Publications
Matthews, Keith B.; Renner, Ansel; Blackstock, Kirsty L.; Waylen, Kerry A.; Miller, Dave G.; Wardell-Johnson, Doug H.; Juarez-Bourke, Alba; Cadillo-Benalcazar, Juan; Schyns, Joep F.; Giampietro, Mario
In: Sustainability, 13 (18), pp. 10080, 2021, ISSN: 2071-1050.
Abstract | Links | BibTeX | Tags: common agricultural policy, Energy, FADN, food nexus, Societal metabolism, sustainability, Water
@article{Matthews2021,
title = {Old Wine in New Bottles: Exploiting Data from the EU's Farm Accountancy Data Network for Pan-EU Sustainability Assessments of Agricultural Production Systems},
author = {Keith B. Matthews and Ansel Renner and Kirsty L. Blackstock and Kerry A. Waylen and Dave G. Miller and Doug H. Wardell-Johnson and Alba Juarez-Bourke and Juan Cadillo-Benalcazar and Joep F. Schyns and Mario Giampietro},
url = {https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/18/10080/htm https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/18/10080},
doi = {10.3390/su131810080},
issn = {2071-1050},
year = {2021},
date = {2021-09-01},
journal = {Sustainability},
volume = {13},
number = {18},
pages = {10080},
publisher = {Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute},
abstract = {The paper presents insights from carrying out a pan-EU sustainability assessment using Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) data (the old wine) with societal metabolism accounting (SMA) processes (the new bottles). The SMA was deployed as part of a transdisciplinary study with EU policy stakeholders of how EU policy may need to change to deliver sustainability commitments, particularly to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The paper outlines the concepts underlying SMA and its specific implementation using the FADN data. A key focus was on the interactions between crop and livestock systems and how this determines imported feedstuffs requirements, with environmental and other footprints beyond the EU. Examples of agricultural production systems performance are presented in terms of financial/efficiency, resource use (particularly the water footprint) and quantifies potential pressures on the environment. Benefits and limitations of the FADN dataset and the SMA outputs are discussed, highlighting the challenges of linking quantified pressures with environmental impacts. The paper concludes that the complexity of agriculture's interactions with economy and society means there is great need for conceptual frameworks, such as SMA, that can take multiple, non-equivalent, perspectives and that can be deployed with policy stakeholders despite generating uncomfortable knowledge.},
keywords = {common agricultural policy, Energy, FADN, food nexus, Societal metabolism, sustainability, Water},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {article}
}
The paper presents insights from carrying out a pan-EU sustainability assessment using Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) data (the old wine) with societal metabolism accounting (SMA) processes (the new bottles). The SMA was deployed as part of a transdisciplinary study with EU policy stakeholders of how EU policy may need to change to deliver sustainability commitments, particularly to the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The paper outlines the concepts underlying SMA and its specific implementation using the FADN data. A key focus was on the interactions between crop and livestock systems and how this determines imported feedstuffs requirements, with environmental and other footprints beyond the EU. Examples of agricultural production systems performance are presented in terms of financial/efficiency, resource use (particularly the water footprint) and quantifies potential pressures on the environment. Benefits and limitations of the FADN dataset and the SMA outputs are discussed, highlighting the challenges of linking quantified pressures with environmental impacts. The paper concludes that the complexity of agriculture's interactions with economy and society means there is great need for conceptual frameworks, such as SMA, that can take multiple, non-equivalent, perspectives and that can be deployed with policy stakeholders despite generating uncomfortable knowledge.
Matthews, K B; Waylen, K A; Blackstock, K L; Juarez-Bourke, A; Miller, D G; Wardell-Johnson, D H; Rivington, M; Giampietro, M
In: Elsawah, S. (Ed.): MODSIM2019, 23rd International Congress on Modelling and Simulation, pp. 877–883, Modelling and Simulation Society of Australia and New Zealand, 2019, ISBN: 9780975840092.
