Daniel: [00:00:00] Welcome to the supply chain dialogues season three, episode five. I am Daniel Helmig.

Let me ask you something. Do you eat? To get drink.

Well, most of us do it daily. It's a necessity, not a lifestyle choice. Right. Even if you are on a 16-to-8 or therapeutic fasting setup, without water, we wouldn't last more than three to five days. Primarily, our bodies are made of 50 to 60% water. While opinions in the scientific community vary on food, it's clear that after about three weeks without it, our bodies shut down, even if we stay hydrated.

Daniel: So why do I mention such grim scenarios? History is filled with times where harvests fail and even subtle shifts in temperature costs, severe food and water shortages. Poor agricultural policies by governments have had similar catastrophic impacts even in the last 200 years. These events have led to mass starvation and significant population declines. Only those who could migrate. We're able to survive. And here's some perspective on that. If you're curious whether your family was part of these migrants. Your DNA heritage might reveal whether your ancestors were among them. Most people living in present day Europe. Have genetic ancestry tracing back to ancient.

Hunter-gatherers. Early farmers from near east and nomadic herders from the Eurasian steps among others. Individuals in the Americas often have ancestors who migrated from Asia tens of thousands of years ago. Along with most recent ancestors from Europe, Africa, or other parts of the world. In the olden times, therefore the migration cue often came from the climatic events or rampant misuse of the environment that fed them. Not only did [00:02:00] migration occurred due to changes in climatic conditions. But many scholars argue now with better temperature data available. That whole empire is tumbled due to even minute temperature changes.

So for example, the Roman empire. Which thrived over 650 years. In a warm and moist weather period in Europe came to an end with the emergence of the late antique little ice age, roughly from 536 to 660 CE common era. The same applies to cultures in every continent of the world. Societies and not just dinosaurs. Rose and fell due to subtle and sometimes abrupt changes in temperature and climatic conditions. And here's another point of information that many of us don't know about. Up to a third of our food supplier. Sometimes even 50% in certain regions of the world. Comes from small farmers. So-called small holders. These entrepreneurs working alongside the families and often migrant laborers. Say the produce to local cooperatives who sell to larger companies, which then either directly. All of a even larger companies put the food on our store shelves. And similar than in the industrial side, The first part of the supply chain. I often don't even receive a sustainable living wage.

But the climate makes survival even harder for the small farmers. Marginal changes can wreck havoc. And the ecosystems and incomes, therefore. They are the canaries in the coal mines, alerting us to dangerous conditions. However, unlike canaries farmers can adapt and evolve by using innovative food technology and agricultural methods to cope with these changes.

Now the time to stop climate change is long gone. Now we need to focus on how to survive in the environment we created. Facing [00:04:00] volatile weather conditions. Biodiversity loss and pollution of air, water, and seas.

And while most episodes of this podcast focus on the industrial side of whole world and efforts, did she agree in those guys, net zero to indirectly stabilize our climate and secure? They are for food and water supplies. Today and this episode, we addressing a more immediate threat. As the native American tribe. Cree proverb says only when the last tree has been cut down.

The last fish caught and the last stream poisoned. We'll realize we cannot eat money.

It takes leaders bridging the business and academic, the food innovation and technology science world to secure these 30% of all food supply. Recently I had the chance to meet Yuan Zhou. One of these leaders who is working to make agriculture, climate smart and resilient. And our dialogue, she will explain more.

What climate smart actually is. You and under colleagues collaborate with small holder farmers to ensure food security, farm income, rural employment, and resilience. Bridging the gap. Between research and practical application. I seldomly do a detailed review of my guests, CVS, but in nuance case. I make an exception because it's so revealing.

What I mean about bridging worlds, both business, academic and geographies. You want studied economics at whole high university in Nanjing, China earned her master of science degree from the E Institute for water management and holds a PhD from the university of Hamburg in Germany.

She also completed an MBA. At IMD for good measure. One of Switzerland and stock management schools and is a member of the international max Planck research school on earth system modeling. In her previous role, she served as president of the Swiss forum of international [00:06:00] agricultural research. She works at a foundation for sustainable agriculture in Switzerland. Focusing on policy research, advocacy platforms and overseeing their China program. You are. It's a pleasure to have you here on the supply chain dialogues. Welcome to the show.

