Global climate change is a two-sided coin; the first argument is perhaps best overly dramatized by the recent movie The Day After Tomorrow, the preverbal we are all doomed aspect of it. The other argument although never made into a movie, is that we will be able to survive quite comfortable, with only some minor modification to our way of life. Although very few in the scientific community can deny the existence of global climate change the argument lies in whether it poses a threat or not. One highly significant aspect to look at would therefore be its effect on agriculture. As the world as a whole continues to struggle with starvation, especially in Africa and parts of Asia, the question at hand is whether or not global climate change is going to shrink the world's population significantly? The answer to this many other questions lies somewhere in between both arguments.
There are a couple of main indicators that prove the existence of global climate change. Firstly, global temperature has increased approximately 0.3°C to 0.6°C (Maslin 29) which in effect explains the recent increase in precipitation, since the warmer the ocean temperatures the more precipitation. This relates to agriculture in many important ways. There are a dwindling number of positive thinkers in the scientific community that believe that we will be able to adapt to the consequences of global climate change. The first feather in the hat of the positive thinkers is that the increased temperature creates a longer growing season. With the longer growing season fruit bearing plants will bear more fruit and other plants will grow larger. This school of thinking not only says that we will be able to adapt but that we will be better off. Another part...
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...sed by decades of air pollution.
Works Cited
Adams, Richard M, Brian H Hurd, and John Reilly. Agriculture & Global Climate Change: A Review of Impacts to U.S. Agricultural Resources. Pew Center. 26 June 2005 http://www.pewclimate.org/document.cfm?documentID=234.
EPA. "Global Warming Impacts." EPA Global Warming. 26 June 2005 http://yosemite.epa.gov/oar/globalwarming.nsf/content/ImpactsAgriculture.html.
Maslin, Mark. Global Warming Causes, Effects, and the Future. Stillwater, MN: Voyager, 2002.
USDA. Agricultural Adaptation to Climate Change: Issues of Longrun Sustainability. 26 June 2005 http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/aer740/.
Global Warming, much of what does or does not happen forty years from now rests on our actions or inactions taken between now and then. The crucial question is whether we should pour all our resources into mitigation – reducing our carbon emissions. According to scientists who study the climate there are other environmental problems; “we now face a global crises in land use and agriculture that could undermine the health, security, and sustainability of our civilization”.
Spross, Jeff. "The Impact Of Climate Change On The Midwest: More Heat, More Droughts, More Floods, Fewer Crops." ThinkProgress RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 May 2014. http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/05/07/3434933/national-climate-assessment-midwest/
The plants we grow for food needs specific resources to thrive, which includes the night temperature and enough water. A changing climate could create a lot of problems. Climate change could make it too hot and also make it too cold to grow crops in some areas of the world and also climate change can cause drought, which is made by the unavailability of water for irrigation. Climate change is likely to cause stronger storms and more floods, which will damage the crops. . Latin America and Southern Asia is seeing it in lethal storms and floods whereas Europeans are experiencing it in melting glaciers, forest fires and disastrous heat waves (Pearce, 2006). Deforestation is another anthropogenic factor that is causing climate change because of the need for fossil fuel, agricultural lands are being used. Forests are being burnt down by humans on a daily basis. As agricultural lands becomes less in need of growing population, people extend their space by cutting and clearing forest. The land beneath the forest sometimes tends to be unproductive and lacks the natural chemicals for a growing. The plantation will serve as a source of food for a few years after then the land becomes useless because of its infertility, it nutrients get depleted and used up. Deforestation results in numerous problems such as destruction of our natural resources, ecosystem, wildlife,
The clock is ticking! Global Co2 emissions have increased exponentially since the industrialization of today’s developed world. Emissions have now passed the absorptive capacity of the earth and are accumulating in the earth’s atmosphere, warming the surface of the earth and inducing localized climatic changes. Climate change is often a localized issue. Many regions of the world will continue to become hotter, while others may experience highly variable weather patterns. Climate change poses a serious threat to ecosystems, economic sectors, and human welfare. Although almost entirely caused by the developed world, climate change will disproportionally affect the world’s poor.
The effects of climate are felt throughout the world, all living things are affected with it. The effects of climate change are affecting directly the human life. It has been noticed that around the globe, seasons are shifting, temperatures are climbing and sea levels are rising. The world compares to century ago, it has changed drastically and it is becoming worse with climate change. Climate change will rapidly alter the lands and waters which we all depends upon for survival which will leave our children thus the future generation with a different world. In the time to come if not much is done for the case of climate change, There will be shortage of food and drinks, many new illnesses and diseases and some part of the world will become in appropriate for living things to live due to natural disaster. It can be that with the rapid Global warming and climate change, one-fourth of Earth’s species could be headed for extinction by the year 2050.
