Climate change will hammer food production: researcher

About 90 per cent of humanity — including most of the world’s poorest people — faces poorer harvests and smaller catches if efforts to fight climate change don’t drastically ramp up, according to a report co-written by a UBC researcher.

And while Canada may be one of the only countries where production of grain and fish could increase, Canadians shouldn’t feel smug, says study co-author William Cheung from the University of British Columbia.

“We are living in the same world. Everything is connected. Any country that thinks they would be able to isolate themselves from any problems or impacts in other countries is unrealistic,” Cheung said.

His research has long focused on the impact of climate change on marine resources. He co-authored a recent paper concluding the amount of life in the oceans will decrease 17 per cent by 2100 under current greenhouse gas rules.

The paper, published in the journal Science Advances on Wednesday, is broader yet.

It starts by estimating the average productivity of agriculture and fisheries in about 200 countries by 2100. For some countries, average farm production could increase while fisheries decline, the paper says. For others, it’s likely to be the reverse.

It also says that in Canada — almost uniquely in the world — both are expected to increase. But there are plenty of lose-lose countries, mostly in the heavily populated nations around the equator. It predicts that heat is expected to make much of their land unfarmable and tropical fisheries are likely to disappear as fish head to cooler waters.

Cheung compared that data to how dependent local people are on their own agriculture and fisheries. He also considered how resilient their communities are to climate change. He came to a disturbing conclusion. Not only are 7.2 billion people will likely see declining food production, they are also the most dependent on it, the least resilient and the poorest.

The study was released the day after the United Nations warned that governments are not doing enough to keep global temperature increases to between 1.5 and two degrees Celsius.

Cheung points out there’s still time to avert disaster.

Cutting greenhouse gases to keep within Paris targets would reduce average crop losses for loselose countries to five per cent from 25 per cent. Their average fisheries losses would improve to 15 per cent from 60 per cent.

“That’s a big opportunity to reduce the impacts on the most vulnerable regions.”

But he’s not kidding himself. “We need drastic action.”