Yuan Zhou: Thank you very much, Daniel. It's my pleasure to be here.

Daniel Helmig: I'm really looking forward to this dialogue because it goes into areas that I'm not that familiar with. And I hope that I can learn a lot from you, . And hopefully as well, some of our listeners find that quite interesting. Let's start with your career.

Daniel: You authored and edited three books and numerous articles on sustainable agriculture. Can you share how your journey began and what inspired you to focus on agriculture and sustainability in the first place?

Yuan Zhou: I grew up in rural areas in North China, in a province where agriculture is the major economic activity. So we used to support the farming community quite a lot. So from early on, agriculture, rural livelihood, and rural environment are quite close to my heart. During college, when I was studying economics, I was involved in one of my professor's projects, focusing on soil conservation and water conservation in one of the most degraded ecosystems of China.

And there I discovered my passion for environmental protection. And later on, I've got the opportunity to do further studies on environmental resources management and environmental economics. After my studies, the first big project I led was focusing on understanding farmer youth behavior in a river basin.

I conducted hundreds of farm household surveys in rural villages, and I spent three months there. talking with farmers and trying to get data and information for this research project. I really enjoyed it. And since then, I have not left the [00:08:00] agriculture sector. After joining the foundation, I had the opportunity to work on a number of interesting projects related to agriculture, food security, and environmental sustainability.

Daniel Helmig: As the head of the Agricultural Policy in China program of the Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture, you oversee initiatives to change policies and practices. Please explain a bit more about this. What are the main objectives of your current projects, especially those that aim at climate change and reducing greenhouse gas emissions?

Yuan Zhou: At the foundation, I and my team, cover two types of work. So one is focusing on agriculture policy research and advocacy. So this type of project aims to improve the enabling environment for smallholder farming. we do it through influencing policy makers, policy advisors, and regulators to adopt more effective agriculture policies.

Based on evidence based scientific research, we address policy issues and propose policy solutions and reform recommendations. For example, we have studied, in a number of countries, agriculture subsidy policy. Thank you. to better understand the design of such policies, the implementation, as well as the effectiveness and impact of such policies.

for example, recently we did a very in depth study looking at the soil health and green development subsidy policy in China. And, we also have done extensive study looking at fertilizer subsidy and power subsidy in India and proposed a list of policy recommendations to policymakers. Fortunately, some of the recommendations have been incorporated into government policy and strategies.

The second type of project, as the head of [00:10:00] China, I'm responsible for are smallholder development projects. So this type of project aims to scale up adoption of modern agriculture technology and also sustainable agriculture practices. For instance, the work we are doing in China is focusing on Gansu province, very dry region.

And there, what we are promoting is, drip irrigation. And we are also promoting greenhouse for vegetable production as a, you know, a water saving kind of activity. And we are also introducing a lot of drought tolerant crop varieties, especially for vegetables and fruits, as well as potatoes.

Daniel Helmig: This, if I'm not mistaken, that's already goes into the direction of what you call climate smart agriculture. So explain that please. How important is for smallholder farmers in developing countries?

Yuan Zhou: Yeah, climate smart agriculture is a broad term. It has three main objectives. Number one is to increase the adaptive capacity and resilience of farmers in the face of a changing climate. Second, it intends to reduce the negative impact of agriculture on climate change. While doing both, we also need to keep farming productive and profitable.

So essentially three main pillars are resilience, mitigation and the productivity and why does it matter? climate smart agriculture is one of the most important tool or methodology or practices in our view for farmers to deal with climate change. Smallholder farmers are already experiencing devastating effects of climate change with one, degree increase in temperature.

Crop can lose about five to 10 percent of their yields for major, food [00:12:00] crops as well as cash crops. And also smallholders as many other agriculture producers are contributing to greenhouse gas emissions. So to address climate change, we also must address agriculture, including smallholder farmers as well as deforestation.

Daniel Helmig: Amazing. Five to 10 percent based on one degree of, of climate. And I mean, there are not that many people any longer that believe that we will be able to curb our climate change to 1. 5 percent as it was set up in the Paris Climate Accord.

