Advanced Search
MyIDEAS: Login

Climate change: Impact on agriculture and costs of adaptation

Contents:

Author Info

  • Nelson, Gerald C.
  • Rosegrant, Mark W.
  • Koo, Jawoo
  • Robertson, Richard
  • Sulser, Timothy
  • Zhu, Tingju
  • Ringler, Claudia
  • Msangi, Siwa
  • Palazzo, Amanda
  • Batka, Miroslav
  • Magalhaes, Marilia
  • Valmonte-Santos, Rowena
  • Ewing, Mandy
  • Lee, David

Abstract

"The Challenge The unimpeded growth of greenhouse gas emissions is raising the earth’s temperature. The consequences include melting glaciers, more precipitation, more and more extreme weather events, and shifting seasons. The accelerating pace of climate change, combined with global population and income growth, threatens food security everywhere. Agriculture is extremely vulnerable to climate change. Higher temperatures eventually reduce yields of desirable crops while encouraging weed and pest proliferation. Changes in precipitation patterns increase the likelihood of short-run crop failures and long-run production declines. Although there will be gains in some crops in some regions of the world, the overall impacts of climate change on agriculture are expected to be negative, threatening global food security. Populations in the developing world, which are already vulnerable and food insecure, are likely to be the most seriously affected. In 2005, nearly half of the economically active population in developing countries—2.5 billion people—relied on agriculture for its livelihood. Today, 75 percent of the world’s poor live in rural areas. This Food Policy Report presents research results that quantify the climate-change impacts mentioned above, assesses the consequences for food security, and estimates the investments that would offset the negative consequences for human well-being. This analysis brings together, for the first time, detailed modeling of crop growth under climate change with insights from an extremely detailed global agriculture model, using two climate scenarios to simulate future climate. The results of the analysis suggest that agriculture and human well-being will be negatively affected by climate change: * In developing countries, climate change will cause yield declines for the most important crops. South Asia will be particularly hard hit. * Climate change will have varying effects on irrigated yields across regions, but irrigated yields for all crops in South Asia will experience large declines. * Climate change will result in additional price increases for the most important agricultural crops–rice, wheat, maize, and soybeans. Higher feed prices will result in higher meat prices. As a result, climate change will reduce the growth in meat consumption slightly and cause a more substantial fall in cereals consumption. * Calorie availability in 2050 will not only be lower than in the no–climate-change scenario—it will actually decline relative to 2000 levels throughout the developing world. * By 2050, the decline in calorie availability will increase child malnutrition by 20 percent relative to a world with no climate change. Climate change will eliminate much of the improvement in child malnourishment levels that would occur with no climate change. * Thus, aggressive agricultural productivity investments of US$7.1–7.3 billion are needed to raise calorie consumption enough to offset the negative impacts of climate change on the health and well-being of children." from Text

Download Info

If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
File URL: http://www.ifpri.org/sites/default/files/publications/pr21.pdf
Download Restriction: no

Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in its series Food policy reports with number 21.

as in new window
Length:
Date of creation: 2009
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:fpr:fprepo:21

Contact details of provider:
Postal: 2033 K Street, NW, Washington, DC 20006
Phone: 202-862-5600
Fax: 202-467-4439
Email:
Web page: http://www.ifpri.org/
More information through EDIRC

Related research

Keywords: Adaptation; Agriculture; Climate change; Developing countries; food security;

References

No references listed on IDEAS
You can help add them by filling out this form.

