An Overview Of Our Solution
Wild pollinators are overseen as part of agrobiodiversity and as production factor. Wild pollinators are globally in decline. Farming with Alternative Pollinators (FAP) increases yields/ha (up to 100%) by habitat enhancement for wild pollinators. FAP creates an incentive for farmers to seed strips of additional marketable plants (crops, medicinal plants, spices) attracting a high diversity of pollinators and predators. The strips allow income from the entire land and prevent spread of weeds. FAP pays-off already in the first year and requires knowledge only. FAP is the only economically self-sustaining approach to protect pollinators, which are essential for agriculture, ecosystems and human wellbeing. The new approach (Christmann and Aw-Hassan 2012) is replicable due to results in Uzbekistan and Morocco hosting very different species.
Who is this solution impacting?
Community Type
Suburban
Rural
Additional Information
- Population Impacted:
- Continent: Africa
General Information
Organization type
Nirlaba
Ecosystem (select all that apply)
Forests
Population impacted
All producers & consumers of these crops globally
Challenge
Size of agricultural area
The total of agricultural lands (globally), because farmers producing rice, wheat or maize might later shift to pollinator dependent crops or benefit from rich environment around
Production quantity
Productivity was more than double for sour cherry and cucumber in comparison to control; FAP might increase income from pollinator dependent crops 50% per ha. The crops in the habitat strips buffer against income loss in case pest affect the main crop.
People employed
We do on farm trials, by now with around 60 farmers, but trained farmers started to experiment themselves using the FAP-approach
Solution
Describe your solution
FAP is based on The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB 2010) and thus on the demonstration of the economic value of ecosystem services and biodiversity. FAP measures the economic benefit of habitat enhancement attracting a higher diversity and abundance of pollinators and also predators. FAP was tested in on-farm trials with smallholder farmers, commercial farmers and schools having a school garden. In Uzbekistan and Morocco (2013-2016) we tested FAP with cucumber as main crop. These countries host very different pollinator species. FAP-fields producing cucumber as main crop provided more than double the income than control fields in both countries. This shows that FAP is replicable. In Uzbekistan FAP more than doubled the yield of sour cherry (not yet replicated in another country). Currently, we assess the impact of FAP on faba bean in Morocco. Farmers are highly interested in this low-cost approach, which increases yields significantly already in the first year. In some rural areas we had only 30% readiness to enhance habitats ex ante, but 94% ex post. In Uzbekistan the regional government and farmers circulated the results of the first year, in consequence it was a challenge to find control farmers for the second year (Christmann et al. in review). We produce manuals with detailed planting instructions, which are readable also for illiterates, as they are based mainly on photographic documentation (available at research gate).
Implementation
Describe your implementation
FAP builds on the natural win-win-situation that (1) higher diversity of effective pollinators can increase the yield of many crops in economic terms (in quantity and quality), (2) diversity is more crucial than abundance and (3) the distance between crop and nest/habitat is the limiting factor for pollinator diversity and higher yields (e.g. Christmann and Aw-Hassan 2012; Garibaldi et al. 2014; Garibaldi et al. 2016; Kohler et al. 2008). FAP promotes simultaneously environmentally sustainable intensification of production and economically self-supporting species protection. Enabling conditions: Whereas seeding wildflower strips in agricultural (promoted by the majority of entomologists, see e.g. Garibaldi 2014; Feltham et al. 2015) is not accepted by farmers (spread of weeds, no income from these zones) FAP develops the habitat zones participatory with farmers. Family farmers are the ideal target group to get the first results on net income increase in a country, because they use less chemicals than commercial farmers, don’t pay for labor and women are interested in the crops of the habitat zone. The results can later be used to convince also commercial farmers. Key success factor: The high income gain is the argument to convince also commercial farmers. In Uzbekistan they clearly declared that the higher investment for labor in the habitat zone is a negligible factor in comparison to the income increase. The habitat zone can be simplified for commercial farmers using only the most effective habitat plants and slightly different nesting support. Main obstacle (for research): If the income increase of the first year is communicated by national extension service, it is difficult to find farmers ready to do control fields in the second year; but this is good from the point of development.
External connections
Please note that FAP is a very young innovation, so it cannot have political impact yet. The Ministry for Agriculture and Fishery in Morocco confirmed in a letter to BMUB that Morocco will fund the outscaling of FAP in Morocco, if ICARDA provides the manuals. ICARDA and ICIPE developed a MoU to collaborate on FAP.
German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Protection, Building and Nuclear Safety, Germany (BMUB, donor)
German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ, donor)
Federal Agency for Nature Conservation, Germany (Dr. Axel Ssymank, visited fields in Uzbekistan)
University of Mons/Belgium (Prof. Pierre Rasmont)
University of Reading (Prof. Simon G. Potts, reference for proposals, support letters for this approach; Prof. Potts is lead author of the IPBES-report)
Ulrich Lepel (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), visited fields in Morocco)
Research Institute of Gene Pool of Plants and Animals of Uzbek Academy of Sciences (collaborating partner)
Samarkand State University, Uzbekistan, (collaborating partner)
Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA), Morocco (collaborating partner)
Results
What is the environmental or ecological challenge you are targeting with your solution?