So they have to be some dramatic changes in the way that as well, the small old farmers. have to work in the future so that we still have something to eat, I guess.

Yuan Zhou: Yes, exactly.

Daniel Helmig: Now, and you mentioned it already, innovation is crucial in addressing climate change, being climate smarter and promoting then sustainability in agriculture. What are the, from your perspective, the most significant technological innovations in the sustainable agricultural space from the small farmer perspective?

What do you see there? Is it all big technology or how do I have to think about that?

Yuan Zhou: There are quite many innovations. A few came to my mind. The first one is, improved crop varieties, especially climate resilient varieties, which can withstand drought, floods, extreme heat and other events driven by climate change. The second category is, Precision agriculture basically means the, optimal use of agriculture inputs such as fertilizers, chemicals, and irrigation.

This involves the use of sensors, the use of drones, and the use of GPS technology. another relevant one for smallholder farmers are micro irrigation systems, including drip irrigation, as well as the solar. Sprinkler. So this can really improve what you use [00:14:00] efficiency, last but not the least, digital agriculture.

So this involves digital apps and also digital platforms, which can not only share information, especially market price information to farmers. They can also link farmers directly with the marketplace. So e commerce platforms, for example. So these are some of the technologies.

Daniel Helmig: In one of our pre discussions, you mentioned something about, which I found quite fascinating as well, with the digital approach, tractors, similar like Uber, that can be used. What is this all about?

Yuan Zhou: So this is one project we are working in Nigeria with a partner called Harlow Tractor. So Harlow Tractor is a platform which is a Uber like platform for hiring tractors for farmers. So farmers actually can use their mobile phones or internet connection to book a tractor to do the land preparation for their farmland.

Daniel Helmig: Amazing.

Yuan Zhou: Um, yeah, and this kind of technology again involves using sensors and also GPS, uh, locators, and they can connect, the tractors directly to internet, to link the data up as well. So this really provide farmers affordable and accessible way of using mechanization

Daniel Helmig: Amazing. What other innovations are you and your colleagues working on? So can you share anything which is not too secret?

Yuan Zhou: Yeah. Definitely. At the Foundation, we are very active, working on crop improvement and seed development. For example, we have worked on quite a few R& D projects trying to develop climate smart and resilient crop varieties. In South Asia, We have developed and marketed a few drought tolerant maize varieties.

And in Ethiopia, over the last 10 15 years, we have developed quite a number of [00:16:00] improved taff varieties for local farmers. These varieties, are tolerant to drought, to lodging, and also to some of the diseases. Another example is, tropically adapted potatoes. So we have been working with International Potato Center and also a seed company trying to, develop, new tropical adapted potatoes, which are also resistant to late flight diseases.

All of these kind of R& D partnerships are public private partnerships, leveraging the strengths from public sector, research and private sector knowledge and also the on the ground presence of NGO sector.

Daniel Helmig: Amazing. And when you talk, Yuan, when you talk about drought resilient crop, how does it even work? I mean, they will, need some water, don't they?

Yuan Zhou: Yeah, they need some water, but they need a very limited amount of water. the researchers are selecting or breeding for varieties which can really grow in a low water kind of condition, drought conditions. And they do a lot of field

Daniel Helmig: Yeah, I can imagine.

Yuan Zhou: to make sure this, yeah, this works.

Daniel Helmig: By using probably as well then digital technology again to get this done. So it's quite different than what might have been done hundreds of years ago when you were basically just looking every year. Does it work? Does it not work? You can do much more, I guess.

Yuan Zhou: Yes.

Daniel Helmig: You work on a range of different programs across many countries. Many of those are related to developing sustainable agricultural practices within, as you mentioned, China, India, other Asian and African countries.

How do these practices contribute to greenhouse gas emission reduction and support the livelihood of the local farmers?

Yuan Zhou: let me give you a few examples. In Bangladesh, since 2019, we have been working on a project called EVET, Introducing Virtual Efficient Technologies. we are promoting two types of technologies. So one is we [00:18:00] call ultra high density plantation with drip irrigation for mango production.