Abstract | Links | BibTeX | Tags: common agricultural policy, nexus, science-policy, Societal metabolism, sustainability
@inproceedings{Matthews2019a,
title = {Science for Sustainability: Using Societal Metabolism Analysis to check the robustness of European Union policy narratives in the water, energy and food nexus},
author = {K B Matthews and K A Waylen and K L Blackstock and A Juarez-Bourke and D G Miller and D H Wardell-Johnson and M Rivington and M Giampietro},
editor = {S. Elsawah},
url = {https://mssanz.org.au/modsim2019/J5/matthews.pdf},
doi = {10.36334/modsim.2019.J5.matthews},
isbn = {9780975840092},
year = {2019},
date = {2019-12-01},
booktitle = {MODSIM2019, 23rd International Congress on Modelling and Simulation},
pages = {877--883},
publisher = {Modelling and Simulation Society of Australia and New Zealand},
abstract = {This paper is an output of an ongoing EU Horizon 2020 project (MAGIC) that aims to better understand how EU water, food, energy, waste and biodiversity policies link with each other and with EU climate and sustainability goals, framed in terms of the nexus concept. The project conducts transdisciplinary research with policy makers using an approach termed Quantitative Story Telling (QST), as an interface between science and policy domains. QST combines semantic (qualitative) and formal (quantitative) approaches to assess the plausibility, normative fairness and analytical coherence of narratives being used by stakeholders to justify either the status quo or alternative policy positions for the EU. The paper focuses on those aspects of the MAGIC analysis highlighted by external reviewers of the project as being most insightful and having the most potential value to a wider community of practice concerned with supporting or evaluating sustainability related policies. The paper outlines the process of QST used and the quantitative method used, multi-scale societal metabolism analyses (SMA) assessing the funds of land and human time needed to create the flows of materials, energy and money that reproduce and maintain the identity of the system of interest. As one of the five MAGIC policy studies, the authors focused on a key EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) narrative. CAP is a policy which is now expected to deliver multiple objectives across policy domains, but as implemented, potentially contributes to a tension between supporting competitiveness and delivering public goods. High-level findings that quantify aspects of this tension are presented, followed by specific technical issues found when conducting the analysis. The paper then reflects on the authors' use of these data to discuss with policy-makers issues where the tension between competitiveness and public goods are most stark; a more interpretive, qualitative phase of analysis that builds on the quantitative analysis. The outputs of the analysis used within the CAP QST imply the need for policy makers to consider alternative issue framings, otherwise they risk appearing to make only a rhetorical commitment to defining and delivering EU sustainability goals. The societal metabolic framing used in MAGIC highlights the biophysical underpinnings of EU farming systems; their dependence on non-renewable resources and the pressures generated by them that degrade ecosystem functions or services. A societal metabolic framing also means considering multiple scales, since otherwise EU policy is blind to the effects it has on sustainability beyond the borders of the EU. If research impact is defined in terms of acknowledged change in stakeholders' concepts or behaviours (an expected impact for the project by funders) then to date, there has been limited 'success'. While the rhetoric of 'evidence-based policy' remains prominent, it remains extremely challenging to engage with policy makers in deliberation on evidence that challenges conventional narratives. This was the case even for staff with extensive experience of inter-and transdisciplinary working at the science-policy interface. In conclusion, science for sustainability policy could benefit from adopting the approaches like QST, which can integrate and balance the semantic and formal parts of science for policy research. For the wider science-policy community of practice, the key insight is that for processes like QST the key decisions are made at the interfaces between the sematic and formal phases of analysis (what is modelled and why) and the formal and semantic phases of analysis (what the outputs mean and why they shouldn't be ignored).},
keywords = {common agricultural policy, nexus, science-policy, Societal metabolism, sustainability},
pubstate = {published},
tppubtype = {inproceedings}
}
This paper is an output of an ongoing EU Horizon 2020 project (MAGIC) that aims to better understand how EU water, food, energy, waste and biodiversity policies link with each other and with EU climate and sustainability goals, framed in terms of the nexus concept. The project conducts transdisciplinary research with policy makers using an approach termed Quantitative Story Telling (QST), as an interface between science and policy domains. QST combines semantic (qualitative) and formal (quantitative) approaches to assess the plausibility, normative fairness and analytical coherence of narratives being used by stakeholders to justify either the status quo or alternative policy positions for the EU. The paper focuses on those aspects of the MAGIC analysis highlighted by external reviewers of the project as being most insightful and having the most potential value to a wider community of practice concerned with supporting or evaluating sustainability related policies. The paper outlines the process of QST used and the quantitative method used, multi-scale societal metabolism analyses (SMA) assessing the funds of land and human time needed to create the flows of materials, energy and money that reproduce and maintain the identity of the system of interest. As one of the five MAGIC policy studies, the authors focused on a key EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) narrative. CAP is a policy which is now expected to deliver multiple objectives across policy domains, but as implemented, potentially contributes to a tension between supporting competitiveness and delivering public goods. High-level findings that quantify aspects of this tension are presented, followed by specific technical issues found when conducting the analysis. The paper then reflects on the authors' use of these data to discuss with policy-makers issues where the tension between competitiveness and public goods are most stark; a more interpretive, qualitative phase of analysis that builds on the quantitative analysis. The outputs of the analysis used within the CAP QST imply the need for policy makers to consider alternative issue framings, otherwise they risk appearing to make only a rhetorical commitment to defining and delivering EU sustainability goals. The societal metabolic framing used in MAGIC highlights the biophysical underpinnings of EU farming systems; their dependence on non-renewable resources and the pressures generated by them that degrade ecosystem functions or services. A societal metabolic framing also means considering multiple scales, since otherwise EU policy is blind to the effects it has on sustainability beyond the borders of the EU. If research impact is defined in terms of acknowledged change in stakeholders' concepts or behaviours (an expected impact for the project by funders) then to date, there has been limited 'success'. While the rhetoric of 'evidence-based policy' remains prominent, it remains extremely challenging to engage with policy makers in deliberation on evidence that challenges conventional narratives. This was the case even for staff with extensive experience of inter-and transdisciplinary working at the science-policy interface. In conclusion, science for sustainability policy could benefit from adopting the approaches like QST, which can integrate and balance the semantic and formal parts of science for policy research. For the wider science-policy community of practice, the key insight is that for processes like QST the key decisions are made at the interfaces between the sematic and formal phases of analysis (what is modelled and why) and the formal and semantic phases of analysis (what the outputs mean and why they shouldn't be ignored).
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