Climate Change Threatens World Food Production In The Next 35 Years
The current accelerated rate of climate change is predicted to hamper food production in a world scale basis, according to scientists who attended the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in San Jose, USA.
"Feeding the world "is going to take some changes in terms of minimizing climate disruption," Jerry Hatfield, director at the National Laboratory for Agriculture and the Environment said in a report from Yahoo News.
As predicted, the world food consumption will be doubled in the next 35 years due to the ballooning of population predicted to reach 9 billion people in 2050.
Hartfield further said that land usage levels and productivity will inevitably decrease in the coming years. Further, worsening environmental factors such as rainfall volatility, increased drought and rising temperatures will affect crop production.
SMN Weekly cited another scientist, present at the same conference, who supported Hartfield's claim.
Kenneth Kunkel, a climatologist at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration pointed out that the sudden rise of temperature will affect corn production.
Earlier this week, scientists have pointed out that the Midwestern area in the US is predicted to experience the worst drought in the 21st century.
"If you look at the future projection for the Midwest, we have high confidence that temperatures will increase by quite a bit," Kunkel said.
Despite this bleak scenario, scientists in the conference are still hopeful for solutions.
As cited by Rappler, James Gerber, an agricultural expert at the University of Minnesota suggested that consumption waste must be regulated in the same way as people should decrease consumption with red meat.
He also pointed the important role of artificial grains and GMOs in the fast propagation of food supply to the growing number of populace.
Paul Ehrlich, president of the Center for Conservation Biology at Stanford University also emphasized the need for a "real social and cultural change over the entire planet" as it is said that there is only at least ten to twenty years to solve the problem on food production.