Citations

Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
as in new window

Cited by:
  1. Wiebelt, Manfred & Breisinger, Clemens & Ecker, Olivier & Al-Riffai, Perrihan & Robertson, Richard & Thiele, Rainer, 2011. "Climate change and floods in Yemen: Impacts on food security and options for adaptation," IFPRI discussion papers 1139, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
  2. Arndt, Channing & Strzepek, Ken & Thurlow, James, 2011. "Climate Change, Agriculture, and Food Security in Tanzania," Working Papers UNU-WIDER Research Paper , World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
  3. von Grebmer, Klaus & Ringler, Claudia & Rosegrant, Mark W. & Olofinbiyi, Tolulope & Wiesmann, Doris & Fritschel, Heidi & Badiane, Ousmane & Torero, Maximo & Yohannes, Yisehac & Thompson, Jennifer & vo, 2012. "2012 Global hunger index: the challenge of hunger: Ensuring sustainable food security under land, water, and energy stresses," Research reports 2012 GHI English, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
  4. Michael J. Roberts & Wolfram Schlenker, 2011. "The Evolution of Heat Tolerance of Corn: Implications for Climate Change," NBER Chapters, in: The Economics of Climate Change: Adaptations Past and Present, pages 225-251 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  5. K, Sudarkodi & K, Sathyabama, 2011. "The Impact Of Climate Change On Agriculture," MPRA Paper 29784, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  6. S. Mahendra Dev, 2011. "Climate change, rural livelihoods and agriculture (focus on food security) in Asia-Pacific region," Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Mumbai Working Papers 2011-014, Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, Mumbai, India.
  7. von Grebmer, Klaus & Ringler, Claudia & Rosegrant, Mark W. & Olofinbiyi, Tolulope & Wiesmann, Doris & Fritschel, Heidi & Badiane, Ousmane & Torero, Maximo & Yohannes, Yisehac & Thompson, Jennifer & vo, . "2012 Global hunger index: the challenge of hunger: Ensuring sustainable food security under land, water, and energy stresses," IFPRI books, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), number 2012 GHI English.
  8. World Bank, 2010. "Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change : Ethiopia," World Bank Other Operational Studies 12504, The World Bank.
  9. Jolejole-Foreman, Maria Christina & Baylis, Katherine R. & Lipper, Leslie, 2012. "Land Degradation’s Implications on Agricultural Value of Production in Ethiopia: A look inside the bowl," 2012 Conference, August 18-24, 2012, Foz do Iguacu, Brazil 126251, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
  10. Thomas F. Döring & Samuel Knapp & Geza Kovacs & Kevin Murphy & Martin S. Wolfe, 2011. "Evolutionary Plant Breeding in Cereals—Into a New Era," Sustainability, MDPI, Open Access Journal, vol. 3(10), pages 1944-1971, October.
  11. Subhadra, Bobban G., 2010. "Sustainability of algal biofuel production using integrated renewable energy park (IREP) and algal biorefinery approach," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(10), pages 5892-5901, October.
  12. Ahmed, Vaqar & Malik, Amin Aslam Khan & Ramay, Shakeel & Munawwar, Zuhair & Pervaiz, Amir, 2011. "National economic and environmental development study: the case of Pakistan," MPRA Paper 30942, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  13. Muamba, Francis M. & Ulimwengu, John M., 2010. "Optimal rainfall insurance contracts for maize producers in Ghana’s Northern Region," IFPRI discussion papers 1016, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
  14. repec:idb:brikps:64698 is not listed on IDEAS
  15. Breisinger, Clemens & Zhu, Tingju & Al Riffai, Perrihan & Nelson, Gerald & Robertson, Richard & Funes, Jose & Verner, Dorte, 2011. "Global and local economic impacts of climate change in Syria and options for adaptation:," IFPRI discussion papers 1091, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
  16. von Braun, Joachim & Tadesse, Getaw, 2012. "Global Food Price Volatility and Spikes: An Overview of Costs, Causes, and Solutions," Discussion Papers 120021, University of Bonn, Center for Development Research (ZEF).
  17. Antonio Turrent Fernández & Timothy A. Wise & Elise Garvey, 2012. "Achieving Mexico’s Maize Potential," GDAE Working Papers 12-03, GDAE, Tufts University.
  18. Philip Thornton & Pierre Gerber, 2010. "Climate change and the growth of the livestock sector in developing countries," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 169-184, February.
  19. Ranganathan, C. & Palanisami, K. & Kakumanu, K. & Baulraj, A., 2011. "Mainstreaming the Adaptations and Reducing the Vulnerability of the Poor due to Climate Change," ADBI Working Papers 333, Asian Development Bank Institute.
  20. Fuss, Sabine & Havlik, Petr & Szolgayova, Jana & Schmid, Erwin & Obersteiner, Michael, 2011. "Large-Scale Modelling of Global Food Security and Adaptation under Crop Yield Uncertainty," 2011 International Congress, August 30-September 2, 2011, Zurich, Switzerland 114347, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
  21. Ludena, Carlos E. & Mejia, Carla, 2012. "Climate Change, Agricultural Productivity and its Impacts on the Food Industry: A General Equilibrium Analysis," 2012 Conference, August 18-24, 2012, Foz do Iguacu, Brazil 126851, International Association of Agricultural Economists.

Lists

This item is not listed on Wikipedia, on a reading list or among the top items on IDEAS.

Statistics

Access and download statistics

Corrections

When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:fpr:fprepo:21

For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ().

If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

If references are entirely missing, you can add them using this form.

If the full references list an item that is present in RePEc, but the system did not link to it, you can help with this form.

If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.