Feeding aquaculture growth through globalization: Exploitation of marine ecosystems for fishmeal

Like other animal production systems, aquaculture has developed into a highly globalized trade-dependent industry. A major part of aquaculture technology requires fishmeal to produce the feed for farmed species. By tracing and mapping patterns of trade flows globally for fishmeal we show the aquaculture industry's increasing use of marine ecosystems worldwide. We provide an in-depth analysis of the growth decades (1980–2000) of salmon farming in Norway and shrimp farming in Thailand. Both countries, initially net exporters of fishmeal, increased the number of import source nations of fishmeal, peaking in the mid-1990s. Thailand started locally and expanded into sources from all over the globe, including stocks from the North Sea through imports from Denmark, while Norway predominantly relied on northern region source nations to feed farmed salmon. In 2000, both have two geographically alternate sources of fishmeal supply: the combination of Chile and Peru in South America, and a regional complement. We find that fishmeal trade for aquaculture is not an issue of using ecosystems of the South for production in the North, but of trade between nations with industrialized fisheries linked to productive marine ecosystems. We discuss the expansion of marine ecosystem appropriation for the global aquaculture industry and observed shifts in the trade of fishmeal between marine areas over time. Globalization, through information technology and transport systems, has made it possible to rapidly switch between marine areas for fishmeal supply in economically connected food producing systems. But the stretching of the production chain from local to global and the ability to switch between marine areas worldwide seem to undermine the industry's incentives to respond to changes in the capacity of ecosystems to supply fish. For example, trade information does not reveal the species of fish that the fishmeal is made of much less its origins and there is lack of feedback between economic performance and impacts on marine ecosystem services. Responding to environmental feedback is essential to avoid the trap of mining the marine resources on which the aquaculture industry depends. There are grounds to suggest the need for some global rules and institutions that create incentives for seafood markets to account for ecosystem support and capacity.     

Energy prices and seafood security

Fish resources are critical to the food security of many nations. Similar to most contemporary food systems, many fisheries and aquaculture resource supply chains are heavily dependent on fossil fuels. Energy price increases and volatility may hence undermine food security in some contexts. Here, we explore the relationships between energy price changes, fish resource supply chain viability, seafood availability and food security outcomes – both for producers and consumers of fish resources. We begin by characterizing the energy intensities of fish resource supply chains, which are shown to be highly variable. We subsequently assess the comparative magnitude and distribution of potential food security impacts of energy price increases for nation states by scoring and ranking countries against a set of vulnerability criteria including metrics of national exposure, sensitivity and adaptive capacity. Considerable variability in the vulnerability of populations and high levels of exposure for already food-insecure populations are apparent. Developed countries are likely to be most exposed to the effects of energy price increases due to their high rates of fleet motorization and preference for energy-intensive seafood products. However, heavy reliance on seafood as a source of food and income, as well as limited national adaptive capacity, translates into greater overall vulnerability in developing countries. At the level of individual producers, a variety of adaptation options are available that may serve to reduce vulnerability to energy price changes and hence contribute to increased food security for producers and consumers, but uptake capacity depends on numerous situational factors.     

Transforming agricultural land use through marginal gains in the food system

There is an increasing need for transformational changes in the global food system to deliver healthy nutritional outcomes for a growing population while simultaneously ensuring environmental sustainability. However, such changes are subject to political and public constraints that usually allow only gradual, incremental changes to occur. Drawing inspiration from the British cycling team’s concept of marginal gains, we show how transformation might be reconciled with incremental changes. We demonstrate that a set of marginal food system changes acting to increase production efficiency, to reduce losses or to adjust diets could collectively reduce the agricultural land required globally for food production by 21%, or over a third given higher adoption rates. The results show that while all categories of action are important, changes in consumer choices in Europe, North America and Oceania and in the supply-chain in Africa and West and Central Asia have the greatest potential to reduce the land footprint of the food system.     

