D3.7 Synthesis of assessment findings in the form of two discussion papers (evolving into scientific articles and policy briefs)
Creators: name: Steiner, Bodo
name: Bustamante, Maria
name: Manrique, Cintya
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2024

description: “Modern societies have acquired an amount of economic wealth, scientific knowledge, and technological capacities that should enable to fund and implement most of the transformations that The Limits to Growth saw as paramount in terms of creating a sustainable world. … The time has come, we believe, for a new Enlightenment or for otherwise overturning current habits of thought and action that only consider the short term.

The Executive Committee of the Club of Rome”

(Preface to: Von Weizsäcker, E. U., & Wijkman, A. (2017). Come on!: capitalism, short-termism, population and the destruction of the planet. Springer.)

“Trade is a good thing and occurs only if both sides expect benefits from it. But trade is also a segment of international competition, which can lead to the defeat of weaker companies or entire states, and trade has enormous effects on natural resources and the environment in general but so far lacks appropriate rules protecting those public goods. The world will need a new appreciation of balance …”

(Von Weizsäcker, E. U., & Wijkman, A. (2017). Come on!: capitalism, short-termism, population and the destruction of the planet. Springer, p. 38)

Below, the reader will find two inter-connected discussion papers. In Discussion paper 1 (DP1), we present thirty-one leverage points, i.e. key points of intervention, that have the potential to contribute to more sustainable agricultural trade, arising from investigations of those actors, regions and commodities which were part of the MATS case studies. The subsequent DP2 aims to set the foundations to link MATS empirical case study evidence with theoretical notions of leverage points, levers and reinforcing feedback in a systems-context, to explain how key points of interventions that make use of reinforcing feedback can support transformative changes toward more sustainable agricultural trade. 

Nearly half of the thirty-one leverage points identified and discussed below in DP1 relate to policies, governance, and regulations; nine pertain to economic and market elements; six to social capital; and one to human capital, specifically knowledge and skills. The first discussion paper DP1 concentrates on leverage points within each contextual dimension of the agricultural trade system as they were assessed through the MATS case studies and in the context of previous literature. We provide information on potential actions for change and case study-specific conditions supporting actions for change

In the subsequent discussion paper DP2, we focus only on those intervention points that we identify as strategic cross-cutting in their potential to transform the agricultural trade system. These are those leverage points recognized each in more than 5 of the 15 MATS case studies and located in at least two of the four SDG regions investigated under MATS [(1) Sub-Saharan Africa, (2) Northern Africa and Southern Asia, (3) Northern America and Europe, (4) Latin America and the Caribbean]. 

We consider our MATS findings presented in DP1 and DP2 as offering actionable information on leverage points and intertwined levers that could feed into the pathways to sustainability identified in the IPBES Global Assessment. Considering the focus of DP2 on strategic cross-cutting leverage points, we hope that it not only simplifies the challenges facing policymakers in looking for entry-points and prioritization; we also hope that we have contributed with a conceptually-based multi-actor application of the interplay of enabling conditions, reinforcing feedbacks and interventions to trigger systemic changes that could be applied to other research projects with multi-actor settings beyond MATS. 

Finally, we hope that both discussion papers contribute to a better practical and conceptual understanding of the relevance of the diversity of contextual conditions in agri-food systems when policymakers aim to identify key points of intervention on which to design more sustainable agricultural trade interventions and policies.