Climate Change to Affect Crop Yields from 2030s

Crop yields in temperate and tropical regions will soon face the brunt of climate change, according to researchers. The drastic alterations will lead to a reduction in the harvest.

Global warming has become an increasingly important issue with human activity being the primary cause for its acceleration. A research team at the University of Leeds found that global warming by even two degree Celsius can damage crops in temperate and tropical regions.

What is even more dreadful is that the effect can be seen from 2030, much before than the previous estimates.

"Our research shows that crop yields will be negatively affected by climate change much earlier than expected. Furthermore, the impact of climate change on crops will vary both from year-to-year and from place-to-place - with the variability becoming greater as the weather becomes increasingly erratic," Professor Andy Challinor, from the School of Earth and Environment at the University of Leeds and lead author of the study said in a statement.

The meta analysis was based on the data created by analyzing results from over 1,700 published assessments that focused on the impact climate change would have on crop yields that include rice, maize and wheat.

The study will be reported in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fifth Assessment Report. In previous Fourth Assessment Report, scientists showed that regions having temperate climates, like Europe and North America, reflected a few degrees of warming but did not have a noticeable effect of the crop yield.

 For the fifth assessment report the experts worked on twice the number of studies they had researched during the fourth assessment report that was done in 2007.

"As more data have become available, we've seen a shift in consensus, telling us that the impacts of climate change in temperate regions will happen sooner rather than later," said Professor Challinor.

In this study the researchers predict that on an average, there will be an increased negative impact of climate change on the crop yields during the 2030s. This impact will be marked as the greatest in the second half of the century and nearly 25 percent of crop yields will get affected more frequently.

This study suggests that farmers can employ certain minor adaptation techniques in order to reduce the impact of climate change.

"Climate change means a less predictable harvest, with different countries winning and losing in different years. The overall picture remains negative, and we are now starting to see how research can support adaptation by avoiding the worse impacts," concludes Professor Challinor.

The finding was published in the journal Nature Climate Change.