Arguments
A hotter world is a hungrier world warns Oxfam ahead of IPCC report
Posted on 25 September 2013 by John Hartz
This article is a reprint of news release posted by Oxfam International on Sep 23, 2013
Climate change will leave families caught in a vicious spiral of falling incomes, rising food prices, and declining quality of food, leading to a devastating impact on the health of millions, Oxfam warns today (Sep 23, 2013).
Oxfam’s new report Growing Disruption offers an up to date assessment of the links between climate change and the many causes of hunger. While there is increasing awareness that climate change can harm crop production, the report shows that its threat on food security is much broader, hitting incomes, food quality and human health in ways that are not yet well understood.
At a time when one in eight people are going hungry and demand for food is rising, climate change will not only reduce production, it will reduce the nutritional value of both crops and livestock, worsen human health and lead to higher prices. Climate change will mean that many more people will not be able to afford enough to eat and this toxic mix is likely to hit regions that are already more susceptible to food insecurity.
The report comes ahead of the launch of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment report (AR5) on Friday. Final discussions between governments and scientists begin today in Stockholm.
The IPCC is expected to confirm beyond doubt that climate change is not only happening, but that it is getting worse and that humans have caused the majority of it.
Tim Gore, Head of Policy for Oxfam’s GROW campaign said: “Just as the evidence of man-made climate change is becoming stronger, so too is our understanding of how it hits people, especially around hunger.
“We've long known that climate change will mean lost crops, but increasingly we're seeing its impacts through higher food prices, lower earnings, more health problems and lower quality food too."
Oxfam has previously estimated that the average price of staple foods is likely to more than double in the next 20 years compared with 2010 trend prices – with up to half of the increase caused by climate change.
The events highlighted in the report offer a glimpse of potential future impacts which will get worse and more frequent in urban as well as rural areas:
- In 2012 the drought in Russia cut the grain harvest by nearly 25 per cent, causing domestic prices of grain and bread to rocket. Oxfam research shows that the cumulative effects of the 2010 and 2012 droughts have driven many farmers into significant debt.
- In Pakistan the devastating 2010 flood destroyed over 570,000 hectares of crop land in Punjab and affected more than 20 million people. Eighty per cent of food reserves were lost. The destruction of crops and drowning of animals meant not only that people had nothing to eat, but that they had nothing to trade to be able to buy food as it became available. The flood caused a massive 75% reduction in income across all households affected.
- A recent climate attribution study has confirmed that the 2011 drought in East Africa which affected over 13 million people and led to a famine in Somalia was more likely to have occurred because of climate change.
- In Nepal, Oxfam field surveys showed how disruption to the monsoons is creating further pressure on men to migrate leaving women alone to look after their families and having to undertake more daily waged labour reducing their energy levels. Women often also eat last prioritizing the men and children so they can fall into a downward spiral of poor diet, health and loss of strength and energy.
- In 2012 the US Midwest experienced its worst drought in 50 years, which reduced the expected maize crop by 25 per cent. This contributed to global maize prices rising by around 40 per cent.
Gore said: “We want a world in which everyone enjoys the right to enough affordable and nutritious food, and we cannot allow climate change to throw us off course.
“Leaders listening to the latest findings from climate scientists this week must remember that a hot world is a hungry world. They must take urgent action to slash emissions and direct more resources to building a sustainable food system.”
Notes:
The first of four separate instalments of The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) fifth assessment report (AR5) will be launched on Friday 27th September. It will be its first assessment report since 2007 (AR4), the year the IPCC won the Nobel Peace prize. The first instalment will focus on the physical science basis of the climate system.
There are four recognized pillars of world food security which Oxfam’s report considers: availability, access, utilization and stability.
Download the report: Growing Disruption: Climate Change, Food, and the Fight Against Hunger
A further Oxfam report as referred to above - After the Drought based on interviews with Russian farmers affected by the droughts of 2010 and 2012 will be published and available for copies from Wednesday 25th.