And the second one is the alternate wetting and drying irrigation technology for rice production. and since then, about fifty thousand farmers have benefited from our projects. And in terms of mango production, this technology can save about 80 percent of the world's usage. compared with traditional mango production.

and since mango orchards is considered as agroforestry as well, so we have successfully developed a carbon credit project based on the agroforestry concept. Starting from this year, our farmers are going to get, the carbon credit as an additional income stream.

Daniel Helmig: Oh, that's cool.

on top of, yeah, on top of their, income coming from this mango production.

And for rice as well, the alternate wetting and drying methodology, AWD, it's saving a lot of water. for farmers, especially who are using flood irrigation for rice paddy. And also it can reduce methane emission by about 35%. So both projects contributed hugely to greenhouse gas emission reduction.

amazing. Because I mean, I have never had the chance to be at a rice field. But when you look at TV the typical perception that you have is these rice fields, which are completely bathed in water. So that's no longer needed today. Is this different? It's probably not that

Yuan Zhou: is the most traditional way of doing rice production. It's very popular in many Asian countries for paddy rice, but this is leading to a huge missing emission from rice production. So now this new technology is to called alternate wetting and drying. So when you need water, you put water in. When you don't need, you drain the land and get the water out.[00:20:00]

So this way the methane reduction can happen. that's why we and a lot of other projects are working to promote this technology to raise farmers.

Daniel Helmig: easy to to change their ways, I guess. And, and I understand that. I mean, you talk to a lot of farmers and you have talked to a lot of farmers. You mentioned that as well when you were talking about what you have done in China, but it seems that education and the community engagement is very vital for achieving this sustainable agriculture.

How do you use these elements to ensure long term adoption for these practices?

Yuan Zhou: farmer education is very important for farmers to get knowledge and know how, especially in relation to new technologies or sustainable practices. However, most farmers are not getting adequate extension services, especially because extension services has been underfunded over the past few decades.

One data point I want to share with you in some regions of Kenya, there is one government extension worker for 2000 smallholder farmers.

Daniel Helmig: That's terrible. Yeah. Oh,

Yuan Zhou: clearly you can see there is a huge gap in terms of providing farmers with the education and extension services. So at the foundation, what we are doing is, to promote an agri entrepreneur program which we launched about 10 years ago.

the basic idea is we train rural young people to become agri entrepreneurs in their villages or communities following a three to six months training including some practical internship and mentorship as well. These young people set up a agriculture input stall where they can provide not only input to farmers but also advisory services and sometimes market linkage services to smallholder farmers.

so far, the foundation has established about 25, [00:22:00] 000 agri entrepreneurs across many countries in Asia and Africa. And each agri entrepreneur is reaching about 100 to 500 smallholder farmers. So we are focusing on strengthening the capacity of agri entrepreneurs to provide services and product to farmers and also to drive behavior change at the farmer level.

So we link Agri entrepreneurs with the climate smart agriculture technology providers and also more than inputs and training as well so that they can pass on this kind of knowledge and input to smallholder farmers in their communities.

Daniel Helmig: It's amazing, isn't it? I mean, you, we were talking about massive changes in terms of numbers by utilizing newer technologies or different ways of how to do agriculture. There were 30%, you mentioned 80 percent in some areas. And even from a governmental perspective, but not only from a government, but as well from the big corporate food and beverage companies, it should be in their interest to train those people because just tribal knowledge is not going to do that.

If you have these massive changes, this needs to be trained. This education is needed everywhere. So specifically then with regard to farmers, it seems so simple. But, uh, still it hasn't been done enough. It's good that you guys doing this. This is fantastic.

Yuan Zhou: Yes, and also we focus on women farmers and the youth in the villages for our training. So we try to engage as many as the women farmers to become agri entrepreneurs. So that they can also serve more like underserved women population in the villages. And on top of that, we also leverage digital technology in our agri entrepreneur network.

So we use digital training. We also use SMS for sharing knowledge and information. Also, we link them with e [00:24:00] commerce platforms in some instances.

