Keynote presentation at the International High Level Dialogue on Bridging Land- and Water Management for enabling agribusiness development and Green Economic Growth 24 April 2012 – Wageningen – the Netherlands

1. Green growth:
the need for unpacking the concept
Alain Vidal, CPWF Director
International High Level Dialogue:
Bridging Land- and Water Management for enabling agribusiness development and Green Economic Growth
24 April 2012 – Wageningen – the Netherlands

2. Unpacking…
From river basin management to river basin
development
Basis – the key role of ecosystem services
Boost – the potential for local innovation platforms
Balance – the need for sharing the benefits

3. Water, food and poverty analyzed in 10 basins
1.5 billion people
50% of the poorest < 1€/j
Niger

4. Poverty: Is it the resources scarcity?
5,000
4,000 Bangladesh
Bolivia
Brazil
3,000
GNI ($US/cap)
Burkina Faso
China
Colombia
2,000 Egypt, Arab Rep.
Ethiopia
India
1,000 Thailand
Vietnam
World
0
0.00E+00 2.00E-05 4.00E-05 6.00E-05 8.00E-05 1.00E-04
Water availability (km3/cap)

5. …even in very dry areas ?
5,000
4,000
Bangladesh
Bolivia
Brazil
3,000
GNI ($US/cap)
Burkina Faso
China
Colombia
2,000 Egypt, Arab Rep.
Ethiopia
India
1,000 Thailand
Vietnam
World
0
0.00E+00 1.00E-06 2.00E-06 3.00E-06 4.00E-06 5.00E-06
Water availability (km3/cap)

6. But water productivity
remains very low over most areas
WP (estimated potential)
YR
IGB
Mekong
Nile
Limpopo
Volta Niger

7. From river basin management
to river basin development
80
Burkina Faso
General
70 Ethiopia and direction Bangladesh
Contribution of agriculture to GDP growth (%)
Burkina Faso
Bolivia
in agricultural
60 phase of Brazil
development
India
50 Ethiopia
India and
Bangladesh
40 transitioning
to higher
value
30 activities
Brazil strong growth in the 60’s
and in recent years to emerge as
20 an industrial economy
Bolivia emerging
10 slowly after
decades of low
0
0 500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500 4,000 4,500
Per capita GNI (US$)

8. Agriculture
contribution to GDP
Changing economies
(%)
Most African
basins here
Gross National Income

9. Agriculture
contribution to GDP
(%) ....Problems...
Gross National Income

10. Agriculture
contribution to GDP
(%) ... Solutions
Basics need
Meeting urgent
demand growth Emerging need for
sustainability
Increasing Role for
Institutions Providing basics Big invest in agric.
Protecting existing support Resource-sharing & protection Benefit-sharing (trading)
Invest in agricultural basics Developing pathways out of Demand management
farming Supply-chain management
Gross National Income

11. Basis
The key role of ecosystem services
River basins provide a diversity of ecosystem services
 Provisioning, cultural, regulatory, supporting
Most of these are understood individually, to a
degree
As they develop, societies exploit these ES
 Appropriate, invest, exchange, ruin…
…development is influenced by ESs
…development modifies ESs
This represents opportunities and risks

12. Mekong: Hydropower and livelihoods
From Stone, 2011
40 million people in the Mekong
depend on fisheries for at least
part of the year
Yet the entire region is looking
to hydropower as Laos
Techniques, land and water uses exist
that can increase benefits available to
riparian communities and to dam
builders
Fish-rice systems
Artificial wetlands

13. Boost
The potential for local innovation platforms
Established around local
specific production and
marketing systems, ideally
merged into larger
commercialization networks
Promote technologies improving production at
household level, making products more marketable
Implement strategies improving market efficiency and
reduce transaction costs along the value chain
Allow more money to flow to the producer an incentive
for improved farming practices

14. Limpopo: Rainwater management,
innovation platforms and value chains
Strengthen agricultural value
chains where market-related
failures contribute to poverty
Greater alignment of
production with market
requirements
Appropriate technologies must
fit existing livelihood systems
and include socially acceptable
incentives

15. Balance : The need for sharing
the benefits
Move beyond sharing waters
Consider socially and economically
most beneficial land and water uses
Successful experiences in the Andes
(trust funds), financing ecosystems
restoration and livelihoods
improvement

16. Unpacking green growth?
A few guiding messages
Basis: Despite challenges in many river basins, overall the planet
has enough water (and land?) to meet the full range of people’s
and ecosystems’ needs for the foreseeable future, but equity will
only be achieved through judicious and creative management
Boost and Balance: Wise use of our L&W resources for
strengthening (rural) livelihoods and ecosystem services requires
simultaneously using them more productively and sharing L&W
and their benefits more equitably
Institutions: Higher L&W productivity and greater social equity
can be obtained only through a radical in change of policies and
institutional arrangements in both developed and developing
nations

17. Thank you
a.vidal@cgiar.org
www.waterandfood.org
www.slideshare.net/cpwf