Ask anyone who's been working on policy-change or advocacy efforts in any arena long enough and they’ll tell you: Change takes time. Except in very rare cases, big, noticeable shifts take years—often decades—of work by countless people, working on all levels and in different ways to achieve change. On one hand, this glacial pace makes sense. After all, it took years to get where we are—a climate on the fritz, food for some while others go hungry, a financial system that is more akin to an online casino—why should getting somewhere else be any quicker? On the other hand, if we aren’t able to think big about the changes we want, and get caught up in little victories, we risk losing sight of our real goals.
It is in this spirit that Oxfam held an online discussion last year calling on experts from across the food and development policy world to write a series of essays focused on four “big picture” questions:
- What if all farmers had adequate risk management systems to deal with climate trends and shocks, as well as with price volatility in input and product markets?
- What if fossil fuels were no longer required in any form of input to global agricultural production?
- What if all farmers, male and female, had full and equal control over the necessary resources for farming, and over the outputs of their labor?
- What if the ideas and innovations of resource-poor farmers leading to improvements of their natural resource base were supported by adequate access to public and private sector investments?
IATP’s Sophia Murphy was invited to submit one of 23 essays that formed the basis of the spirited, online debate about what was possible. Murphy's essay, “Risky Business”, focuses on opportunities for risk-management that could change the face of agriculture and the food system.
"Farmers need strong risk insurance programs to have the confidence to invest in what they do," she writes. "Without investment, agriculture stagnates, and so does food production. With investment agriculture can grow the food the world needs, rural economies thrive, and rural–urban migration slows." She goes on to discuss what farmers, the government and the private sector each can contribute, underlining the importance of procuring and holding public stocks to counter food price volatility.
Now, Oxfam has released a synthesized version of the entire online debate, as well as all 23 essays, available on their website. For more background, check out their blog.
View The Future of Agriculture: Synthesis of an online debate.
