Faculty of Public Health and Policy, Department of Public Health, Environments and Society, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom.
UCL Institute for Environmental Design and Engineering, Bartlett School of Environment, Energy and Resources, University College London, London, United Kingdom.
PLoS One. 2021 Feb 11;16(2):e0246788. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0246788. eCollection 2021.
Undernutrition is a major contributor to the global-burden of disease, and global-level health impact models suggest that climate change-mediated reductions in food quantity and quality will negatively affect it. These models, however, capture just some of the processes that will shape future nutrition. We adopt an alternative standpoint, developing an agent-based model in which producer-consumer smallholders practice different 'styles of farming' in the global food system. The model represents a hypothetical rural community in which 'orphan' (subsistence) farmers may develop by adopting an 'entrepreneurial' style (highly market-dependent) or by maintaining a 'peasant' style (agroecology). We take a first look at the question: how might patterns of farming styles-under various style preference, climate, policy, and price transmission scenarios-impact on hunger and health-supporting conditions (incomes, work, inequality, 'real land productivity') in rural areas? imulations without climate change or agricultural policy found that style preference patterns influence production, food price, and incomes, and there were trade-offs between them. For instance, entrepreneurial-oriented futures had the highest production and lowest prices but were simultaneously those in which farms tended towards crisis. Simulations with climate change and agricultural policy found that peasant-orientated agroecology futures had the highest production, prices equal to or lower than those under entrepreneurial-oriented futures, and better supported rural health. There were, however, contradictory effects on nutrition, with benefits and harms for different groups. Collectively the findings suggest that when attempting to understand how climate change may impact on future nutrition and health, patterns of farming styles-along with the fates of the households that practice them-matter. These issues, including the potential role of peasant farming, have been neglected in previous global-level climate-nutrition modelling but go to the heart of current debates on the future of farming: thus, they should be given more prominence in future work.
营养不良是全球疾病负担的主要原因之一,全球卫生影响模型表明,气候变化导致的食物数量和质量减少将对其产生负面影响。然而,这些模型仅捕捉到了一些将塑造未来营养状况的过程。我们采用了另一种观点,开发了一个基于代理的模型,其中生产者-消费者小农在全球粮食系统中实践不同的“耕作方式”。该模型代表了一个假设的农村社区,其中“孤儿”(自给自足)农民可以通过采用“企业家”风格(高度依赖市场)或通过维持“农民”风格(农业生态学)来发展。我们首先探讨了这样一个问题:在各种风格偏好、气候、政策和价格传递情景下,耕作方式模式如何影响农村地区的饥饿和健康支持条件(收入、工作、不平等、“实际土地生产力”)?在没有气候变化或农业政策的模拟中发现,风格偏好模式会影响生产、食品价格和收入,并且它们之间存在权衡。例如,以企业家为导向的未来具有最高的产量和最低的价格,但同时也是农场趋于危机的未来。在有气候变化和农业政策的模拟中发现,以农民为导向的农业生态学未来具有最高的产量,价格与以企业家为导向的未来相同或更低,并且更好地支持农村健康。然而,对营养的影响存在矛盾,不同群体有好处和坏处。总的来说,研究结果表明,当试图了解气候变化可能如何影响未来的营养和健康时,耕作方式模式——以及实践这些模式的家庭的命运——很重要。这些问题包括农民耕作的潜在作用,在前瞻性全球气候-营养模型中被忽视了,但它们是当前关于农业未来的辩论的核心:因此,在未来的工作中应更加重视这些问题。