Statistic from 2011 Oxfam report: Growing a Better Future, Food justice in a resource constrained world - the average price of staple foods is likely to more than double in the next 20 years compared with 2010 trend prices – with up to half of the increase caused by climate change.
Another factor that will hit food production is rising sea levels.Much of our food is grown on land that is less than 5 feet above sea level, paricularly the major river deltas. Bangladesh is little more than one big delta. These are home to hundreds of millions of people, and when they flood we will not only lose a lot of agricultural land, the people will be forced to migrate to higher ground, if they can find anywhere suitable!
On both sides of my family, people migrated huge distances - from Europe to the Western US (lack of farm land in Ireland) and from Asia to Hawaii. These migrations took place before 1900. One migration took place in 1820.
Of course, people can adapt.
Lei apparently sees no contradiction in her facile suggestion that "People will just migrate to northern areas" and her opposition to "illegal immigration". Either people will be allowed to migrate en masse, or else the rate of immigration will be insufficient to ameliorate the problems caused by global warming. There is no evidence that any population on Earth is willing to accept immigration en masse today, so it is hardly a prospective solution for tomorrow. Of course, greatly harmed by global warming due to loss of water or food may well be tempted to emigrate en masse - hence the risk of increased conflict.
@ Tom #5
There is no indication at all that people will be migrating 'en masse' to anywhere. These things always go on a scale of decades or longer with slow movements of people. And anyway, was it really necesary to label another person's post as 'facile'?
IMO, we are missing some of the current problems that are causing food shortages and higher prices. Is it not time to end the disaster of the Biofuels program? This is not helping anyone but the producers that are lining their pockets.
To elaborate on Hank's post, the ethanol made from corn is the real problem. Biofuels are derived mainly from 2 crops: corn and sugar cane.
The sugar cane based biofuels are mostly produced in Brazil, where the use of bagasse for powering the processing plants allows said plants to be energetically self sufficient and even sell surplus to the utilities. Available studies on the enery balance indicate it is quite good (8 to 10 range). The reduction in GHG, even after taking into account land use changes is around 60%, per the US EPA. Sugar cane production uses about 2% of the available arable land in Brazil.
All this can be found in seconds on Wikipedia, plenty of references there.
In the US, ehtanol is produced from corn. The energy balance and GHG reduction are nowhere near as good as that of sugar cane and big producers did switch from white to yellow corn to jump on the higher price bandwagon. As a result, some types of food became less affordable. Corn based ethanol does not appear to be anywhere near as satisfactory. It had the side effect of reducing governement subsidies, however. Strangely enough, the anti-tax, anti-government spending crowd never mentions that as benefit.
What about future inventions to desalinate salt water and to live in floating communities? What about other inventions that will help? Eating powdered food - LOL - comes to mind. I didn't say that people will "just" migrate. It would be one of many adaptations just like my ancestors made.
How do the researchers reconcile the fact that food production has exploded since 1961. There was significant warming AND significant CO2 increases in that time period.
http://historylink101.com/lessons/farm-city/food_production.htm
Or the fact that worldwide cereal production in 2013 is predicted to reach a historic high?
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=45388#.UkRXeM7n-cw
The data clearly shows food production increasing as temps and CO2 increases. How do the researchers make their leap when the data shows the opposite?
freshie2005 @9.
Absolutely so. But there is data and there is data. Take for instance the analysis carried out by Rus Ackoff who demonstrated that, not only did smoking cause cancer, it was even better at preventing cholera. He agreed with the medical folk that his analysis was facetious, but that was the point of it!!
MA, there is analysis and there is data. You haven't answered the question. Food production has exploded since 1961. That's the raw data we have to analyze. Rates of cancer vs. smokers and non-smokers was the raw data used in the analysis you site. Bottom line, smoking raises your chances of getting cancer and since 1961, food production has exploded. When prediction do not match impirical data, scientists are supposed to find out why the prediction failed. In this case, the researchers present a WAG that runs 100% counter to the available raw data.