Complex resource supply chains display higher resilience to simulated climate shocks

Global resource supply chains deliver products such as fish, rice and minerals from producers to consumers around the world, linking disparate regions and economies. These supply chains are increasingly exposed to the impacts of a changing climate, yet receive little attention relative to the study of the production phase. Too often, business learns from experience if and how their supply chains can withstand and recover from climate shocks with little insight on proactively developing climate resilient supply chains. We use a network-based simulation approach to estimate the resilience of supply chains, particularly to disruption experienced during climate-related extreme events. We consider supply chain examples from three Australian resource industries – fisheries, agriculture and mining – that have experienced climate shocks in recent years. We derive four supply chain indices – evenness, resilience, continuity of supply and climate resilience – to estimate the performance of simple and complex supply chains in each industry. As with ecological systems, we show that complex supply chains with a large number of nodes and links are more resilient to disruption. Critically, all chains, regardless of their complexity, will have diminished resilience as climate disruptions become more frequent. This highlights the importance of considering the broader economic benefits of diversified chains, leading to risk reduction and improved design post-disruption. It also reinforces the importance of a systems approach to risk management in supply chains, particularly in considering adaptation options for addressing direct and indirect impacts on the chain as well as the global challenge of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.     

Inland capture fisheries in the Mekong and their place and potential within food-led regional development

The inland capture fisheries of the Mekong represent critical sources of nutrition in rural diets in a region that faces endemic food and nutritional deficits. However within regional development debates that prioritize utilising the waters of the Mekong to generate electricity, capture fisheries are often presented as ultimately doomed, and therefore as an unfortunate, but necessary trade-off for hydropower. At the heart of these debates, lie contested definitions of development. The notion that fisheries could or should be traded-off for some other form of development exemplifies this tension.This paper draws on anthropological approaches to policy analysis based on discourse and narratives. We begin by placing the conventional wisdom regarding the place of fisheries in regional development under closer scrutiny. We then explore the potential for a counter narrative based around food and food sovereignty, in which fisheries and fishers are drivers, rather than costs of development. We argue that fisheries provide a range of livelihood and developmental values that cannot be replaced and that their management continues to hold potential for strengthening independence and self-reliance. In doing so, we build on empirical evidence from the Lao PDR, a country with a rich capture fishery but also endemic food crises, and also a national policy commitment to both poverty reduction and extensive large-scale hydropower development. As such, this paper attempts to reframe the debate on development in the Mekong. The paper has wider significance for considering how a broader focus on food and food producers can generate alternative development pathways.     

Exploring sustainable aquaculture development using a nutrition-sensitive approach

Micronutrient deficiencies constitute a pressing public health concern, especially in developing countries. As a dense source of bioavailable nutrients, aquatic foods can help alleviate such deficiencies. Developing aquaculture that provides critical micronutrients without sacrificing the underlying environmental resources that support these food production systems is therefore essential. Here, we address these dual challenges by optimizing nutrient supply while constraining the environmental impacts from aquaculture. Using life cycle assessment and nutritional data from Indonesia, a top aquaculture producer, we sought to identify aquaculture systems that increase micronutrient supplies and reduce environmental impacts (e.g., habitat destruction, freshwater pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions). Aquaculture systems in Indonesia vary more by environmental impacts (e.g. three order of magnitude for fresh water usage) than by nutritional differences (approximately ± 50% differences from mean relative nutritional score). Nutritional-environmental tradeoffs exist, with no single system offering a complete nutrition-environment win–win. We also find that previously proposed future aquaculture paths suboptimally balance nutritional and environmental impacts. Instead, we identify optimized aquaculture production scenarios for 2030 with nutrient per gram densities 105–320% that of business-as-usual production and with environmental impacts as low as 25% of those of business-as-usual. In these scenarios Pangasius fish (Pangasius hypophthalmus) ponds prove desirable due to their low environmental impacts, but average relative nutrient score. While the environmental impacts of the three analyzed brackish water systems range from average to high compared to other aquaculture systems, their nutritional attributes render them necessary when maximizing all nutrients except vitamin A. Common carp (Cyprinus carpio) ponds also proved essential in maximizing zinc and omega n-3, while Tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) cages were necessary in optimizing the production of calcium and vitamin A. These optimal aquaculture strategies also reduce business-as-usual demand for wild fish-based feed by 0–30% and mangrove expansion by 0–75% with no additional expansion into inland open waters and freshwater ponds. As aquaculture production expands globally, optimization presents a powerful opportunity to reduce malnutrition rates at reduced environmental impacts. The proposed reorientation promotes UN sustainable development goals 2 (zero hunger), 3 (health), 13 (climate action) and 14 (life under water) and requires concerted and targeted policy changes.     

