Hydro-social and environmental impacts of sugarcane production on land use and food security

Globally, the area of sugarcane is rising in response to growing demand for bioethanol and increased demand for sugar for domestic consumption due to increased prosperity and socio-economic development. In some countries, these changes in land use are happening through conversion of existing agricultural land used for subsistence; whilst in other areas there has been extensive displacement of native vegetation for new cane cultivation. In both cases, this trend towards large-scale industrial mono-cropping is likely to have major impacts on land-use, agro-ecology, food security and ecosystem services. There are also concerns regarding the impact of climate change on land use and food security with rainfall variability putting increased pressure on yields; it is also likely to create greater uncertainty on the viability of rainfed cane production and thus increase water demand for irrigation.

The aim of this project is to launch an international programme to foster trans-disciplinary science, networking and community building. The focus will be on understanding the hydro-social and environmental impacts, benefits and trade-offs that arise through the continued expansion of cane production, and its broader consequences global food security. The project will focus on Brazil, India and South Africa, where agriculture is an important cornerstone of the economy, a basis of economic growth and a significant source of livelihood. It is also a sector under pressure to improve resource efficiency and increase resilience to future climate uncertainty.

The project involves researchers from the UK, the USA, India, Brazil, South Africa and Australia and will encourage a more trans-disciplinary and holistic approach integrating agronomic, climatic, environmental and socio-economic knowledge. The consortium has expertise in agricultural systems, land use modelling, social science, climate impact assessment, rural resource economics, GIS, remote sensing and spatial modeling for decision-making.

We recognise the importance of maximising research impact and the need to embrace a range of innovative measures for knowledge transfer. The THESIS project will have an impact plan to maximise the dissemination and uptake of its outputs to the international research community, as well as to stakeholders, including policy makers involved in agricultural development and the impacts of sugarcane expansion on land use change and food security. The community and capacity building activities will be targeted to specific countries where sugarcane production constitutes a significant component of land use; where agricultural and development pressures on natural resources (land and water) are acute; and where opportunities for supporting knowledge transfer, building research capacity and strengthening the research skills base exist. The principal aim of this project is to bring together a group of researchers, with industry, NGO's and other stakeholders to foster closer multi- and trans-disciplinary subject integration. The relatively short timeframe for this networking and community building activity means that effective user engagement from the outset will be paramount.

The project partners are already well connected with a number of nationally and internationally important organisations, including CGIAR; the Future Agricultures Consortium a DFID-funded initiative supporting an Africa-based alliance of research organisations to improve agricultural policy and practice in Africa; FACCE JPI MACSUR Knowledge Hub, a JPI initiative on Agriculture, Food Security and Climate Change committed to building an integrated European research area to address the interconnected challenges of sustainable agriculture, food security and impacts of climate change; CCAFS, a research program that aims to address the challenges of global warming and food security on agricultural practices, policies and measures through a strategic collaboration between all CGIAR research centres and Future Earth; and other national scale institutions including, for example, the Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association (UNICA) and Bon Sucro who will be invaluable for end-user engagement. All these will provide a double role - offering important links for end user engagement and providing an effective route for output dissemination.

The project will also use innovative approaches including blogs with each work package committing to produce 2 or 3 blogs. Other channels for dissemination include webcasts on the project website. There will also be a variety of opportunities for delivering technical meeting and/or conference presentations, and for writing science papers for submission to relevant journals, including Open Access journals.

Beneficiaries of the community building project:
In addition to building an international researcher network, the project will impact on two groups of non-academic beneficiaries (i) local partners and organisations in each region (Brazil, India, S. Africa) and (ii) other regional and national organisations with interests in land use and food security. Local partners should benefit enormously from this community building project via direct involvement in the stakeholder workshop, but also from the inevitable raising of awareness that will accrue as a result regarding knowledge of the issues facing sugarcane expansion on land use and food security. The stakeholder workshop will provide a mechanism for discussing and capturing the issues from key informants, and sharing experiences from other regions nationally and internationally. Although the project is focused on Brazil, India and S. Africa, the agricultural and socio-economic landscapes represented by these countries are considered representative of other regions globally where cane is grown. This project will therefore provide valuable new insights, evidence and approaches of much wider relevance to a range of regional and national and international organisations and/or businesses.