The Economist August 28, 2021 pp50-51|International|Agriculture|”Farming’s new frontiers” “Climate change will alter where many crops are grown. That means gains for some people, but losses for more”
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Many stakeholders from investors, to farmers, to ecologists, to politicians are more and more assessing how climate change will affect farming and food availability from North to South and West to East. “Climate change could make a cornucopia out of land that was once frigid and unproductive. It could also do great harm to regions that feed millions.” Up until “the end of the 20th century” farm productivity increased with the advent of “chemical fertilizers, the development of more productive varieties of grains and rice, along with improved access to irrigation, pesticides and machinery…” Since then “the rise in global temperatures…[has] slowed increases in [farm] productivity” by as much as a fifth from 1971 onward. This is especially bad news for farmers in tropical areas. Indeed, global warming may increase farmable land north but decrease yields in the south. One study suggests that “for every degree that global temperatures rise, mean maize yields will fall by 7.4%, wheat yields will fall by 6%, and rice yields will fall by 3.2%. Those three crops supply about two-thirds of all the calories that humans consume.” Making matters worse, the population is expected to rise to 9.7B by 2064 from 7.98B now.
A worry about the biome has emerged with agriculture's response to global warming. This is especially a concern about the boreal-region forests. These forests “cover vast tracts of land south of the Arctic Circle [and now] boast temperatures warm enough to grow the hardiest cereals, such as oats and barley.” Farmable boreal lands in Sweden could increase from 8% to 41% and in Finland from 51% to 81%. Many worry that cutting down forests will result in losing biodiversity and the ecosystems that support “the lives of forest dwellers, particular indigenous ones” yet the net effect on climate change is unclear as many factors are in play. For example, forests trap heat, snow-covered fields reflect heat, forests consume carbon dioxide, and “ploughing up the soils that lie beneath [the forests] will release carbon.”
Investors are “increasingly stumping up for Canadian land as a hedge against climate risks they face elsewhere” and governments are looking to “capitalize on climate change.” Russia sees higher “temperatures as a boon...spend less money on fur coats and grow more-grain.” “Since 2015, Russia has become the world’s largest producer of wheat, chiefly because of higher temperatures.” Having said that, converting more remote regions of Siberia, for example, will be very slow and costly. Russia is also now leasing large tracts of land on its eastern frontier to “Chinese, South Korean and Japanese investors.” “Soya exports from its far-eastern farmlands may reach $600M by 2024” up fivefold from 2017.
The planet is greening actually due to more carbon dioxide in the environment and that “can help boost crop yields.” Although unclear how “climate change will alter patterns of rainfall” it may not benefit “more farming in northern climes.” As temperatures rise so do “pests and pathogens” that were previously killed by the cold winter snap.
To improve food security as the planet warms we need to adapt by improving irrigation systems, protecting crops from severe weather, developing crop varieties that can better withstand higher temperatures and reducing food waste. Up to one-third of food is reportedly wasted.