What farmers' adaptation to climate change means for the future of food

Think food prices are high now? By the end of this century, climate change could significantly cut production of six staple food crops around the world — including wheat production in Canada, leading to higher prices, a new study finds.

And certain crops in higher-income regions, such as corn and wheat in the U.S. Midwest and wheat in Canada's Prairies, could see some of the bigger losses compared to crops in developing countries, projects the study published Wednesday in the journal Nature.

"Better-off parts of the world end up getting harmed in ways that are surprising that I didn't expect," said lead author Andrew Hultgren, an assistant professor of agricultural and consumer economics at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champagne.

But farmers' adaptation will make a difference.

Meanwhile, Canada does have some options and may fare better than other parts of the world.

The study looked at data about regional climates; climate impacts on specific crops; access to resources such as fertilizer and insurance and costs and benefits of different farming practices for farmers in 54 countries that grow corn, soybeans, rice, wheat, cassava and sorghum. The goal was to find out how farmers are adapting to weather shocks and the extent to which adaptation is offsetting the impacts of climate change.

In a high-emissions scenario, where global temperatures warm by 3.2 to 5.4 C by 2090, corn production is expected to decline up to 40 per cent in the U.S., eastern China, central Asia, southern Africa and the Middle East; and wheat production is expected to fall 30 to 40 per cent in China, Russia, the U.S. and Canada.

Some of the losses in developing countries will be offset by growing wealth in those countries that allows them to mechanize to increase productivity.

Adaptation strategies, such as growing different varieties and adjusting fertilizer use and irrigation, can also help, offsetting about one-third of global agricultural losses.

"That's good," Hultgren said. "But it's not everything."

But even with adaptation, the study projected a 25 per cent productivity loss globally by 2100 among the six crops it looked at.

The United Nations projects that we're on track to warm as much as 2.9 C by the end of the century — less than the high emissions scenario.

Hultgren said even with warming of only 3 C, global production would be lowered "by the amount of calories that people eat for breakfast every day."

That could lead to higher prices in higher-income countries, and social and political instability in poorer countries, where many people could have trouble affording food.

"These results indicate a scale of innovation, cropland expansion or further adaptation that might be necessary to ensure food security in a changing climate," the study concludes.

Hultgren and his research team found that while losses in low-income regions were "substantial," they were bigger in productive farming areas in higher-income areas such as the U.S., Canada and western Europe.

That's because many poorer countries have already done much more adaptation, Hultgren said — they're already facing more extreme heat and don't have access to resources such as insurance, requiring them to be more risk averse.

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Gurcharn Brar, the principal investigator of the Cereal Breeding Lab at the University of Alberta, grew up in the wheat-growing Punjab region of India. He said his parents tell him it used to have cooler winters necessary for good yields. But now the winter is shorter and wheat may be exposed to extreme heat while flowering. That may prevent it from producing seeds or cause it to produce smaller seeds.

Climate change "is already affecting yields in that part of India," he said. "I think we do not realize it as much… we still have cooler summers."

While the lower level of adaptation means higher-income countries have lots of room to adapt, Hultgren notes that adaptation is costly. For example, more varieties that flower earlier in the season before extreme heat hits may have lower yields.

Brar is developing new wheat varieties for commercial cultivation in northern parts of the Prairies, known as the Parkland region.

He said Canada still has cooler summers, but wheat here has already been affected by more frequent droughts, since the crop mostly relies on rain rather than irrigation.

He said some losses in Canada have already been offset by growing improved, higher yielding wheat varieties — although they would be seeing bigger gains in yield without climate change.

"We know that varieties that will be grown 10 years from now…should stand drought and heat better," he said. Researchers are already developing them, as it takes eight to 12 years.

Developing a new variety also costs about $1 million on average, he said.

Gunter Jochum runs Blue Diamond Farms west of Winnipeg and is growing wheat, oats, canola and soybeans on 2,550 hectares with his brother-in-law. He's been farming the region for 40 years and is also the president of the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association.

Jochum said he and other farmers are constantly improving their farming practices, technology, and changing their crops and varieties to suit changing conditions in the climate and the market.

Despite challenging swings between wet and dry conditions in recent decades, he said, "our yields still seem to be able to go up every year because of the way we change farming — the way we adapt to the climate, to the changes."

In Canada's case, the study shows that while wheat yields may decline in some areas, they could increase for crops such as corn and soybeans in more northern areas.

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Jochum said that's already happening in his region. Until 2000, no one thought to grow soybeans there because it was too cold, but in the last 20 years, "they've become a really important crop on our farm, in our area."

That's partly because a warming climate has extended the growing season slightly and partly because scientists have developed faster-growing varieties.

"In the last five years, corn has really taken off in southern Manitoba," he added.

While he sees bigger risks and issues closer to the equator, he thinks Canadian farmers are well-placed to adapt to the changing climate if they have the right support.

His group is pushing for more government investment in new varieties of crops and policies that encourage the private sector to develop new varieties.