Global Climate Change and Food Security: Recent Trends, Current Progress and Future Directions

A special issue of Atmosphere (ISSN 2073-4433). This special issue belongs to the section "Biometeorology".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (22 November 2021) | Viewed by 9777

Special Issue Editors

Royal Academy for Overseas Sciences, 1180 Bruxelles, Belgium
Interests: climate change; agriculture; food security; soil science; remote sensing; statistical analysis
School of Agriculture and Food Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, QLD 4072, Australia
Interests: environmental sustainability; carbon management; soil linked human nutrition; food and nutrition security; biodiversity and natural resources management; climate change and agricultural development―sustainable development goals
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Climate change is one of the most significant challenges facing world agriculture in fulfilling the Sustainable Development Goals in 2030. On one hand, global surface temperature has increased more than 1°C above the pre-industrial levels. The acceleration in global warming and its associated changes in other indicators of the climate system, such as precipitation, have already impacted global agriculture and the food production system. On the other hand, the world’s population grew from 1.65 billion in 1900 to 7.9 billion in 2020. Despite a decreasing growth rate, world population will most likely reach 9.7 billion by 2050, and 10.8 billion by 2100. Thanks to technological breakthroughs in crop production, such as those of the Green Revolution, a matching growth rate in crop yield has been largely maintained during the past few decades. However, some 690 million to 2 billion people are still suffering chronic undernourishment and food insecurity at present due to, e.g., climatic stresses and market disruptions to the food system. Clearly, there are still severe challenges that need to be overcome, and solutions are therefore needed to sustain food security for humanity facing climate change in the course of the twenty-first century.

This Special Issue is devoted to hosting scientific discussions on all relevant topics of global climate change and food security in the twenty-first century. These include but are not limited to (1) the impact of climate variability and change on food production systems (crop, animal, fishery, etc.) and food security at relevant spatial scales and time horizons; (2) adaptation strategies for, and adaptive capacity of, agroecosystems to climate change; and (3) countermeasures (institutional reforms and policy options) needed to sustain long-term food security under climate change.

Dr. Liming Ye
Dr. Waqar Ahmad
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

  • climate change
  • climate variability
  • temperature
  • precipitation
  • radiation
  • impact
  • adaptation
  • adaptive capacity
  • food systems
  • food security
  • food insecurity
  • undernourishment
  • agricultural sector
  • food production system
  • crop production
  • cropland management
  • technology
  • sustainable intensification
  • sustainability
  • resilience
  • yield
  • food consumption
  • dietary change
  • scenarios
  • options
  • risk management
  • institutions

