FAO and the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) have released the report entitled More People, More Food, Worse Water? on behalf of the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems.

Its aim is to flag the fact that agriculture causes more ecological damage in many countries than human settlements or industry.

“Industrial agriculture is among the leading causes of water pollution, especially in most high-income countries and many emerging economies, where it has overtaken contamination from settlements and industries as the major factor in the degradation of inland and coastal waters,” the report states.

Pesticide accumulation in water that is later carried down the food chain threatens human health, and has led to the widespread ban on certain pesticides, including DDT, a common insect control chemical once used in the United States until its cancellation in 1972. DDT was also banned in China in 1983, but is still used in India.

The report also adds that nitrate used in farming ranks among the most common contaminants found in groundwater aquifers. To tackle the problem, the report recommends a wider range of data-driven outcomes, including data collection that can help develop water quality models and produce better water policies.

Authors of report conclude that the report 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is designed to shape policies and strategies around the reduction of water pollution, in particular those that are based around SDG target 6.3. FAO launched the report at the High-Level International Conference on the International Decade for Action ‘Water for Sustainable Development’ 2018-2028 in June 2018 in Dushanbe, Tajikistan.

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Local prices of maize, sorghum and other cereals are near or at record levels in large areas of Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Uganda and Tanzania.

“Rising food prices can have very diverse effects on households, depending on their net position towards food markets as well as on the distribution of households around the poverty threshold,” Boubaker Ben-Belhassen, Director of the Trade and Markets Division at the FAO, told The Source. “Sustained food price increases will generally have an impact on the rate of poverty and on food security. Although higher prices will favour net food producers, most of the poor are net buyers of food and, therefore, are adversely affected by the food price upswings.”

Inadequate rainfall in most areas of the sub-region has put enormous strain on livestock and their keepers. High cereal prices are hitting pastoral households particularly hard. In most drought‑affected areas, the lack of effective demand for livestock has led to rapid loss of value.

Sheep and goats now sell for about one-third of their normal prices, and cattle and camels fetch only half their normal market values. In addition, as pastoralists continue to reduce herd sizes in order to increase their ability to sustain the remaining animals, markets are saturated and terms of trade are precipitously deteriorating against them.

“When communities are hit by drought, FAO provides a range of support to help them quickly get back on their feet and start producing food,” added Ben-Belhassen. “Cash transfer mechanisms (like cash-for-work) are used to give the most vulnerable people a direct source of cash, while rehabilitating vital irrigation infrastructure, water reservoirs and feeder roads that will boost food production. In the longer term, FAO assists countries in building resilience to droughts and other climate related hazards to safeguarding development gains.”

Somalia’s maize and sorghum harvests are estimated to be 75 percent down from their usual level, and some 6.2 million people, more than half of the country’s total population, now face acute food insecurity, with the majority of those most affected living in rural areas.

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