Trading more food: Implications for land use,greenhouse gas emissions,and the food system

The volume of agricultural trade increased by more than ten times throughout the past six decades and is likely to continue with high rates in the future. Thereby, it largely affects environment and climate. We analyse future trade scenarios covering the period of 2005–2045 by evaluating economic and environmental effects using the global land-use model MAgPIE (“Model of Agricultural Production and its Impact on the Environment”). This is the first trade study using spatially explicit mapping of land use patterns and greenhouse gas emissions. We focus on three scenarios: the reference scenario fixes current trade patterns, the policy scenario follows a historically derived liberalisation pathway, and the liberalisation scenario assumes a path, which ends with full trade liberalisation in 2045.Further trade liberalisation leads to lower global costs of food. Regions with comparative advantages like Latin America for cereals and oil crops and China for livestock products will export more. In contrast, regions like the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia face the highest increases of imports. Deforestation, mainly in Latin America, leads to significant amounts of additional carbon emissions due to trade liberalisation. Non-CO₂ emissions will mostly shift to China due to comparative advantages in livestock production and rising livestock demand in the region. Overall, further trade liberalisation leads to higher economic benefits at the expense of environment and climate, if no other regulations are put in place.     

The poverty implications of climate-induced crop yield changes by 2030

Accumulating evidence suggests that agricultural production could be greatly affected by climate change, but there remains little quantitative understanding of how these agricultural impacts would affect economic livelihoods in poor countries. Here we consider three scenarios of agricultural impacts of climate change by 2030 (impacts resulting in low, medium, or high productivity) and evaluate the resulting changes in global commodity prices, national economic welfare, and the incidence of poverty in a set of 15 developing countries. Although the small price changes under the medium scenario are consistent with previous findings, we find the potential for much larger food price changes than reported in recent studies which have largely focused on the most likely outcomes. In our low-productivity scenario, prices for major staples rise 10–60% by 2030. The poverty impacts of these price changes depend as much on where impoverished households earn their income as on the agricultural impacts themselves, with poverty rates in some non-agricultural household groups rising by 20–50% in parts of Africa and Asia under these price changes, and falling by significant amounts for agriculture-specialized households elsewhere in Asia and Latin America. The potential for such large distributional effects within and across countries emphasizes the importance of looking beyond central case climate shocks and beyond a simple focus on yields – or highly aggregated poverty impacts.     

The impacts of food price and income shocks on household food security and economic well-being: Evidence from rural Bangladesh

This paper examines the combined impacts of food price and income shocks on household food security and economic well-being in low-income rural communities. Using longitudinal survey data of 1800 rural households from 12 districts of Bangladesh over the period 2007–2009, we estimated a three-stage hierarchical logit model to identify the key sources of household food insecurity. The first-difference estimator was then employed to compare pre- and post-shock expenditure for those households that experienced acute food shortages and those that managed to avoid the worst impacts of the shocks. On the basis of our results we conclude that: (1) the soaring food prices of 2007–2009 unequivocally aggravated food insecurity in the rural areas of Bangladesh; (2) the subsequent income shocks of 2007–2009 contributed toward worsening food insecurity; (3) the adverse impacts of these shocks appeared to have faded over time due to labor and commodity market adjustments, regional economic growth, and domestic policy responses, leaving no profound impacts on households’ economic well-being in most cases; and (4) although the immediate adverse consequences of rising food prices were borne disproportionately by the poor, the longer term consequences were distributed more evenly across the rich and poor and were favorable for the day laborers.     

Sustainability transformations: socio-political shocks as opportunities for governance transitions

Faced with accelerating environmental challenges, research on social-ecological systems is increasingly focused on the need for transformative change towards sustainable stewardship of natural resources. This paper analyses the potential of rapid, large-scale socio-political change as a window of opportunity for transformative change of natural resources governance. We hypothesize that shocks at higher levels of social organization may open up opportunities for transformation of social-ecological systems into new pathways of development. However, opportunities need to be carefully navigated otherwise transformations may stall or lead the social-ecological system in undesirable directions. We investigate (i) under which circumstances socio-political change has been used by actors as a window of opportunity for initiating transformation towards sustainable natural resource governance, (ii) how the different levels of the systems (landscape, regime and niche) interact to pave the way for initiating such transformations and (iii) which key features (cognitive, structural and agency-related) get mobilized for transformation. This is achieved through analyzing natural resource governance regimes of countries that have been subject to rapid, large-scale political change: water governance in South Africa and Uzbekistan and governance of coastal fisheries in Chile. In South Africa the political and economic change of the end of the apartheid regime resulted in a transformation of the water governance regime while in Uzbekistan after the breakdown of the Soviet Union change both at the economic and political scales and within the water governance regime remained superficial. In Chile the democratization process after the Pinochet era was used to transform the governance of coastal fisheries. The paper concludes with important insight on key capacities needed to navigate transformation towards biosphere stewardship. The study also contributes to a more nuanced view on the relationship between collapse and renewal.     

