Economic valuation of the vulnerability of world agriculture confronted with pollinator decline (original) (raw)
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Economic valuation of the vulnerability of world agriculture confronted to pollinator decline
HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), 2008
There is mounting evidence of pollinator decline all over the world and consequences in many agricultural areas could be significant. We assessed these consequences by measuring 1) the contribution of insect pollination to the world agricultural output economic value, and 2) the vulnerability of world agriculture in the face of pollinator decline. We used a bioeconomic approach, which integrated the production dependence ratio on pollinators, for the 100 crops used directly for human food worldwide as listed by FAO. The total economic value of pollination worldwide amounted to €153 billion, which represented 9.5% of the value of the world agricultural production used for human food in 2005. In terms of welfare, the consumer surplus loss was estimated between €190 and €310 billion based upon average price elasticities of-1.5 to-0.8, respectively. Vegetables and fruits were the leading crop categories in value of insect pollination with about €50 billion each, followed by edible oil crops, stimulants, nuts and spices. The production value of a ton of the crop categories that do not depend on insect pollination averaged €151 while that of those that are pollinatordependent averaged €761. The vulnerability ratio was calculated for each crop category at the regional and world scales as the ratio between the economic value of pollination and the current total crop value. This ratio varied considerably among crop categories and there was a positive correlation between the rate of vulnerability to pollinators decline of a crop category and its value per production unit. Looking at the capacity to nourish the world population after pollinator loss, the production of 3 crop categories-namely fruits, vegetables, and stimulants-will clearly be below the current consumption level at the world scale and even more so for certain regions like Europe. Yet, although our valuation clearly demonstrates the economic importance of insect pollinators, it cannot be considered as a scenario since it does not take into account the strategic responses of the markets.
How much does agriculture depend on pollinators? Lessons from long-term trends in crop production
Annals of botany, 2009
Productivity of many crops benefits from the presence of pollinating insects, so a decline in pollinator abundance should compromise global agricultural production. Motivated by the lack of accurate estimates of the size of this threat, we quantified the effect of total loss of pollinators on global agricultural production and crop production diversity. The change in pollinator dependency over 46 years was also evaluated, considering the developed and developing world separately. Using the extensive FAO dataset, yearly data were compiled for 1961-2006 on production and cultivated area of 87 important crops, which we classified into five categories of pollinator dependency. Based on measures of the aggregate effect of differential pollinator dependence, the consequences of a complete loss of pollinators in terms of reductions in total agricultural production and diversity were calculated. An estimate was also made of the increase in total cultivated area that would be required to com...
The Economic Impacts of Pollinator Declines: An Approach to Assessing the Consequences
2009
Since agricultural activities were first recorded, there have been shortages of pollinators. Today it seems that pollination systems in many areas of agriculture are threatened by the inadequacy or lack of sustainable managed, indigenous, or imported pollinators. Pollinator shortages can adversely affect crop production and commodity markets. This paper presents an economic model than can be used to measure some of the economic impacts of pollinator deficits on traded commodities. This economic analysis indicates that consumers of a commodity affected by a pollinator deficit may suffer because the commodity costs more and becomes less available. At the same time, although the producers of the affected commodity may experience crop declines, they may also experience economic gains in the form of higher prices. The amount the producer gains or loses depends on the shape of the supply and demand functions, and the magnitude of these losses or gains is an empirical question. Although there are few data available to evaluate this model, those we do have indicate that serious problems for world food supply, security, and trade could be in the offing if current declines in pollinator abundance, diversity, and availability are not reversed. Various crops and cropping systems are suggested as practical starting places for economic studies of the effects of pollinator
Economic Consequences of Pollinator Declines: A Synthesis
Agricultural and Resource Economics Review, 2010
This paper surveys the literature on pollinator declines and related concerns regarding global food security. Methods for valuing the economic risks associated with pollinator declines are also reviewed. A computable general equilibrium (CGE) approach is introduced to assess the effects of a global catastrophic loss of pollinators. There appears to be evidence supporting a trend towards future pollinator shortages in the United States and other regions of the world. Results from the CGE model show economic risks to both direct crop sectors and indirect noncrop sectors in the economy, with some amount of regional heterogeneity.
Mapping the dependency of crops on pollinators in Belgium
One Ecosystem, 2017
Background Because of their pollinating activity, insect pollinators provide an ecosystem service that is essential to ecosystems and our economy. A large majority of the flowering plants we consume depends on it. In turn, the decline in pollinators observed for the last decades in Belgium as in many other European countries threatens agriculture and human well-being. New information Here we evaluate the pollination service at a country-wide scale through the estimated value of the contribution of insect pollination to the production used for human consumption in Belgium using crop dependency ratios. We then mapped the vulnerability of crops in the face of pollinator decline at the provincial level. We show that the part of plant production for human food that we can attribute to the action of insect pollinators represents a value of about 251.6 million euros in 2010 in Belgium. As a result, 11.1 % of total value of Belgian plant production (in terms of fruit quantity and quality) depend on pollinators.