Lei @8. People will no doubt do their best to adapt. Currently, despite the fact that there is enough food to feed the world's human population 1 in 8 people do not get enough food to be healthy and lead an active life (a truly horrific statistic) suggesting that individuals' attempts to adapt to the current situation are not 100% effective.
Personally I believe that the current situation could be improved massively by changing economic and political systems so that they are geared much more towards meeting basic needs, but whatever system is in place climate change seems likely to worsen the risk of hunger for a very large number of people.
Although there is a lot of uncertainty associated with projections, uncertainty cuts both ways and I am truly scared by the potential for increased widespread hunger resulting from climate change. Even by 2050 (with relatively small increases in temperature), Nelson et al 2009 (reference 6 in the Oxfam report) estimate that climate change may cause and increase of around 8 to 10 percent in the number of malnourished children in all developing countries, relative to perfect mitigation. As temperature rises further, the effects on food security could be much much worse, and may be extremely non-linear.
Rob,
Could you please link me to empirical data that supports the WAG that as temp and CO2 increase, food production drops? The only empirical data I've been able to find states just the opposite.
@fresshie2005:
Perhaps you should start on your quest to learn more about how climate change may impact food production by actually reading the OXfam reports and the numerous referenced documents they are based on. The OP provides direct links to those reports.
All: I have deleted a number of Lei's comments on this thread because they were off-topic sloganeering and repetitive.
In parts of the Western US (Willamette Valley of Oregon) they have the most productive farmland in the US. It is due to planting methods, apparently. The farmers are very well-educated and are businessmen using computers.
Some have complained about climate change, but it is obvious to me that they should simply invest in northern farmland until man's ability to cool the air (planting more trees or other methods) catches up and turns the problem around - and even scientists have no complaints.
@ Lei:
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@Lei:
Per Sks Commnets Policy, all complaints about moderation will be summarily deleted. You have violated this policy once. Please cease and desist or face the conequences.
Lei @6 writes:
With apologies to the moderator, that is exactly what you wrote, ie:
And Hank_ @4, when somebody suggests a problem will be solved because "People will just migrate", then their response is facile. And because it is facile, it is worthwhile pointing out that it is.
freshie2005 @9.
I think your question was answered @8 but you need that answer explaining to you.
Do you agree with Rus Ackoff (as linked @8) that the assertion that smoking prevents cholera is entirely facetious? Do remember the data supported that assertion more strongly than that same data demonstrated smoking caused cancer, itself a result the Surgeon General considered worthy of publishing.
Now I could make a WAG about how you will respond, but I will do you the courtesy of awaiting your reply.
I am not trying to intentionally antagonize you. I am presenting other sides so that you can hear the stories as the title stated. Also, we all need to work at being more peaceful and seeing what unites us.
Deflect much MA?
You are still trying to dance around the question, so let me make it something you can't degrade into semantics and keep it in the scientific realm. And yes, I have a scientific background which means there is very little that I consider absolute!
Let's break it down to something you can't dance around.
1. During 1961 to the present there is a large body of evidence that verifies CO2 increased.
2. During 1961 to the present, there is a large body of evidence that verifies temperatures increased.
3. During 1961 to the present, worldwide food production exploded. This is a fact!
It's really simple MA. How can you possibly support this theory when the empirical data completely refutes it? No dancing, no siting studies that have zero impact on climate change. Yes or no to question 1 through 3. You can't dance through science, no matter how hard you try. If you can't answer yes or no for questions 1 through 3, it's pretty obvious no amount of empirical data will change your mind.
[JH] Either lose the snark, or lose your posting privileges.
Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can be rescinded if the posting individual treats adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.
Please take the time to review the policy and ensure future comments are in full compliance with it. Thanks for your understanding and compliance in this matter.
Freshie - I don't think anyone here disputes that food production has increased since the 1960's. The facts are very well established. But it smacks of child-like reasoning to expect the road ahead to be like the road already travelled. Numerous studies have demonstrated that heat tolerance thresholds for crops such as maize and corn will eventually be passed as the world continues to warm. Yields will decline dramatically once this occurs.