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

15 pages, 2548 KiB  
Article
Climate Trends and Extremes in the Indus River Basin, Pakistan: Implications for Agricultural Production
by Ana Magali Carrera Heureux, Jorge Alvar-Beltrán, Rodrigo Manzanas, Mehwish Ali, Robina Wahaj, Mina Dowlatchahi, Muhammad Afzaal, Dildar Kazmi, Burhan Ahmed, Nasrin Salehnia, Mariko Fujisawa, Maria Raffaella Vuolo, Hideki Kanamaru and Jose Manuel Gutiérrez
Atmosphere 2022, 13(3), 378; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/atmos13030378 - 24 Feb 2022
Cited by 16 | Viewed by 3719
Abstract
Historical and future projected changes in climatic patterns over the largest irrigated basin in the world, the Indus River Basin (IRB), threaten agricultural production and food security in Pakistan, in particular for vulnerable farming communities. To build a more detailed understanding of the [...] Read more.
Historical and future projected changes in climatic patterns over the largest irrigated basin in the world, the Indus River Basin (IRB), threaten agricultural production and food security in Pakistan, in particular for vulnerable farming communities. To build a more detailed understanding of the impacts of climate change on agriculture s in the IRB, the present study analyzes (1) observed trends in average temperature, precipitation and related extreme indicators, as well as seasonal shifts over a recent historical period (1997–2016); and (2) statistically downscaled future projections (up to 2100) from a set of climate models in conjunction with crop-specific information for the four main crops of the IRB: wheat, cotton, rice and sugarcane. Key findings show an increasing trend of about over 0.1 °C/year in observed minimum temperature across the study area over the historical period, but no significant trend in maximum temperature. Historical precipitation shows a positive annual increase driven mainly by changes in August and September. Future projections highlight continued warming resulting in critical heat thresholds for the four crops analyzed being increasingly exceeded into the future, in particular in the Kharif season. Concurrently, inter-annual rainfall variability is projected to increase up to 10–20% by the end of the 21st century, augmenting uncertainty of water availability in the basin. These findings provide insight into the nature of recent climatic shifts in the IRB and emphasize the importance of using climate impact assessments to develop targeted investments and efficient adaptation measures to ensure resilience of agriculture in Pakistan into the future. Full article
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15 pages, 1293 KiB  
Article
What Drives Climate Change Adaptation Practices in Smallholder Farmers? Evidence from Potato Farmers in Indonesia
by Tina Sri Purwanti, Syafrial Syafrial, Wen-Chi Huang and Mohammad Saeri
Atmosphere 2022, 13(1), 113; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/atmos13010113 - 11 Jan 2022
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2847
Abstract
The potato is the third most consumed crop globally after rice and wheat, but climate change has often disrupted its production. Therefore, adaptation practices are needed to maintain potato productivity. This study investigates the determinants of on- and off-farm climate change adaptation practices [...] Read more.
The potato is the third most consumed crop globally after rice and wheat, but climate change has often disrupted its production. Therefore, adaptation practices are needed to maintain potato productivity. This study investigates the determinants of on- and off-farm climate change adaptation practices among smallholder farmers in Indonesia, considering adaptation intensity, which has not discussed in previous literature. The cross-sectional data were collected from 302 smallholder potato farmers in East Java, Indonesia, analyzed by a multivariate probit model to estimate the determinants. An ordered probit model was subsequently employed to understand the intensity factors. The findings indicated that the significant factors that affect farmers’ choice of on-farm adaptations were the farmers’ education, their participation in farmers’ groups, agricultural-related infrastructure, and agriculture output prices. Meanwhile, the off-farm adaptations were significantly affected by the farmers’ education, employed family members, agriculture-related infrastructure, and livestock ownership. The ordered probit model also suggested that participation in farmers groups and agricultural-related infrastructure were the most significant factors that encouraged adaptation. Therefore, adaptation planning should consider these factors to optimally improve farmers’ adaptation capacity. Full article
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11 pages, 1408 KiB  
Article
A Multi-Site Evaluation of Winter Hardiness in Indigenous Alfalfa Cultivars in Northern China
by Lijun Xu, Qian Liu, Yingying Nie, Feng Li, Guixia Yang, Ya Tao, Shijie Lv, Xinjia Wu and Liming Ye
Atmosphere 2021, 12(11), 1538; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/atmos12111538 - 21 Nov 2021
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 1713
Abstract
Integration of perennial grass species into the current food production systems, especially in the agropastoral regions worldwide, may produce multiple benefits including, among others, a more stable productivity and a smaller eco-environmental footprint. However, one of the fundamental challenges facing the large-scale adoption [...] Read more.
Integration of perennial grass species into the current food production systems, especially in the agropastoral regions worldwide, may produce multiple benefits including, among others, a more stable productivity and a smaller eco-environmental footprint. However, one of the fundamental challenges facing the large-scale adoption of such grass species is their ability to withstand the vagaries of winter in these regions. Here, we present a comprehensive evaluation of the winter hardiness of 50 indigenous Chinese cultivars of alfalfa, a high-quality leguminous perennial grass, in comparison with six introduced U.S. cultivars in a multi-site field experiment in northern China. Our results reveal that indigenous cultivars have stronger winter hardiness than introduced cultivars. Cultivars native in the north performed better than southern cultivars, suggesting that suitability evaluation is an unavoidable step proceeding any regional implementations. Our results also show that the metric we used to assess alfalfa’s winter hardiness, the average score index (ASI), produced more consistent results than another more-widely used metric of winter survival rate (WSR). These findings offer a systematic field evidence that supports regional cropping system adjustment and production system betterment to ensure food security under climate change in the region and beyond. Full article
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