Daniel Helmig: It's good that you mentioned as well, the women aspect. I would go through the UN sustainability goals, development goals, you take a lot of boxes with your work on a day to day basis. Fascinating. Now let's, let's talk about something else , which I really liked when I read through what. You are and your colleagues are doing, which is the whole use of KPIs, because it is all good and nice to talk about these things, but as a operations guy by heart, I know that only what you can measure will get actually done. So how do you measure the impact and success of the programs that you and your colleagues are working on?

Yuan Zhou: New project, at the foundation, we usually have a theory of change and then associated with that a number of KPIs, to measure the progress and impact of that project. as you can imagine, we have very diverse projects, so really a diverse list of KPIs. So since about six, seven years ago in the foundation, we established a new performance measurement system where we picked about 10 to 12 foundation wide KPIs.

Indicators against which almost all the project needs to report on. This includes number of farmers, served, number of women farmers or percentage of women farmers. number of agri entrepreneurs created, number of jobs created, and also the revenues of agri entrepreneurs, and also the number of farmers who are trained on climate smart agriculture, etc.

So this type of indicators. Using the performance measurement system plus our monitoring protocol, we collect the data regularly, and then we analyze the data and do our performance. Management reports, each year. But this is not enough because these are monitoring data. So to complement this kind of, [00:26:00] data, we also engage, with independent, evaluators or third party evaluators to do impact evaluation studies.

So this is usually for large project or for which has been running for two or three years. We engage an external evaluator to come in to do farmhouse household survey, usually like 300 farmers, and then to better understand what are the impact at the farmer level, including whether there is a change in farmers income, whether there are changes in adoption of technologies, and also farmers perceptions on climate change, for example.

So, this kind of work. farmer level impact. And these insights and data are very useful for our decision making and also for us to improve our programs.

Daniel Helmig: That's as well how you run any corporation in any manufacturing area. You need this feedback loop. I'm an old Six Sigma fan. So therefore, when you look at the DMAIC cycle, the last point is always control. You can change everything.

It's wonderful, but at the end, you need to control, learn. Adapt and then define again and take that into the next circle. There is no such thing as do it once, right, and then forever. You always have to change that. It's good that you do that

Yuan, based on your work, what strategies have proven most effective in encouraging this shift among farmers, especially in less developed regions.

Yuan Zhou: I think field level demonstration is very important and works well to show the benefits of a certain innovation. Seeing is believing. Seeing the tangible results can be a powerful motivator for adoption. So the second strategy is to leverage social influence, especially the opinion leaders in the rural community.

So that's why we often focus our efforts on lead farmers or opinion leaders in the farming community, to convince them that this [00:28:00] technology is really good or sustainable. And if they adopt that technology, it will generate a lot of replication or more adoption in the farming community because of their influence and they are trusted by local people So another strategy, is making innovation more accessible and affordable for smallholders. For example, small packs of fertilizers, small packs of seeds, small packs of agrochemicals, these kind of things can make it more accessible and affordable for smallholder farmers. And in relation to that, some incentives, provision is also important if there is a discount on the first use of innovation or if there is access to credit provided.

So this can really lower the risk of adopting a new technology. And sometimes if a company can provide a guaranteed minimum price for farmers produce. This also can encourage farmers to experiment with new practices and new technologies.

Daniel Helmig: That makes perfect sense. The topic of living wage specifically with smallhold farmers is a big deal. We haven't talked so far about circular economy, and I know that you're working on that as well. how do you see practices evolving to align more closely with circular principles?

Yuan Zhou: I have seen increasing attention on reducing the fertilizer and the chemical use in agriculture, especially the quantity of such inputs. In China, a few years ago, the government had two action plans for achieving zero growth of fertilizer and pesticide use. And in some other Asian countries, they have also adopted similar strategies.

another one I want to mention is the adoption of regenerative agriculture practices, such as cover cropping, crop rotation, intercropping, or conservation tillage. So this kind of practice is [00:30:00] not only improve soil health, but also reduce waste. In addition, there is also increasing composting in some places and biochar production, so this kind of technology also contributes to a circular economy.

Last but not the least, coming back to precision agriculture. So again, using drones, sensors, and GPS technologies to optimize input use and reduce waste. So this is also very much related to circular

Daniel Helmig: Fascinating. I mean, there's a lot going on in this space. I did not know that at all. next and we can go one step higher. Okay. Circular economy is driven via regulators so let's talk about policy from your perspective. What fundamental policy changes or interventions are needed?

