Climate Change on Agriculture

Climate change and agriculture are interrelated processes both of which takes place on global scale. Climate change affects agriculture in a number of ways, including through changes in average temperature, rainfall and climate extremes  (Heat waves) changes in pest and diseases changes in atmospheric carbon and ground level ozone concentration changes in the nutritional quality of some foods and change in sea-level.

Climate change in already affecting agriculture with effects unevenly distributed across the world. Future climate change will likely negatively affect the crop production in low latitude countries, while effect in northern latitude countries will be either positive or negative.

Agriculture contributes to climate change by

(1) Anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs), and

 (2) By the conversion of non-agricultural land (e.g., forest) into agricultural land. Agriculture, forestry and land-use change contributed around 20 to 25% to global annual emissions in 2010.

There are ranges of policies that can reduce the risk of negative climate change impacts on agriculture, and to reduce GHG emissions from the agriculture sector