Editing IPCC:AR6/SRCCL/Chapter-5 (section)

==== 5.6.4.4 Sustainable intensification ====

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The need to produce about 50% more food by 2050, required to feed the increasing world population (FAO 2018a <sup>[[#fn:r1138|1138]]</sup> ), may come at the price of significant increases in GHG emissions and environmental impacts, including loss of biodiversity. For instance, land conversion for agriculture is responsible for an estimated 8–10% of all anthropogenic GHG emissions currently (Section 5.4). Recent calls for sustainable intensification (SI) are based on the premise that damage to the environment through extensification outweighs benefits of extra food produced on new lands (Godfray 2015 <sup>[[#fn:r1139|1139]]</sup> ). However, increasing the net production area by restoring already degraded land may contribute to increased production on the one hand and increased carbon sequestration on the other (Jat et al. 2016 <sup>[[#fn:r1140|1140]]</sup> ), thereby contributing to both increased agricultural production and improved natural capital outcomes (Pretty et al. 2018 <sup>[[#fn:r1141|1141]]</sup> ).

Sustainable intensification is a goal but does not specify ''a priori'' how it could be attained, for example, which agricultural techniques to deploy (Garnett et al. 2013 <sup>[[#fn:r1142|1142]]</sup> ). It can be combined with selected other improved management practices, for example, conservation agriculture (see above), or agroforestry, with additional economic, ecosystem services, and carbon benefits. Sustainable intensification, by improving nutrient, water, and other input-use efficiency, not only helps to close yield gaps and contribute to food security (Garnett et al. 2013 <sup>[[#fn:r1143|1143]]</sup> ), but also reduces the loss of such production inputs and associated emissions (Sapkota et al. 2017c <sup>[[#fn:r1144|1144]]</sup> ; Wollenberg et al. 2016 <sup>[[#fn:r1145|1145]]</sup> ). Closing yield gaps is a way to become more efficient in use of land per unit production. Currently, most regions in Africa and South Asia have attained less than 40% of their potential crop production (Pradhan et al. 2015 <sup>[[#fn:r1146|1146]]</sup> ). Integrated farming systems (e.g., mixed crop/livestock, crop/aquaculture) are strategies to produce more products per unit land, which in regard to food security, becomes highly relevant.

Sustainable intensification acknowledges that enhanced productivity needs to be accompanied by maintenance of other ecosystem services and enhanced resilience to shocks (Vanlauwe et al. 2014 <sup>[[#fn:r1147|1147]]</sup> ). SI in intensively farmed areas may require a reduction in production in favour of increasing sustainability in the broad sense (Buckwell et al. 2014 <sup>[[#fn:r1148|1148]]</sup> ) (Cross-Chapter Box 6 in Chapter 5). Hence, moving towards sustainability may imply lower yield growth rates than those maximally attainable in such situations. For areas that contain valuable natural ecosystems, such as the primary forest in the Congo basin, intensification of agriculture is one of the pillars of the strategy to conserve forest (Vanlauwe et al. 2014 <sup>[[#fn:r1149|1149]]</sup> ). Intensification in agriculture is recognised as one of the pathways to meet food security and climate change adaptation and mitigation goals (Sapkota et al. 2017c <sup>[[#fn:r1150|1150]]</sup> ).

However, SI does not always confer co-benefits in terms of food security and climate change adaption/mitigation. For example, in the case of Vietnam, intensified production of rice and pigs reduced GHG emissions in the short term through land sparing, but after two decades, the emissions associated with higher inputs were likely to outweigh the savings from land sparing (Thu Thuy et al. 2009). Intensification needs to be sustainable in all components of food system by curbing agricultural sprawl, rebuilding soils, restoring degraded lands, reducing agricultural pollution, increasing water use efficiency, and decreasing the use of external inputs (Cook et al. 2015 <sup>[[#fn:r1151|1151]]</sup> ).

A study conducted by Palm et al. (2010) <sup>[[#fn:r1152|1152]]</sup> in Sub-Saharan Africa, reported that, at low population densities and high land availability, food security and climate mitigation goals can be met with intensification scenarios, resulting in surplus crop area for reforestation. In contrast, for high population density and small farm sizes, attaining food security and reducing GHG emissions require the use of more mineral fertilisers to make land available for reforestation. However, some forms of intensification in drylands can increase rather than reduce vulnerability due to adverse effects such as environmental degradation and increased social inequity (Robinson et al. 2015 <sup>[[#fn:r1153|1153]]</sup> ).

Sustainable intensification has been critiqued for considering food security only from the supply side, whereas global food security requires attention to all aspects of food system, including access, utilisation, and stability (Godfray 2015 <sup>[[#fn:r1154|1154]]</sup> ). Further, adoption of high-input forms of agriculture under the guise of simultaneously improving yields and environmental performance will attract more investment leading to higher rate of adoption but with the environmental component of SI quickly abandoned (Godfray 2015 <sup>[[#fn:r1155|1155]]</sup> ). Where adopted, SI needs to engage with the sustainable development agenda to (i) identify SI agricultural practices that strengthen rural communities, improve smallholder livelihoods and employment, and avoid negative social and cultural impacts, including loss of land tenure and forced migration; (ii) invest in the social, financial, natural, and physical capital needed to facilitate SI implementation; and (iii) develop mechanisms to pay poor farmers for undertaking sustainability measures (e.g., GHG emissions mitigation or biodiversity protection) that may carry economic costs (Garnett et al. 2013 <sup>[[#fn:r1156|1156]]</sup> ).

In summary, integrated agricultural systems and practices can enhance food system resilience to climate change and reduce GHG emissions, while helping to achieve sustainability ( ''high confidence'' ).

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