Rob,
If you noticed, I haven't given my opinion to what WILL happen. I'm only trying to determine how researchers can come up with a conclusion that is COMPLETELY DIAMETRICALLY OPPOSED to empirical data. What are they basing this on? If you base it on the empirical data we have, food production should increase in the manner it has for the last 40 years. I have yet to see anyone on this thread point to ANY empirical data that suggests that worldwide food production will decrease as temperatures and CO2 increase. I have presented what empirical data we have, which shows an EXPLOSION in food production from 1961 through the present.
Is there ANYONE on this thread that can point to empirical evidence that this research is valid?
[JH] The use of all-caps is expressly prohibitied by the SkS Comments Policy. Future posts containing all caps will be summarily deleted.
Wait . . . freshie2005, are you claiming that the increase in food production since 1961 is due to increased GMST and increased CO2? Or is this all an exercise in "gotcha-ism"? Is someone trying to say something meaningful? Freshie, I don't see it in your comments. You don't account for improvements in agricultural method, increased planting, improved genetics, more efficient and effective distribution and storage, better crop management, etc. etc. Do you need citations for all those?
As for food production declining:
Lobell et al. 2011: "Efforts to anticipate how climate change will affect future food availability can benefit from understanding the impacts of changes to date. We found that in the cropping regions and growing seasons of most countries, with the important exception of the United States, temperature trends from 1980 to 2008 exceeded one standard deviation of historic year-to-year variability. Models that link yields of the four largest commodity crops to weather indicate that global maize and wheat production declined by 3.8 and 5.5%, respectively, relative to a counterfactual without climate trends. For soybeans and rice, winners and losers largely balanced out. Climate trends were large enough in some countries to offset a significant portion of the increases in average yields that arose from technology, carbon dioxide fertilization, and other factors."
Johanson & Fu 2008: "Observations show that the Hadley cell has widened by about 2°–5° since 1979. This widening and the concomitant poleward displacement of the subtropical dry zones may be accompanied by large-scale drying near 30°N and 30°S. Such drying poses a risk to inhabitants of these regions who are accustomed to established rainfall patterns."
Thornton 2012: "An analysis of the effects of climate change on 22 critical agricultural commodities and three important natural resources in the developing world reveals a number of cross-cutting themes: The world’s agricultural systems face an uphill struggle in feeding a projected nine to ten billion people by 2050."
Ahsan et al. 2011: "However, with increasing population, degraded land quality, and potential global warming, agriculture is seen as one of the major vulnerabilities facing Bangladesh in near future. More specifically, a progressive decline in sunshine duration (25%) over a period of 30 years has become a growing concern for agriculture in terms of reduced photosynthesis and food security."
Roos et al. 2012: "In Scandinavia, a milder and more humid climate implies extended growing seasons and possibilities to introduce new crops, but also opportunities for crop pests and pathogens to thrive in the absence of long cold periods. Increased temperatures, changed precipitation patterns and new cultivation practices may lead to a dramatic change in crop health. Examples of diseases and insect pest problems predicted to increase in incidence and severity due to global warming are discussed."
Giannakopolous et al. 2009: "Regarding agriculture, crops whose growing cycle occurs mostly in autumn and winter show no changes or even an increase in yield. In contrast, summer crops show a remarkable decrease of yield. This different pattern is attributed to a lengthier drought period during summer and to an increased rainfall in winter and autumn."
Funk & Brown 2009: "If yields continue to grow more slowly than per capita harvested area, parts of Africa, Asia and Central and Southern America will experience substantial declines in per capita cereal production. Global per capita cereal production will potentially decline by 14% between 2008 and 2030. Climate change is likely to further affect food production, particularly in regions that have very low yields due to lack of technology. Drought, caused by anthropogenic warming in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, may also reduce 21st century food availability in some countries by disrupting moisture transports and bringing down dry air over crop growing areas. The impacts of these circulation changes over Asia remain uncertain. For Africa, however, Indian Ocean warming appears to have already reduced rainfall during the main growing season along the eastern edge of tropical Africa, from southern Somalia to northern parts of the Republic of South Africa. Through a combination of quantitative modeling of food balances and an examination of climate change, this study presents an analysis of emerging threats to global food security."