Exploring temporality in socio-ecological resilience through experiences of the 2015–16 El Niño across the Tropics

In a context of both long-term climatic changes and short-term climatic shocks, temporal dynamics profoundly influence ecosystems and societies. In low income contexts in the Tropics, where both exposure and vulnerability to climatic fluctuations is high, the frequency, duration, and trends in these fluctuations are important determinants of socio-ecological resilience. In this paper, the dynamics of six diverse socio-ecological systems (SES) across the Tropics – ranging from agricultural and horticultural systems in Africa and Oceania to managed forests in South East Asia and coastal systems in South America – are examined in relation to the 2015–16 El Niño, and the longer context of climatic variability in which this short-term ‘event’ occurred. In each case, details of the socio-ecological characteristics of the systems and the climate phenomena experienced during the El Niño event are described and reflections on the observed impacts of, and responses to it are presented. Drawing on these cases, we argue that SES resilience (or lack of) is, in part, a product of both long-term historical trends, as well as short-term shocks within this history. Political and economic lock-ins and dependencies, and the memory and social learning that originates from past experience, all contribute to contemporary system resilience. We propose that the experiences of climate shocks can provide a window of insight into future ecosystem responses and, when combined with historical perspectives and learning from multiple contexts and cases, can be an important foundation for efforts to build appropriate long-term resilience strategies to mediate impacts of changing and uncertain climates.     

A sweet deal? Sugarcane,water and agricultural transformation in Sub-Saharan Africa

Globally, the area of sugarcane is rising rapidly in response to growing demands for bioethanol and increased sugar demand for human consumption. Despite considerable diversity in production systems and contexts, sugarcane is a particularly “high impact” crop with significant positive and negative environmental and socio-economic impacts. Our analysis is focused on Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), which is a critical region for continued expansion, due to its high production potential, low cost of production and proximity, and access, to European markets. Drawing on a systematic review of scientific evidence, combined with information from key informants, stakeholders and a research-industry workshop, we critically assess the impacts of sugarcane development on water, soil and air quality, employment, food security and human health. Our analysis shows that sugarcane production is, in general, neither explicitly good nor bad, sustainable nor unsustainable. The impacts of expansion of sugarcane production on the environment and society depend on the global political economy of sugar, local context, quality of scheme, nature of the production system and farm management. Despite threats from climate change and forthcoming changes in the trade relationship with the European Union, agricultural development policies are driving national and international interest and investment in sugarcane in SSA, with expansion likely to play an important role in sustainable development in the region. Our findings will help guide researchers and policy makers with new insights in understanding the situated environmental and social impacts associated with alternative sugar economy models, production technologies and qualities of management.     

Coping with food crises: Lessons from the American Dust Bowl on balancing local food,agro technology,social welfare,and government regulation agendas in food and farming systems

This paper examines four broad policy and public responses to the American Dust Bowl in the 1930s as a way of exploring how society today could address our own “food crisis”. More particularly, in the Dust Bowl some argued that solutions would be found by engineers and farmers who would develop new ways of watering dry fields. A second group believed that inappropriate political and economic incentives had led to bad farming practices prior to the drought and this contributed to wide-spread erosion. To this group, the best solutions included governmental regulation of farm practices. A third group focused on the welfare of individuals, arguing that creating a social safety net to protect marginalized families was the highest priority. Finally, there were commentators who advocated for a smaller scale, ecological, and holistic approach to farming. Today, the same four perspectives are present in debates about how to maintain global food security in light of population growth, high energy prices and climate change. Exploring the similarity of the discourses between today's food crisis and the one that hit American society 80 years ago reveals that advocates of the four different camps are motivated by very different principles. Briefly, proponents of technological solutions base many of their arguments on the assumption that human ingenuity is capable of producing extremely productive food systems. The managerial arguments, by contrast, are based on the idea that the natural environment can be rationally and efficiently managed using scientific principles. The social welfare narrative seeks to create a more equitable food system. Finally, the ecological and holistic narrative argues that diverse, small scale and local food systems are a prerequisite for long term sustainability. The primary contribution of this paper, therefore, is to expose these deeply held ontological tensions as a way of arguing that policy makers today must de-politicise arguments and use the principles embedded in all four narratives when designing programmes to ensure that the 21st century does not face a repeat of the crisis of the 1930s.     

