Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
bedded in both culture and commercial advertising infl uences. We simply
delineate here the physical possibilities of a particular area.
In this respect also we are aware that the conclusions drawn herein
can be quite easily caricatured. We know for instance that a number of
foodstuffs consumed in Paris are imported from far away because they
cannot be grown in the North of France. Our analysis of the nitrogen fl ows
involved in the import of such products shows that these are minor (Billen
et al., 2011), while they can account for a signifi cant share of the monetary
fl uxes involved in feeding the city. This has always been the case, as Abad
(2001) showed that already at the end of the 18th century, import to Paris
of exotic and luxury agricultural goods (such as citrus fruits, tea, coffee,
spices, etc.) already accounted for a signifi cant value in the food “Great
Market”. Our approach is focused on the major biogeochemical fl uxes
associated with food production and consumption, because these are the
most signifi cant in terms of environmental impact, including water qual-
ity. There is no reason in this respect to advocate the complete cessation
of exotic product imports. The localisation option explored in this paper
concerns the general organisation of the agro-food system feeding Paris
and the general balance of its inhabitants' diet, not the details of their oc-
casional consumption of luxury products. In that sense, the suggestion that
a shift to localising the food supply in Europe would “starve the poor” and
“increase global inequality”, as suggested by Ballingall and Winchester
(2008), is irrelevant.
In a recent report (Westhoek et al., 2011), a scenario of 50% reduc-
tion of animal protein in the human diet in the EU has been explored at
the global scale using the IMAGE model of the Netherlands Environmen-
tal Assessment Agency. The results are a strong decline in the import of
protein-rich feed into Europe and an increase in cereal, meat and milk ex-
ports from Europe, so that the scenario would mainly have effects on land
use and environmental quality outside the EU. Our purely biogeochemical
approach differs from this one not only because we are not taking into ac-
count any economic mechanisms, but also because we fi rst constrained the
local agricultural system to self-suffi ciency for feed and for meat and milk
products. This additional constraint explains the strong local response of
the system to decreasing the animal protein consumption observed in our
scenario, in particular in terms of water quality. It therefore appears that
 
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