraints
From Fader et al. 2013 Environ. Res. Lett. 8
% of popln dependent on
imported food
“available [land] per capita has
shrunk from 13.5 ha/person in
1950 to 3.2 ha/person in 2005, and
is projected to diminish to 1.5
ha/person in 2050” United Nations
Population Fund 2007
But evidence of bans on exports (Earth Policy Institute)

12. Extent and modification of hydrological flows have increased
over the past centuries
Gordon et al. 2008

13. Identified regime shifts related to agriculture and the hydrological cycle
EVAPORATION & LEAF AREA
Wet savanna -> dry savanna
Cloud forests -> Woodland
Forest -> savanna
Monsoons -> No monsoon
Gordon, et al. 2008
RUN-OFF QUANT, QUAL
Eutrophication
Hypoxic zones
River channel change
INFILTRATION, MOISTURE
Salinisation
Vegetation patterns
Soil structure
Atmosphere
Aquatic
Soil

14. CONSUMPTION-meat&fuel
(richoldmillions)
FOOD SELF-SUFFICIENCY
(poor young billions)
High
High
Low
A safe operating space for the world’s food systems?

15. “the capacity to absorb disturbance and re-organise so as to
retain essentially the same function, structure and feedbacks –
to have the same identity”
involves three, intertwined concepts:
1. Thresholds (specified resilience)
2. Adaptability (general resilience)
3. Transformability (capacity to become a different system)
Resilience

16. resilience, per se, is neither ‘good’
nor ‘bad’
undesirable states of systems can
be very resilient (dictatorships,
saline landscapes)
a system state that once was
desirable can become ‘undesirable’
through changes in external
conditions (context)

17. • most losses in resilience are unintended
consequences of processes beyond the scale
of focus
• in particular, failure to recognise cross-scale
and cross-domain feedbacks

18. The shape and size of the basin can change
– thresholds move, and so resilience changes

19. Alternate stable states of a rangeland in western NSW
Grassy state Shrubby state
critical feedback loop
amount of shrubs  amount of grass (fuel load)  intensity of
fire  shrub mortality

20. Thresholds & tipping points
COSTS (Chemicals; fuel; labour; ecosystem services management)
YIELDperHectare
Droughts
Fuel price
Overgrazing Infrequent fires
Meat
demand

21. Thresholds & tipping points
COSTS (Chemicals; fuel; labour; ecosystem services management)
YIELDperHectare
Droughts
Cheap imports
Over-investment Ecosystem mismanagement
Demand
for dairy
products
Recession
Over-pumping

22. Transformability
• preparedness to change
• getting beyond the state of denial
• options for change
• new ‘trajectories’ - emerge from support for experiments,
novelty, continual learning
• capacity to change
• levels of capitals (including ‘social capital’), higher-scale
support - governance
Capacity to make use of ‘windows of opportunity’
Folke et al. 2009 In: Principles of Ecosystem Stewardship: Springer

23. Just LOOKING at the problem
will not solve it

24. Social-ecological systems framework
Goulburn Broken Catchment Management Plan, Australia
http://www.gbcma.vic.gov.au
With participation and empowerment at every level and in every sphere

25. Innovation: no holy cows anymore
Global Harvest Initiative 2012

26. Investing in APPROPRIATE research & extension services
Global Harvest Initiative 2012
Returns to investment in research, and extension,
respectively is 43% and 49% (Alston 2000; Global Harvest
Initiative 2012)

27. Innovation
• The promise of cooperatives
– Milk production: Indian National
Dairy Development Corporation
– Agri-cooperatives
• BUT require
– Governance
– Trust
– Leadership

28. The Fort Hare Agri-park, South Africa
Over time a range of economic activities and developments will occur, towards expanded and holistic enhancement
of local livelihoods, led in the longer term by organized, capacitated, self-representing and flourishing communities
FEEDER PLOT co-owned by
community members in collective/
cooperative structure
Independent local
producers
AGRO-PROCESSING
FACILITY co-owned
with community members-
workers
NURSERY - Co-operatively owned
supplying planting material to local
producers
Public Sector
Markets
- Schools (SNP)
- Hospitals & Clinics
- Other public
establishments
Private
Sector
Markets
domestic and
international
R&D, capacity-building and other development support by university,
departments and other institutions
Depot
Depot
Courtesy of Prof Jan Raats

29. Working with farmers to incorporate local knowledge
Is the perception that it is getting drier true?
Enfors and Gordon, 2007
Not for seasonal rainfall..
…but dryspells are increasing

30. What promotes resilience thinking and practice?
1. foster an understanding of SES as complex adaptive systems
2. maintain diversity and redundancy
3. manage connectivity
4. manage slow variables and feedbacks
5. encourage learning and experimentation
6. broaden participation
7. promote distributed systems for decision making at multiple
levels
Biggs et al. 2012. Annual Review of Environment and Resources 37

31. Social transformation
• From only productivity-focused to using
a resilience lens
• Diversification
• Looking across scales and knowledge
systems. From policy reform to local
use of technology
• Linking ecosystems, society, economic
systems and governance
• “Novel social infrastructure” built on
trust
• “Collaborative resilience”: private
sector, governments, farmers
• Empowerment of women
– Farming is an excellent entry point

32. Resilience resources:
-www.resalliance.org
-information and news
- workbooks (free, downloadable)
-Ecology and Society
-www.ecologyandsociety.org
-Twitter:
@christofab
@resilienceSci

33. http://islandpress.org/ip/books/book
/islandpress/R/bo8070201.html
Island Press