How access to Maine⬢s fisheries has changed over a quarter century: The cumulative effects of licensing on resilience

We describe how the evolution of the licensing system for commercial fisheries in Maine has progressively limited the ability of both fishers and the State to respond to changing environmental circumstances. Over the twenty-five year period from 1990 to 2014 new licenses were created at the rate of about 0.6 per year. The changes that have occurred have not been the result of a strategic policy agenda that was set to decrease fishers⬢ access, but rather the consequence of multiple decades of policy interventions that have sought to improve the socioeconomic and ecological productivity of individual fisheries. However, the cumulative effect has limited the flexibility of individual fishers and created strong economic interests that are incompatible with shifts towards ecosystem-based management. We use this finding to contribute to the literature on resilience, with a specific focus on the relationship between adaptive management and sustainability.     

Policies for reducing agricultural sector vulnerability to climate change in Mali

Abstract

The Mali agricultural sector and the country's food security are potentially vulnerable to climate change. Policies may be able to mitigate some of the climate change vulnerability. This article investigates several policy changes that may reduce vulnerability, including climate-specific and other policies. The policy set includes migration of cropping patterns, development of high-temperature-resistant cultivars, reduction in soil productivity loss, cropland expansion, adoption of improved cultivars, and changes in trade patterns. When all policies are considered together, results under climate change show an annual gain of $252 million in economic benefits as opposed to a $161 million loss without policy adjustment. Simultaneously, undernourishment is reduced to 17% of the Malian population as compared with 64% without policy adjustment. We also find tradeoffs in cases between economic benefits and undernourishment. Policies are also studied individually and collectively. Overall, the results indicate that policy can play an important role in reducing climate change vulnerability in Mali.     

Biophysical indicators and Indigenous and Local Knowledge reveal climatic and ecological shifts with implications for Arctic Char fisheries

Managing Arctic marine resources to be resilient to environmental changes requires knowledge of how climate change is affecting marine food webs and fisheries. Changes to fishery resources will have major implications for coastal Indigenous communities whose livelihoods, health, and cultures are strongly connected to fisheries. Understanding these broad social-ecological changes requires a transdisciplinary approach bringing together contrasting and complementary disciplines and ways of knowing. Here, we examine climatic proxies, ecological, and fishery indicators (stable isotopes, fish condition, and lipid content), and interviews with Inuit fishers to assess how marine ecosystem changes have influenced Arctic Char (Salvelinus alpinus) ecology and fisheries over a 30-year time period (1987–2016) in the Kitikmeot region of the Canadian Arctic. Inuit fishers reported several observations of environmental changes, including longer ice-free seasons, warmer ocean temperatures, and the arrival of new marine species. Biophysical data revealed important changes toward earlier dates of ice breakup (>12 days in some areas) and a shift in isotopic niche reflecting a changing Arctic Char diet, with increased contribution of pelagic carbon and higher trophic level prey. Fish condition was improved in years with earlier ice breakup, as observed by both Inuit fishers and biophysical indicators, while lipid content increased through time, suggesting that longer ice-free seasons may have a positive effect on Arctic Char quality as reflected by both fish condition and lipid content. Long-term impacts of continuing climate change, however, such as the northward expansion of boreal species and increasing ocean temperatures, could have negative effects on fisheries (e.g., physiological impairment in fish if temperatures exceed their thermal range). Continuous community-based monitoring that directly informs fisheries management could help communities and managers adaptively, and sustainably, manage in the face of multiple interacting changes in Arctic marine systems.     

What drives food insecurity in southern Africa? a meta-analysis of household economy studies

Food insecurity, and the factors that determine it, are experienced at the level of the household and the individual. Food insecurity is also spatially varied across regions. In this paper meta-analysis is used to synthesize 49 household economy local-level studies that focus on community-level livelihood strategies to identify drivers of food insecurity in southern Africa. The results reveal entrenched cycles of vulnerability in southern Africa's food insecure communities, where socio-economic issues feature prominently. The direct causes of inadequate food access are poverty, environmental stressors and conflict: these account for 50% of the identified indirect drivers of food insecurity. Meta-analysis is used to suggest the common processes behind food insecurity that take specific forms in particular communities. The findings underscore the need to understand the multiple social and political dimensions of food insecurity, such as the breakdown in social capital associated with poverty, conflict and HIV/AIDS, that run deeper than environmental constraints to food production.     

