Innovation in agriculture: learning from IAASTD

A report of the September 2008 meeting of the FEC’s Business Forum

We need innovation in agriculture, but how should we innovate and who decides? The September 2008 meeting of the Food Ethics Council’s (FEC) Business Forum debated this issue.

We are very grateful to Professor Bob Watson, Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK Department for Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, for speaking at the meeting.

The meeting was chaired by David Croft, Director of Conformance and Sustainability at Cadbury and a member of the FEC.

Key points from the meeting include:

• Population and consumption trends suggest we will have to double food production over the next 20-50 years.
• Yet recent production increases have failed to eradicate hunger, seen increased diet-related disease and caused major environmental damage. Agricultural innovation must feed a growing world population in ways that are fair and environmentally sustainable.
• IAASTD concluded that business as usual is not an option.
• It calls for agroecological approaches combining scientific research with farmer know-how, and involving stakeholders from the start.
• It highlights that social and economic innovation can be as valuable as new technologies.
• A highly controversial issue in IAASTD was GM crops on which it was cautious, though it was not opposed to them on principle.
• Critics argue that current GM crops are anti-innovation, because they are the product of intellectual property (IP) systems that restrict the sharing of technology and knowledge.
• As well as shaping and enforcing IP systems, governments get involved in innovation by funding and procuring research, creating new markets and regulating new technologies.
• England should look to other countries for models to help improve its agricultural innovation systems.