Responsible Business Forum: Whose Business Is Climate Change?

MANILA: Of course you can make responsible business out of climate change, such as in producing, processing and pushing any or all of these: drought-resistant and flood-tolerant crop varieties, irrigation-saving technologies, water-harvesting technologies, and building watersheds.

So I was interested in reading, just now, early morning of Tuesday, 03 May 2016, when I saw the "Responsible Business Forum" Facebook post of Bruce Tolentino, the roving IRRI Deputy Director General for Communication & Partnerships, on "Recommendations of the Responsible Business Forum (Jakarta, April 25-26) on RICE." So I clicked the link – http://asean-csr-network.org/c/responsible-business-forum  – and read the final recommendations. I was thinking of my own idea of development agriculture (visit my INA DAGA, blogspot.com).

But first, what is it all about? The webpage says (asean-csr-network.org):

The Asean Responsible Business Forum (is) a regional platform that (brought) together government officials, civil society and businesses in a multi-stakeholder platform to discuss the burning issues of the day and share best practices of responsible business or Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The theme of the conference (was) “Promoting responsible business practice in the ASEAN Economic Community.”

Areas of discussion (included):

(1)     Building a more competitive and sustainable ASEAN Economic Community Post-2015 through responsible business

(2)     Promoting the business responsibility to respect human rights

(3)     New business models for inclusive and sustainable agriculture in ASEAN

(4)     Creating a culture of integrity in ASEAN businesses

(5)     Building a more competitive and sustainable ASEAN Economic Community Post-2015 through responsible business

(6)     Promoting the business responsibility to respect human rights

(7)     New business models for inclusive and sustainable agriculture in ASEAN

(8)     Creating a culture of integrity in ASEAN businesses.

That's an exact reproduction of the list on the webpage; notice that #1 and #5 are the same; #2 and #6 are the same; #3 and #7 are the same; and #4 and #8 are the same? So, there are only 4 areas of discussion, not 8. Who was responsible for this business of the list? I did not notice the mistake at once, but since I always read and reread what I have written, this didn't escape my editorial eye.

Reading on, I learn that the experts were grouped into commodities (products) and they were asked to generate 4-6 "actionable recommendations" they could agree on, for their respective commodities to implement. There were 6 groups: Coffee, Corn, Dairy, Palm Oil, Rice, and Sugar.

I note that all the 6 groups recommended the building and/or strengthening of public-private partnerships, to which I have subscribed as a scholar of agriculture since I read it being proposed by ICRISAT under then-Director General William Dar, at least since 2010.

As an agriculturist, teacher, writer and advocate of primate change considering climate change impinging on agriculture, I note that the Palm Oil, Rice, and Sugar Groups mentioned climate change, but not the Coffee, Corn and Dairy Groups. That means the last groups did not consider climate change a priority business concern, which is a mistake, because climate change certainly impinges on business.

Further, as an inveterate blogger and author of several books on the art & science of agriculture published in the last decade, courtesy of ICRISAT, it is very interesting to me that only the Rice Group recommended that knowledge be spread wide; I quote the statement:

Scale is attained through widespread knowledge extension systems enabled by public-private partnerships.

So far, the Philippine government has failed in extension to spread knowledge widely so, yes, with public-private partnerships, it can be looked at a business opportunity or two.

And yes, a vigorous, wide network of extension initiatives can and should campaign for the funding, implementation and management of all 29 final recommendations of the 6 commodity groups.

But note that the actionable recommendations were for "their respective commodities to implement" – that means that the recommendations for a commodity (crop) does not necessarily apply to another commodity.

In fact I was surprised that the forum was fragmented into commodities, and only 6: coffee, corn, dairy, palm oil, rice, and sugar. Why did they not discuss the different commodity recommendations and come up with only one list applicable to all 6? And why only 6; why did they not include vegetables and fruits, for instance? The report did not mention how they arrived at the 6, but whatever the logic, I would still say:

Climate change is the business of businessmen – that's a given. What about making it the business of the non-businessmen, the farmers? After all, the farmers are the ones who are the first sector that suffers from climate change, and they don't know that they should treat farming as a business so that they don't remain losers? Why not a partnership between businessmen and government to teach farmers the business of climate change, not merely to survive but to thrive?

The blurb I quoted above from the webpage says, in part, that the forum was "a multi-stakeholder platform to discuss the burning issues of the day and share best practices of responsible business or Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)." Let me share with my own list of 2 burning issues:

(1)     Farmers do not see how their "good agricultural practices" exacerbate climate change, such as the application of nitrogenous fertilizer as recommended. For instance, the findings of ICRISAT is that a planted hill of a crop needs only a 3-finger pinch of fertilizer each time. Our farmers apply a minimum of 10 bags per hectare. That means our farmers are over-applying fertilizers. Not only that; nitrogenous fertilizers when applied on the soil gives off nitrous oxide, the deadliest greenhouse gas in the world, absorbing and giving off atmospheric heat 300 times more than carbon dioxide, molecule for molecule.

(2)     Farmers do not know how to escape from their eternal cycle of debt. They still borrow from usurers, which include input suppliers.

For the CSR people, here are the 4 areas of discussion as listed above and my inputs:

Responsible business – Managers and cultivators of the soil should be taught how to be responsible in business, conserving natural resources.

Human rights – I would expect more women than men engaged in a farm business because the wife behaves more responsibly than the husband for the good of the whole family.

Inclusive and sustainable agriculture – In any business, the farmers should be included as active participants for their own welfare.

Culture of integrity – This has to do with honesty and reliability.

Given all that, I do not see how responsible Asean business would not be able to help the Asean farmers escape from poverty.