Greedy or needy? Land use and climate impacts of food in 2050 under different livestock futures

Both supply and demand side changes are necessary to achieve a sustainable food system. However, the weight accorded to these depends on one’s view of what the priority goals are for the food system and the extent to which production systems versus consumption patterns are open to change. Some stakeholders see the problem as one of ‘not enough food’ and focus on the need to sustainably increase supply, while others consider the resource demanding and ‘greedy’ consumption patterns of the Western world as the main problem and emphasize the need to shift diets. In this study global land use and greenhouse gas emissions are estimated for a set of scenarios, building on four ‘livestock futures’ reflecting these different perspectives. These scenarios are: further intensification of livestock systems; a transition to plant-based eating; a move towards artificial meat and dairy; and a future in which livestock production is restricted to the use of ‘ecological leftovers’ i.e. grass from pastures, food waste and food and agricultural byproducts. Two dietary variants for each scenario are modelled: 1) a projected diet following current trends and 2) a healthy diet with more fruits and vegetables and fewer animal products, vegetable oils and sugar. Livestock production in all scenarios (except the baseline scenario) was assumed to intensify to current levels of intensive production in North-Western Europe. For each scenario, several variant assumptions about yield increases and waste reductions were modelled. Results show that without improvements in crop productivity or reductions on today’s waste levels available cropland will only suffice if production of all protein currently supplied by animal foods is replaced by (hypothetical) artificial variants not requiring any land. With livestock intensities corresponding to current ones in North-Western Europe and with yield gaps closed by 50% and waste reduced by 50%, available cropland will suffice for all scenarios that include a reduction of animal products and/or a transition to poultry or aquaculture. However, in the scenario based on an extrapolation of current consumption patterns (animal product amounts and types consumed in proportions corresponding to the current average consumption in different world regions) and with livestock production based on feed from cropland, available cropland will not be enough. The scenario that makes use of pastures for ruminant production and food waste for pigs, uses considerably less cropland and could provide 40–56 kg per capita per year of red meat. However, such a livestock future would not reduce GHG emissions from agriculture on current levels. This study confirms previous research that to achieve a sustainable food future, action is needed on all fronts; improved supply and reduced demand and waste.     

Assessing the vulnerability of food crop systems in Africa to climate change

Africa is thought to be the region most vulnerable to the impacts of climate variability and change. Agriculture plays a dominant role in supporting rural livelihoods and economic growth over most of Africa. Three aspects of the vulnerability of food crop systems to climate change in Africa are discussed: the assessment of the sensitivity of crops to variability in climate, the adaptive capacity of farmers, and the role of institutions in adapting to climate change. The magnitude of projected impacts of climate change on food crops in Africa varies widely among different studies. These differences arise from the variety of climate and crop models used, and the different techniques used to match the scale of climate model output to that needed by crop models. Most studies show a negative impact of climate change on crop productivity in Africa. Farmers have proved highly adaptable in the past to short- and long-term variations in climate and in their environment. Key to the ability of farmers to adapt to climate variability and change will be access to relevant knowledge and information. It is important that governments put in place institutional and macro-economic conditions that support and facilitate adaptation and resilience to climate change at local, national and transnational level.     

The vulnerabilities of agricultural land and food production to future water scarcity

Rapidly increasing populations coupled with increased food demand requires either an expansion of agricultural land or sufficient production gains from current resources. However, in a changing world, reduced water availability might undermine improvements in crop and grass productivity and may disproportionately affect different parts of the world. Using multi-model studies, the potential trends, risks and uncertainties to land use and land availability that may arise from reductions in water availability are examined here. In addition, the impacts of different policy interventions on pressures from emerging risks are examined.Results indicate that globally, approximately 11% and 10% of current crop- and grass-lands could be vulnerable to reduction in water availability and may lose some productive capacity, with Africa and the Middle East, China, Europe and Asia particularly at risk. While uncertainties remain, reduction in agricultural land area associated with dietary changes (reduction of food waste and decreased meat consumption) offers the greatest buffer against land loss and food insecurity.