Want more? There's plenty out there.
Oh, and Freshie, could you cut out the all-caps. I can read without you slapping me in the face with words.
Freshie, I don't get your intense focus on what has happened since 1960. The only claim I can see coming from it is "food production has increased since 1960; therefore, food production will continue to increase." If you establish that food production has EXPLODED since 1960, what's the point?
DSL,
I have not once stated my opinion on what will happen. I am simply saying that the only empirical evidence we have on increasing CO2 and temperature are corresponding increases in food production. It's pretty funny you use this line of reasoning since this is the EXACT same way the temperature models have been created. You do realize this, don't you?
I am fully prepared to be proven wrong. Whenever proven wrong, one becomes smarter because of it. Until ANYONE presents some empirical evidence to support this research, it's opinion, not science.
[JH] You are now skating on the thin ice of repetitive sloganeering cloaked in snark. Future posts of this nature will be summarily deleted.
Freshie:
DSL has already provided you with six peer reviewed papers in response to your request. Have you taken the time to read them?
Have you taken the time to read any of the Oxfam reports listed in the OP?
Your hand-waving is very tiresome and its continuation will not be tolerated.
Umm, no, Freshie. The mod is deleting your psots because you're ignoring the comments policy. My comments get deleted when I do it; why wouldn't yours get deleted (you special or something?)?
Freshie, you say "I have not once stated my opinion on what will happen." What I am pointing out is that there's no reason for you to point out a food production-GW/CO2 correlation unless you're making a claim about the future. Unless I'm wrong, and I am willing to be wrong if you can provide a reason why you'd do such a thing and not intend to make a claim about future food production.
Freshie:
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Freshie,
In the many reports linked above that you have not read they document that technical improvements and fertilizer have dramaticly increased food production since 1960. In the last two decades, the increase in food production has slowed due to global warming. In many agricultural areas of the globe, the temperature is currently near or above the optimum for food production. Further temperature increases will result in dramatic drops in food production. This includes most of the tropics. You are making a strong argument from ignorance of the data, which you have refused to read in spite of the links you have been shown.
Please provide references to support your claim that further increases in temperature will not affect food production. Your unsupported claims are not worth much. You have been provided copius data in support of the claim that temperature will decrease food production.
"What about future inventions to desalinate salt water and to live in floating communities?" One thing you can bet about future inventions will that they do not change the laws of thermodynamics. Desalination needs a certain minimum energy - if you can solve that energy question, then you could also use it to get off fossil fuel. Your position appears to be that since you dont want people from area affected by climate migrating into your place, (eg 100 million Bangladeshi), you instead prefer that they magically fund artificial communities instead. With what funds pray?
"Also, we all need to work at being more peaceful and seeing what unites us."
Good luck with that, if you are also advocating that a small number of people can screw the planet with their emissions while much poorer people take the consequences.
" I am presenting other sides so that you can hear the stories as the title stated."
The side that would appear to be monumentally uninformed and morally bankrupt it would appear. You seriously expect us to respect this viewpoint?
"Sloganeering" by the way is making statements, usually little more than a political opinon, without providing any supporting evidence. Avoid political statements and be prepared to back assertions with pointers to evidence.
freshie2005 @20.
I am at a loss. What do you mean by "Deflect much MA?"?
You do not appear to want to develop an understanding in this matter. Rather, I get the impression that you will not be satisfied until your questioning is answered in your way with the answers you desire.
Do you have evidence that the "explosion" of agricultural output since 1961 (popularly the "green revolution") results from increased atmospheric CO2 or from increased global temperatures? Do you have evidence that these factors (CO2, temperature) helped rather than hindered this "explosion"? Do you have evidence that these factors will not in the near future overpower the causes that did increase agricultural output or that smoking does prevent cholora?
I do not insist on yes/no answers to these questions. I would never be so bigoted.