Most high value crops depend on pollinators. The demand for high value crops increases faster than for pollinator independent crops (Potts et al. 2016b), but the trend of low and unstable yields of pollinator-dependent crops is compensated by increase of area (Garibaldi et al. 2011) or addressed by breeding pollinator-independent crops. Both puts pollinators at risk as it reduces natural habitats and availability of forage. Globally the diversity of pollinators has been declining rapidly for decades, particularly in agricultural landscapes (Biesmeijer et al. 2006; Burkle et al. 2013). Climate change becomes a major risk factor for pollinators (Potts et al. 2016). Wild pollinators provide 85% of global pollination services (Nabhan and Buchman 1997). Honeybees cannot compensate for the loss of diversity of wild pollinators (Garibaldi et al. 2013). Wild pollinators work with small distance from nests (50-2000m), so each village has to contribute to protection.
Describe the context in which you are operating
By now Farming with Alternative Pollinators (FAP) works mainly with smallholder farmers (˂5 ha), but also with schools and commercial farmers (orchards). FAP compares FAP and control fields concerning insect diversity and net income. Both types of fields use 75% of the field for the main crop. 25% are used either for habitat enhancement (FAP) or also for the main crop (control). Farmers are very ready to collaborate as they get income also from the habitat zone, and because the habitat zone does not spread weeds (different to mostly recommended seeding of “wildflower” strips). Lack of knowledge among farmers is the critical point due to qualitative and quantitative research in 2 countries. Farmers’ readiness to protect pollinators by habitat strips without payment increased from 30 to 94% after farmers learned about evidence of increased yields (more than 100% for sour cherry and cucumber). Farmers request figures on income increase for different crops.
How did you impact natural resource use and greenhouse gas emissions?
FAP fields had much higher pollinator diversity than control fields, because they provide flowers of different flower types and with different colors of petals than the main crop. FAP fields had flowers for a much longer period than control fields. While control fields usually had only honeybees and sometimes one more species, FAP fields often had more than 10 pollinator species simultaneously (e.g. Osmia, Bombus and Andrena in Uzbekistan, Halictus, Colletes, Osmia and different wasps in Morocco). The diversity of predators was much higher and pests reduced (diversity and abundance), so the need for chemicals was reduced. Abundance of pollinators and predators was higher in FAP fields as well. Pollinators also used some of the nesting materials provided in field edges. The second phase of FAP builds on well-aware farmers ready to develop pollinator corridors between natural and agricultural sites. The 3rd and4th phase focus on policy mainstreaming, but we are not yet that far.
Language(s)
Global project. Tests currently in Morocco (Arabic, French, Berber) and Uzbekistan (Uzbek)
Water
87% of all flowering plants require insect pollinators. If pollinators would go extinct, also the water recovery capacity of these 87% of flowering plants would be lost. – Most pollinator dependent crops demand less irrigation than most pollinator dependent crops (rice, wheat, maize etc.). FAP sustains pollinators for later crop change.
Food Security/Nutrition
FAP increases productivity per ha, quality of crops is enhanced. So FAP supports food security concerning high value crops. Higher yields can make vegetables, fruits, nuts, oil seeds etc. also more accessible for low income households.
Economic/Sustainable Development
FAP enhances farm income already in the first year (Christmann et al. in review; brochures in research gate). FAP buffers against income loss in case a pest affects the main crop, as the habitat zone also provides income and is in general not affected by the same pest (experience in 2 countries). FAP increases productivity per ha and might reduce the use of rangelands and forest area for crop production.
Climate
Cross-pollination enhances genetic diversity and thus the development of varieties better adapted to future climates. Sustaining cross-pollination by protection of wild pollinators is therefore crucial for climate change adaptation of natural species. Even rich countries cannot fund broad ongoing protection strategies for species relying on a habitat in a radius of 50-2000m around the nest. FAP triggers intrinsic motivation of farmers to sustain pollinators.
Sustainability
FAP is economically self-supporting as it shows the economic value of pollinators to farmers and thus triggers motivation to protect pollinators. It is based on The Economics of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (TEEB). Different to most other TEEB based approaches FAP does not require a Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) arrangement, because the incentive (higher revenue) is inherent to the approach. This makes it scalable.
Return on investment
The projects in Uzbekistan and Morocco for sour cherry and cucumber had a total volume of 180.000 Euro, the FAP-faba bean project has 240.000 Euro. The project in Uzbekistan developed the experimental designs for FAP for field crops and orchards, the cucumber project in Morocco proved the replicability. Both projects also analyzed the knowledge of farmers, but they did not focus on outscaling. We are in the final stage concerning a 6.5 mln € proposal, for which Morocco (MoA) assured outscaling on their cost. It is a regional project.
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Replication and Scale
How could we successfully replicate this solution elsewhere?
FAP is replicable, as projects in Morocco and Uzbekistan showed.
ICARDA would like to use the prize to prepare
(1) a video presenting Farmer-to-farmer instructions taken in FAP and control fields and
(2) a video taken in modern agricultural landscapes explaining, (a) why pollinators cannot survive in such lands, (b) the overall value of pollinators, (c) the risks mankind will face in the course of climate change if pollinator decline goes on.
Both videos shall be outscaled by youtube and social media.
(3) a policy sheet for all stakeholders engaged in “solution search” to promote a change of curricula of secondary schools to include some lessons on pollinators into obligatory school curricula to reach the future generation, but by pupils also the current farmer generations. We would prepare an Annex to the policy paper covering the main content of these lessons.