10.3.2.5 Synergies, Trade-offs, and No Regrets
The existence of ancillary benefits and synergies in implementing mitigation
options has been addressed in a preliminary way in IPCC (1996c). These issues
are discussed in detail in Chapters 7, 8
and 9. Some relevant findings are highlighted here.
The adoption of more sustainable agricultural practices in Africa (Sokona et al., 1999) illustrates clearly the mutually reinforcing effects of climate change
mitigation, environmental protection, and economic benefits. In fact, the introduction
or expansion of agroforestry and organic agriculture (i.e., methods that intensify
agricultural production while using less input), can improve food security and
at the same time reduce GHG emissions. In agroforestry systems, trees are planted
to delineate plots of land, and further to fix nitrogen, causing the nutrients
lower in the soil to rise up. The trees also prevent soil erosion, supply firewood
and animal fodder, and constitute a source of income. Organic farming improves
the fertility of the soil through the addition of organic matter. The damage
and diseases caused by insects are virtually eliminated through the technique
of “growing in corridors” and other holistic methods. Costly inputs
are not used at all or are kept to a minimum, and the system is flexible. In
addition, these methods restore and maintain carbon levels in the soil. Hence,
if practised on a large scale, they could transform soils from carbon sources
into carbon sinks.
Energy efficiency improvements and energy conservation are other issues of
economic and strategic concern. In developing countries, energy demand (for
electricity in particular) continues to grow at a rate that is often hard to
keep up with. The adoption of environmentally sound technologies (ESTs) for
both energy production and energy consumption would enable these countries to
lower the pressure on energy investments, reduce public investments (in some
cases by up to one-third (World Bank, 1994)), improve export competitiveness,
enlarge energy reserves, and also avoid a large increase in GHG emissions. Thus
the alternative energy paths of low-carbon futures in developing countries can
be compatible with national objectives. Such paths could prevent energy and/or
GDP intensities from following the growth path of the developed world, in which
energy demand and GDP elasticity first increased with successive stages of industrialization,
but since have sharply decreased.
A large number of similar synergy effects can be found in industry, transportation,
and human settlement patterns. For example, more decentralized development patterns
based on a stronger role for small- and medium-sized cities can decrease the
rural exodus, reduce needs for transportation, and allow the use of modern technologies
(biotechnology, solar energy, wind, and small-scale hydropower) to tap the large
reserves of natural resources. Building upon the lending experiences of World
Bank operations and sector programmes in a number of countries, Warford et al.
(1996) provide evidence for the positive linkages between economic policies
and the environment. Although environmental concerns, and climate change issues
in particular, were not explicitly addressed by macroeconomic and sectoral policies,
the country cases analyzed show clear synergies between reform policies and
environmental improvements. In some cases when adverse side effects do occur,
the remedy is not to reverse the reform policies, but rather to introduce specific
complementary measures that address the negative effects.
Finally, it is important to underline that for the elements that constitute
policies at different levels to operate in a mutually reinforcing manner, the
creation of appropriate communication and information channels should be given
special attention. The topic of establishing effective and stable flows of communication
among different stakeholders is seldom addressed in connection with climate
change mitigation. This is mainly because policies related to climate change
tend to treat mitigation options as isolated projects, each falling into a narrow
area in which potential synergies may be ignored or misunderstood. As result,
environmental policies risk resulting poorly structured interventions, with
a limited scope of influence, and an overestimated cost-effectiveness (Eskeland
and Xie, 1998). Greater synergies could be achieved if agencies with global
and local agendas did business together, through effective linkage mechanisms
that allow co-ordination and support in implementing tasks or functions that
belong to different subsystems and involve different actors.
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