Freshie's argument is a little difficult to tease out of the all the rethoric. It seems to imply that, since agricultural production has increased so dramatically between the 60s and 90s, it will continue to do so. Freshie also appears to further argue that the correlation between that fact and the dramatic increase in atmospheric CO2 indicates that, as CO2 continues to increase, so will agricultural production.
The Green Revolution, with its massive injection of pesticides, fertilizers and machinery, is obviously the cause of the late 20th century increased yields. It also has a substantial contribution in the atmospheric CO2 increase, since the amount of fossil fuel used to produce a pound of food is now vastly more than before 1960, so atmospheric CO2 release is truly more of a consequence of the increased agricultural production ( along with all other energy uses), than a cause.
There is much debate as to how long the current practices can be sustained without decreasing yields, even in the absence of climate disturbances. Some places have seen rather drastic adverse effects. Water availability, contamination, soil depletion, higher incidence of cancer and hormonal disturbances, vulnerability to pests and other environmental disturbances, all these and more play against continued higher yields. The varieties of plants bred for intensive monoculture are often pesticide dependent and have high fertilizer requirements. They often have lower resilience and lower nutritional value, especially in vitamins and oligo-elements contents.
From a thermodynamics point of view, one could argue that we're already stretched very far with current practices. Regardless of all other factors, the extreme reliance on oil and gas in these farming practices dooms them on the long run, unless equivalent machinery can be developped that will use different energy sources, sources which will have to be as cheap and abundant as they have been during the Green Revolution.
Of course, this does not even begin to consider what will happen when rain patterns and temperatures patterns depart significantly from what they were when intensive practices were implemented, which is in fact the subject of the article above, a subject that Freshie seems to have essentially side-stepped so far by talking about something else (the Green Revolution).
The 2012 drought in Russia happened in an environment of well established intensive practices; it is a good example of the kind of yield changes that can be expected with the same intensive practices and much different conditions. Nothing in Freshie's posts so far disputes that in any way.
I highly recommend that everyone reading this comment thread check out the following article:
Phosphorus: Essential to Life—Are We Running Out? by by Renee Cho, State of the Planet, The Earth Institute, Columbia University, Apr 1, 2013
Freshie
You might want to read this paper Rice yields in tropical/subtropical Asia exhibit large but opposing sensitivities to minimum and maximum temperature and also look at the papers it references.
Try Googling RICE YIELD TEMPERATURE. Also look up Wikipedia for a discussion of Photosynthesis including the temperature dependent aspect of it.
Graphs like this highlight the temperature dependence of photosynthesis:
[DB] Imageshack sometimes has issues with its images showing up on SkS. This is one of those times.
The science behind graphs such the one posted by Glenn Tamblyn is well established and easy to understand. Indeed simple experiments were (and hopefully still are) carried out by schoolchildren measuring the effect of temperature on the digestive efficency of saliva.
Biochemically - chemical reactions such as photosynthesis and digestion are achieved by the use of enzymes which are large protein molecules. These enzymes have a specific shape which bring the reactants into close proximity to each other, thus facilitating the reaction.
The specific shape of these enzymes is controlled by weak forces - much weaker than ordinary chemical bonds - predominantly these are "hydrogen bonds". As the temperature rises, the enzymes have more energy and can more easily twist out of shape, thus rendering them useless. This explains the distorted bell shaped curve.
Enzymes are synthesised from DNA, indeed the GCAT sequence in DNA code for specific enzymes, and DNA is the subject to natural selection. It is therefore not surprising that the enzymes that plants and animals have evolved are optimised for the current conditions. If current coditions change sufficiently, especially if that change is rapid (on a geological timescale) then extinction ensues.
Another dimension to issues under discussion is the undernourishment of a significant segment of the human population. This dimension is addressed head-on in:
OP-ED: Sustainable Development Goals After 2015 by Olivier De Schutter, Jochen Flasbarth, and Dr. Hans R. Herren, International Press Service (IPS), Sep 25, 2013
Lei:
Or die: Total deaths 1 million
The climate and soils are what makes the Willamette valley so productive.
You're going to have to try harder if you want to be taken seriously here, Lei.