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True Value Accounting: Making the Economic Case for Food Systems Transformation in India and Kenya

The overall aim of this project aims to contribute to food systems transformation in the two countries in scope (India and Kenya) by making the economic case for pro-nature policies that provide sustainable livelihoods and for enhanced community cohesion. UNEP has a comparative advantage in the economics of food system transformation owing to its hosting The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) initiative launched at the G8+5 Potsdam Meeting of Environment Ministers in 2007. TEEB has developed the TEEBAgriFood Evaluation Framework that provides a comprehensive and universal approach to capture all the impacts and dependencies on nature. The Framework was recognized with the Future Policy Vision Award 2018, awarded by the World Future Council in partnership with FAO and IFOAM – Organics International. The TEEBAgriFood policy implementations (country- and firm-level) are to be included in the upcoming 2023 FAO State of Food and Agriculture (SOFA) report on True Value Accounting. UNEP has been at the forefront of both developing a Framework for assessment with the input of >100 researchers from over 40 countries, as well as showing that implementation can achieve policy impacts. For instance, the TEEBAgriFood analysis on cacao agroforestry contributed to the recent inclusion of agroforestry (for the first time) in the Five-Year Midterm Development Plan for Indonesia. The core value hypothesis is as follows: (i) there are myriad positive and negative impacts and dependencies across the agri-food value chain that routinely and systematically are neither recognized nor captured in decision-making, and yet they contribute to the economy and to livelihoods; (ii) by evaluating and then valuing these impacts and dependencies an economic case can be made for pro-nature policy interventions. The project will contribute to UNEP’s work on food systems transformation embedded in the programme of Mainstreaming Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services Across Sectors and Systems. Specifically, with reference to PoW Indicator N.(iii), Number of countries and national, regional, and subnational authorities and entities that incorporate, with UNEP support biodiversity and ecosystem-based approaches into development and sectoral plans, policies and processes for the sustainable management and/or restoration of terrestrial, freshwater and marine areas. This project will work at State-level in India and County Council-level in Kenya to incorporate, with UNEP support, biodiversity and ecosystem-based approaches that apply economic valuation into development and sectoral plans, policies and processes for the sustainable management of agricultural landscapes. This contributes to MTS Outcome 2A: An economically and socially sustainable pathway for halting and reversing the loss of biodiversity and ecosystem integrity is established and Outcome 2B Sustainable management of nature adopted and implemented in development frameworks. On project sustainability, UNEP would aim to incubate and foster networks/opportunities that will be complementary to the ongoing projects in the regions –implemented either by UNEP or by IKEA Foundation. In addition to that, an exit strategy will be designed during an inception phase and implemented before the end of the project in each of the project areas. An example of this comes from the recently completed IKI-funded TEEBAgriFood work in Kenya. The communities are now better organized owing to the UNEP project and are still actively involved with the County Councils in steering County Integrated Development Plans. A community-led and community-owned enterprise called the Mau Mara Natural Capital Company was established during project implementation and is still active, now working with Absa Bank in Kenya among others to secure financing. This project will develop proof of concept of how to mainstream evidence into public and private decision making to invest on food systems to become more sustainable. This will bring lessons learned for other states and countries to replicate and hence have a bigger impact.