CCAFS: Global warming will cause famine
A recent report by the Climate Change Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) research group says global warming will cause famine in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.
The international research group says millions of people are already suffering from food shortage in these areas and climate change will make it even worse, the state-funded BBC reported.
"We are starting to see much more clearly where the effects of climate change on agriculture could intensify hunger and poverty," said Patti Kristjanson, an agricultural economist with the CCAFS initiative that produced the report.
Some experts believe agriculturalists should have earlier used global climate models to pinpoint regions most affected by rising temperatures.
CCAFS researchers focused their observations on the tropics and identified the regions with chronically-malnourished populations who are highly dependent on local food supplies.
The team then analyzed the climate data provided by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Studies finally revealed the food-insecure regions which will experience the greatest shifts in temperature and precipitation over the next 40 years.
Researchers found that as many African areas are expected to become drier, countries such as South Africa whose agriculture is mainly based on maize farming can shift to more drought resistant crops.
Countries such as Niger, however, will not have many options because they are already supporting themselves by very drought resistant crop varieties, such as sorghum and millet.
"West Africa really stands out as problematic,” explained CCAFS director Bruce Campbell. “Burkina Faso, Niger, Mali. They are already dependent on sorghum and millet.”
"In many places in Africa you are really going to need [a] revolution in farming systems."
According to Sir Gordon Conway, professor of international development at Imperial College London, governments plan to limit the average increase in temperature to 2C by the end of the century, but if temperatures continue to follow their current trajectories "we are on for a 3-4C increase," and "things get very alarming."
Source: presstv.ir
