Food security in the world is getting impacted by climate change. Agriculture is extremely vulnerable to climate change. It is vulnerable to increasing temperatures, weather variability, shifting agroecosystem boundaries, invasive crops and pests, and more frequent extreme weather events. Weather events will reduce crop yields and affect crops’ nutritional quality. Lower livestock productivity is also projected.
Wheat, rice, maize, and soybean provide two-thirds of human caloric intake. Without effective adaptation and genetic improvement with each degree Celsius increase in global mean temperature, a reduction in global yields of wheat will occur by 6 percent, rice by 3.2 percent, maize by 7.4 percent, and soybean by 3.1 percent.
The Food Policy Report of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), 2009, has estimated that South Asia, in particular, will be hit particularly hard. Large-scale yield declines for the most important food crops will be seen.
Climate change will increase prices for the most important crops – rice, wheat, maize, and soybeans. Rainfed maize and irrigated and rainfed wheat will see substantially reduced yields. Sub-Saharan Africa will see mixed results, with small declines or increases in maize yields and large negative effects on rainfed wheat. The Latin America and Caribbean region will show mixed yield effects.
Calorie availability in 2050 will be lower and is expected to decline relative to 2000 levels throughout the developing world. The decline in calorie availability will increase child malnutrition by twenty percent. Aggressive agricultural productivity investments of $US7.1 to 7.3 billion are needed to raise calorie consumption to offset the negative impacts of climate change on the health and well-being of children.
Unconventional food production technologies are the solution to securing the world’s food.
The World Bank has developed more than ten Climate-Smart Agriculture Investment Plans (CSAIPs) for Bangladesh, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Lesotho, Mali, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Cote D’Ivoire, Morocco, and the Republic of Congo. An investment of $2.5 billion benefits 80 million people across these countries. The program aims to build resilience and food and nutrition security while curbing GHG Emissions. An overview of these plans is as under;
Bangladesh:
The project is focused on boosting the resilience of livestock farmers. Production efficiency, improvements in feeding strategies, animal health, breeding, and low emission technologies for milk chilling and transport are some of the areas that are targeted under the program.
China:
Multiple projects seek to improve water-use efficiency, implement new technologies to improve soil conditions, increase crop productivity, build climate resilience, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, etc.
Uruguay projects:
These support sustainable agricultural production initiatives and improve energy efficiency and soil-management capacity.
Brazil’s investments focus on sustainable production previously converted to agricultural use.
Colombia’s projects include sustainable cattle ranching, improving milk production, and raising farm income.
Mexico is focusing on agribusiness and adopting environmentally sustainable technologies.
Morocco focuses on building sustainable agri-food chains and increasing market efficiency and related areas.
These climate-smart projects improve community resilience, food security, and productivity while curbing GHG emissions.
Climate change: Financial risks and opportunities