Apresentao do PowerPoint

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A more accurate value of ecological footprint
for small farms in Brazil
Feni AgostinhoEnrique Ortega State University of
Campinas, Brazil Raul Siche National University
of Trujillo, Peru
International Footprint Conference New
Developments In Ecological Footprinting
Methodology, Policy And Practice 8-10 May 2007,
City Hall, Cardiff, UK
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Introduction

• Agriculture is essential to human life
  maintenance, but besides food and fibers it
  produces externalities

• Positive externalities or environmental services
  water percolation maintenance of biodiversity
  (native vegetation areas) climate regulation
  soil erosion control local labor.

• Negative externalities water and soil
  contamination by chemicals decrease of water
  percolation and increase of soil loss greenhouse
  gases emission (global warming) biodiversity
  loss human exodus.

• The objective of this work is to insert
  externalities in the calculation of footprint and
  biocapacity. In this first attempt we only
  studied small farms.

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Co-products of the ecological farming model
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Co-products of the agro-chemical model
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Negative externalities
Negative externalities for UK agriculture (Pretty
et al., 2005) (a) 360 USD/ha/year for
conventional agriculture (b) 80 USD/ha/year for
organic agriculture.
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Ecosystems services
Source Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
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Ecosystems services
A key work on positive externalities was
published by Costanza et al. (1997), who
estimated the value of environmental services for
the entire planet as USD 33 trillion per year.
Biomes considered in Costanzas work were (a)
Terrestrial Forest, Grass/Rangeland, Wetland,
Lakers/Rivers, Desert, Tundra, Ice/Rock,
Cropland, Urban (b) Marine Open ocean, Coastal.
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Study cases small family farms
Two models of production were compared
ecological model and conventional or chemical
model. Three farms were studied
(a) Duas Cachoeiras farm ecological model
(29.7ha) (b) Santa Helena farm conventional
model (15.5ha) (c) Três Lagos farm
conventional model (25.2ha).
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New assumptions in ecological footprint assessment
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Results
(7.8)
(26.2)
(29.5)
(1.7)
(0.6)
(1.2)
(16.6)
(25.4)
(48.3)
(13.3)
(72.8)
(28.7)
(9.2)
(1.1)
(5.8)
(11.8)
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Results
The unit national hectares was used instead of
global hectares because we used national data
to calculate the yield factor and the Brazilian
emergy density to account the negative
externalities and the environmental services.
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Results
(17.41)
(10.16)
(10.36)
(1.28)
(7.75)
(7.44)
(16.13)
(2.41)
(2.92)

• There is a positive balance for all systems using
  the two methodologies it increases in the case
  of the ecological farm.

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Results
Agroecological farm best performance in
biocapacity, footprint and ecologic balance using
the two methodologies when compared with the
other farms studied.
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Results
BC/EF biocapacity/footprint

• The ecological farm produces almost 4 times its
  footprint

• The conventional chemical farm produces only 1.6
  times its own footprint.

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Conclusions

• Agroecology improves the farm sustainability by
  increasing biocapacity and reducing ecological
  footprint. Consequently the ecological farm
  studied here is doubtlessly an example to be
  followed
• Negative externalities and ecosystem services
  proved to be important factors in EF
  calculations. Thus, it is extremely necessary to
  carry on further studies about their calculation
• The three systems studied are small family farms
  and are not representative of Brazilian
  agricultural business. The farmers sold products
  in local markets and preserve native forest
  therefore they keep some biodiversity. Profit is
  small and it is used to maintain the system under
  production. These facts explain why the
  indicators observed are so similar.

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Recommendation
It is urgent to evaluate the big chemical farms
in Brazil (soybean, sugar-cane, orange, coffee
and cattle) using Ecological Footprint and
considering negative externalities and ecosystem
services.
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Assumptions for future studies
Income depends on size and not on productivity
Ecological farmer 1100 USD/ha/year x 20 ha 22
000 USD/year
Chemical farmer 50 USD/ha/year x 2000 ha 100
000 USD/year
Difference is bigger because externalities are
not paid
Chemical farmer 650 USD/ha/year x 2000 ha 1 300
000 USD/year
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Soybean production in Central Brazil
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High footprint in foreign countries
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Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to CAPES (Coordenação
de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior)
and to CNPq (Conselho Nacional de
Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico) for
their financial support.
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Externalities FP and BC calculation
Positive externalities (ecosystem services)
Biome value data from Costanza et al.
(1997) Brazilian emdollar 3.30E12 seJ/USD
(Ortega, 2007b) Biome area biome area present
in the farm Brazilian emergy density 3.26E15
seJ/ha/yr (Ortega, 2007b).
Negative externalities
Chemical model externalities 246.8 USD/ha/yr
(Ortega et al.,2005) Ecological model
externalities 96.6 USD/ha/yr
(Estimated) Area area with crop production or
pasture
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Chemicals footprint (Zhao et al., 2005)
Footprint seJ/year / seJ/ha/year ha
Transformities of chemical inputs Fertilizer
4.78E13 seJ/kg ( Brandt-Williams,
2002) Pesticide 2.49E13 seJ/kg (Brown and
Arding, 1991) Vaccine 3.30E12 seJ/USD
(Ortega, 2007b) Brazilian emergy density
3.26E15 seJ/ha/yr (Ortega, 2007b).
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References
Costanza R, DArge R, De Groot R, Farber S,
Grasso M, Hannon B, Limburg K, Naeem S, ONeill
RV, Paruelo J, Raskin RG, Sutton P, van den Belt
M. 1997. The value of the worlds ecosystem
services and natural capital. Nature. 387
253-260. IPCC. 2004. Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change. 2004. Inter-annual and decadal
variability of atmospheric CO2 concentrations.
In The Special Report on Land Use, Land-Use
Change, and Forestry. Available in
http//www.grida.no/climate/ipcc/land_use/020.htm.
Date of access 16/12/2006. Millennium Ecosystem
Assessment. Available in http//www.maweb.org/en/
index.aspx. Date of access 10/02/2007. Odum HT.
1996. Environmental Accounting, Emergy and
Decision Making. J. Wiley, NY.
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References
Ortega E. 2007c. What is INFO? The role of
information in agriculture. Proceedings of IV
Emergy Conference, University of Florida,
Gainesville, USA. In press. Ortega E, Cavalett O,
Bonifácio R, Watanabe M. 2005. Brazilian Soybean
Production emergy analysis with an expanded
scope. Bulletin of Science, Technology Society.
25 323-334. Pretty JN, Ball AS, Lang T, Morison
JIL. 2005. Farm costs and food miles An
assessment of the full cost of the UK weekly food
basket. Food Policy. 30 1 19. Venetoulis J,
Talberth J. 2005. Ecological footprint of Nations
(2005 Update) sustainability indicators program.
Redefining Progress. Available in
www.redefiningprogress.org Date of access
11/11/2006.