To accelerate the transition towards more sustainable and greenhouse gas efficient agricultural systems globally. What is your view?

Yuan Zhou: Really, I think policy plays a critical role in shaping the future of agriculture and also its environmental impact. Firstly, I think comprehensive climate policies encompassing agriculture is very much needed. So government need to formulate such policy and implement such policy. And I realized that, agriculture, climate strategy policy is often, Working in separate, dimensions, so there is a lack of coherence or streamlining of climate, targets climate strategy across sectors.

So I think we need to work, on that to bring forestry, environmental sector, even energy sector more closely to the agriculture sector, coming together to to establish a common climate targets and strategy, so to speak. Apart from that, I think policies to, encouraging financial incentive for agriculture, especially sustainable agriculture, very important, like carbon credits, agriculture subsidies, and even tax credits.

So, this [00:32:00] kind of incentives. we will help farmers to adopt more sustainable agriculture. Another important policy I want to mention is the policies which encourage increasing investment. into research and development, both from the public sector and private sector, because we do need a lot of new technologies, to deal with climate change and to, make agriculture more sustainable.

And R& D is, very fundamental to, to come up with this kind of innovation. Last but not the least, I think we need to establish regulation and standards for sustainable agriculture practices as well as for ESG disclosure. So in this context, mandatory disclosure, based on ESG framework, will be very helpful to achieve sustainable agriculture in the longer term.

Daniel Helmig: Completely agree. Looking to the future, what are the emerging trends and technologies that will be most influential from your perspective in integrating sustainability and global agricultural practice says overall to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and lead to better adaption at the end?

Yuan Zhou: So there are a couple of technologies. Precision agriculture, the continuous advancement of precision agriculture technologies can really help optimize the use and reduce waste involving remote sensing or using of drones and even, AI driven, analytics. this kind of technologies can really help farmers to make better decisions.

In relation to that, also digital farming platforms, these platforms can provide real time data to farmers to support farmers to make good decisions on their crop management. another one is biotechnology and gene editing. So this type of technology has huge potential to develop a climate resilient variety.

which can withstand heat, drought, and floods, and other kind of stresses to the agriculture system. And also, they have [00:34:00] potential to develop new varieties which need less nutrients to grow, for example. so really this, there is huge potential there. And another one I want to mention is carbon capture and sequestration.

 So there are emerging technologies in this space as well, especially on soil, carbon management, as well as, direct air capture or biochar production. So all of these technologies, can support greenhouse gas. And

Daniel Helmig: Which, mm

Yuan Zhou: last one I want to mention is renewable energy. So renewable energy for agriculture, especially farm mechanization and also for food processing and transportation logistics.

So this can also be a game changer.

Daniel Helmig: So for those of you who are listening in that and so far were thinking, this is not my industry. I do not have to care necessarily. A, you want to eat, B, you want to drink and C, there are greenhouse gas emission standards that you have to fulfill. And by getting involved in this area and branch out, you might be able to do something good for all of us and do something good for your shareholders and for your company.

Daniel: Well, I hope you enjoy this episode of the supply chain dialogues. If you do, please subscribe on apple, Spotify, YouTube, or any other central podcast platform. And if you are a subscriber, tell someone who likes to eat and drink like you do. Perhaps when you encounter a local farmer next time. I engage in a conversation about their understanding of climate smart practices.

And even if their views may not align with your urban or suburban political perspective. Consider purchasing the product at fair prices, to sustain their livelihoods. Supporting them as paramount over engaging in political debates. Often fueled by simple uninformed bias.

If you're interested in learning more about this or other topics that we covered, you can sign up for online or face-to-face trainings, which is available on our [00:36:00] company website and soon on YouTube. Well, you can book a chat with me to explore the art of the possible for your company. Either via seminars, coaching, dialogues, or complete projects, we always find something. That adds value to our clients.

With that: stay safe, be bold and see you in two weeks.

These are The Supply Chain Dialogues produced and copyrighted by helmig advisory. AG in 2024.