Climate change is a term used to describe the increase in the average temperature of the earth’s surface and has been a major problem recently. Our world is constantly changing and therefore so is our climate, as our country industrializes we create more greenhouse gases from the immense human activity being produced. “These gases get into the atmosphere when coal, natural gas and oil is burned for energy and over the last century the burning of fossil fuels like coal and oil has increased the concentration of carbon dioxide… the clearing of land for agriculture, industry, and other human activities has increased concentrations of greenhouse gases.”(NASA 1). Climate change is causing global warming that causes the earth to heat up rather than
Our world is always changing, so is our climate. Some changes are apparent, others not so much. Climate change is an important issue of concern in the twenty-first century. Environment, if it changes at all, evolves so slowly that the difference cannot be seen in a human lifetime (Wearth, 2014). Mostly all scientists predicted that it would take thousands of years for the planet to warm up due to emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuels called greenhouse gases. But in the past 200 years, things began to change. The rate and the amount of warming that is happening on this planet are unprecedented. Wearth says, “People did not grasp the prodigious fact that both population and industrialization were exploding in a pattern of exponential
Climate change is currently one of the greatest challenges facing our species. This case study report will examine issues related to food production in relation to climate change. In this regard, the focus will be on the Peace River Country, which is a parkland region that spans from northwestern Alberta to the Rocky Mountains in northeastern British Columbia and around the Peace River. As part of its examination, this report will explore the local environment conditions, and offer predictions of what lies ahead in areas of economic development, the food practices including how climate changes may affect the local food production, as well as other future and predicted changes in the area.
Climate Change is any substantial change in climate that lasts for an extended period of time. One contributor to current climate change is global warming, which is an increase in Earth’s average temperature. Plants and animal species throughout the world are being affected by rising temperatures. Many plants are flowering earlier now than they once did; animals, such as the yellowbellied marmot, are emerging from hibernation earlier; and many bird and butterfly species are migrating north and breeding earlier in the spring than they did a few decades ago, all because of slight changes in temperature cues. (Shuster)
Climate change is one of the major issues surfacing on Earth over the past century. The earth’s temperature has increased over the years, leading to detrimental effects on the economic and life sources of people, especially that of agricultural production and livestock. The Merriam-Webster online dictionary (2014), defined climate change as a change in global climate patterns apparent from the mid late 20th century. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, (2007) predicts that by 2100 the increase in global average surface temperature may be between 1.8° C and 4.0° C. With increases of 1.5° C to 2.5° C, approximately 20 to 30 percent of plant and animal species are expected to be at risk of extinction. Moreover, the IPCC (2007) purported that climate change has severe consequences for food security in developing countries.
A new global climate model predicts that in the coming decade, the surface air temperature is likely to exceed existing records (Smith et al., 2007). Growing season temperatures in the tropics and subtropics by the end of the 21st century will exceed the most extreme temperatures recorded in the history (Battistic and Rosamond, 2009). Agriculture is considered to be one of the most vulnerable sectors to climate change. Although at present, the overall impact of climate change on global agricultural productivity is not reliably estimated (Gornall et al., 2010). Many studies show serious implications on agricultural productivity, for instance IFPRI(2009) projects that in South Asia by 2050 climate change will reduce production of rice, wheat and maize by 14%, 44% to 49% and 9%-19% respectively relative to no climate change situation.
As defined by the Oxford dictionary, climate change is, “a change in global or regional climate patterns, in particular a change apparent from the mid to late 20th century onwards and attributed largely to the increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide produced by the use of fossil fuels.” (Oxford Dictionaries) Moreover, evidence of climate change can be found all over the world, and in many different forms, but is especially prevalent in certain regions. For instance, in Southeast Asia, specifically the nation of the Philippines, signs of climate change can be observed frequently, if not regularly. One major ...
Climate change is currently affecting agriculture because it is causing prolonged droughts, violent flooding, sea level to rise, and also health related issues. Droughts and flooding utterly affect agriculture because it damages cultivation since the amount of water applied to crops and farming is fundamental to the...
Global Warming is a condition caused by greenhouse gases and human activities. The increased concentration of greenhouse gases due to activities such as deforestation and fossil fuel burning is causing the Earth’s atmosphere and oceans to warm up. As a result of this, global warming has some serious effects in the shape of extreme weather, species extinctions, and rising sea levels. These effects can contribute to the changes that are taking place all over the world, most of which are dangerous enough to pose a threat to the survival of life on Earth in the future.
Since 1960s both minimum and maximum temperatures have exhibited a rising trend; with minimum increasing by a range of 0.7-2.0 degrees Celsius and maximum by 0.2-1.3 degree Celsius varying by region and season. Notable also is variability of rainfall patterns such as below normal rainfall in the long rains season and more during the short rainfall season, some regions have recorded more intense rainfall and downpours that have resulted to floods and infrastructural impairments. Extinction or near extinction of flora and fauna, changes in flowering and maturity patterns in crops are all attributable to climate change. These changes have had and are expected to have far reaching impacts on the economic sectors of the economy. Some of the expected sectoral impacts are discussed