Sustainability, 2022
One of the new objectives laid out by the European Union’s Common Agriculture Policy is increasing environmental sustainability. In this paper we compare the degree of average dependence index for each member state (ADIMS) in EU28 from 2007 to 2019 in order to verify the following: (1) whether there was a difference in this index when comparing two CAP periods—(a) from 2007 to 2013 and (b) from 2014 to 2019—and (2) which crops had a larger effect on the ADIMS. The study showed no significant variation in the average ADIMS at EU level between the first (2007–2013) and second (2014–2019) CAP periods. The AIDMS index highlighted three types of EU agriculture: (1) agriculture in Eastern Europe, including Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia, characterized by a high level of ADIMS (10.7–22) due to the widespread cultivation of oil crops as rapeseed and sunflower; (2) Mediterranean agriculture including Portugal, Spain, Italy, Croatia, Greece, Malta, Cyprus and France with lower AIDMS ...
Pollinator shortage and global crop yield
Communicative & Integrative Biology, 2009
A pollinator decline caused by environmental degradation might be compromising the production of pollinator-dependent crops. In a recent article, we compared 45 year series in yield, production and cultivated area of pollinator-dependent and nondependent crop around the world. If pollinator shortage is occurring globally, we expected a lower annual growth rate in yield for pollinator-dependent than nondependent crops, but a higher growth in cultivated area to compensate the lower yield. We have found little evidence for the first "yield" prediction but strong evidence for the second "area" prediction. Here, we present an additional analysis to show that the first and second predictions are both supported for crops that vary in dependency levels from nondependent to moderate dependence (i.e., up to 65% average yield reduction without pollinators). However, those crops for which animal pollination is essential (i.e., 95% average yield reduction without pollinators) showed higher growth in yield and lower expansion in area than expected in a pollination shortage scenario. We propose that pollination management for highly pollinator-dependent crops, such us renting hives or hand pollination, might have compensated for pollinator limitation of yield.
Economic assessment of an insect pollinator decline: A general equilibrium analysis
2009
Economic assessment of insect pollinator decline 3 dimension is there and we gain the possibility to grasp more information about the sensitivity and the intensity of the reactions following the shock. We do so first for symmetric agents under, alternatively, the egalitarian and the polarized ownership structures. Then we introduce heterogeneity between producers, due to a technological parameter, and we revisit again, alternatively, the two ownership structures. As it turns out, the ownership structure is crucial to appraise the effect of the ecological shock. The main result is that, under the egalitarian distribution of property rights, all the agents suffer from the shock, hence there is a reduction of welfare; by contrast, under the polarized structure, the agent who possesses the pollinated activity experiences an utility reduction, whereas the other agent can experience a higher utility. This result holds when: 1) either the elasticity of substitution between the two consumption goods is sufficiently high, 2) or when the non pollinated sector is relatively more productive than the pollinated sector. In either case, welfare can increase if the second agent is granted a relatively more important weight in the social welfare criterion. The last section discusses the results and suggests some perspectives.
Myth and reality of a global crisis for agricultural pollination
Ecología Austral, 2022
Mounting evidence shows that pollinators are declining as a result of widespread environmental degradation. This loss raises concerns that a global pollination crisis could threaten the human food supply by decreasing crop yield and even promote famine under a hypothetical scenario of total pollinator extinction. This catastrophic possibility has prompted intense interest from scientists, politicians and the general public. However, three lines of evidence do not support such an apocalyptic scenario. First, even though the abundance and diversity of wild pollinators are declining worldwide, the global population of managed honey-bee hives has increased by ~80% since the early 1960s. Second, agricultural production would decrease by <10% in the total absence of bees because relatively few crops are completely pollinator dependent. Lastly, despite widespread pollination deficits, current evidence is inconsistent with deceleration in yield growth with increasing pollinator dependence at a global scale, probably due to improvements in crop breeding and external agricultural subsidies. Overall, this evidence refutes simplistic claims of human starvation caused by a hypothetical total pollinator extinction. Nevertheless, pollination problems may loom. Although pollinators are responsible for a minor fraction of global agriculture production, this fraction has increased ~600% since 1961, greatly outpacing human population growth and the growth of the global population of managed honey bees. This large production increase is explained to a considerable extent by the rapid expansion of pollinator-dependent monocultures at the expense of natural and diverse agricultural habitats. By driving pollinator decline, this land-use transformation could worsen pollination deficits and promote further crop expansion given sustained market demands. Therefore, although the human food supply is not currently subject to a global pollination crisis, a spiralling positive-feedback between the impacts of agriculture expansion and pollinator decline on crop yield could accelerate precipitous biodiversity loss by promoting further habitat destruction and homogenization.
Insect pollinators and sustainable agriculture
American Journal of Alternative Agriculture, 1990
'forage 99 to sustain populations when the target crops are not in bloom. Examples are discussed to illustrate how private initiatives and changes to public policy can enhance pollinator habitat, and ultimately, agricultural productivity.