The Food Equation Taking a long/term View on World Agriculture, Climate Change and Food Security Josef Schmidhuber Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
Drivers of change POPULATION and INCOME
Total population (billions) 16 Population growth to continue Annual increments (millions) 100 14 12 10 High variant 80 60 8 6 4 2 low variant 40 20 0 0 1850 1900 1950 2000 2050 2100-20
Urbanization to accelerate 7 6 billion people 5 4 3 2 1 0 Rural Urban 1950 1970 1990 2010 2030 2050
Consumption(kcal/pc) and GDP p.c. (62 Developing Countries)
Impacts on FOOD AVAILABILITY & PRODUCTION
Past and projected increase in food production 300 255 250 200 Percent 150 148 1961/63-2005/07 2005/07-2050 100 60 63 77 50 24 0 World Developed Developing
Impacts of change HUNGER & MALNUTRITION
The Hunger targets The MDG one hunger target can be reached, with additional efforts The WFS goal is out of reach:
The changing distribution of hunger in the world, 1990 2014 Latin America and the Caribbean, 6.8% North Africa, 0.6% Western Asia, 0.8% South-Eastern Asia, 13.6% Caucasus and Central Asia, 0.9% Southern Asia, 28.8% Oceania, 0.1% Developed regions, 2.0% Western Asia, 2.3% Latin America and the Caribbean, 4.6% North Africa, 1.6% South-Eastern Asia, 7.9% Eastern Asia, 20.0% Caucasus and Central Asia, 0.7% Oceania, 0.2% Southern Asia, 34.3% Developed regions, 1.8% Eastern Asia, 29.1% Sub Saharan Africa, 17.3% Sub Saharan Africa, 26.6% Total = 1015 million 1990 92 Total = 805 million 2012 14*
The shape of things to come? The Economist, December 2003
Provisional nutritional outcomes (global averages/aggregates) undernourished % of population with kcal/person/day obese % million >2700 >3000 % million 2012/14 11 805 57 28 8 570 2050 4 330 91 52 15 1400 2080 2 150 98 66 21 2000
Impacts of Bioenergy and new Demands
How big is the energy market? 1. Energy market (TPES): nearly 500 EJ 2. Biomass: 50 EJ (80% in developing countries) 3. Biofuels: 3.3 EJ, on ca. 33 million ha 4. Transport energy needs: ca. 95 EJ 5. Crop area to cover transport energy needs: >1000 million ha, i.e. 2/3 of global crop area. => Energy market ispotentially large, creates perfectly elastic demand for agricultural produce up to break-even points (parity prices). => Blendwalls reached for ethanol in the US and approached for biodiesel in the EU. Saturation without further subsidies or lifting blendwalls => Bio-energy subsidies have a price supporting impact, not price depressing as the traditional coupled agricultural subsidies. No WTO pressure to reduce/eliminate them
P From Cochrane to Jevons? D2 Cost reduction thru R&D, better varieties, management, etc. D1 Demand increase when demand is inelastic Demand increase when demand is elastic Q
Impacts of change RESOURCES & ENVIRONMENT
s there enough cropland nd enough yield potential?
1600 Cropland potential and actual use 2005/07, 2050 and 2080 1400 1200 Million ha 1000 800 600 400 200 0 Sub-Saharan Africa Latin America East Asia South Asia Near East/North Africa Total Potential Actual land in use 2005/07 2050 2080 Developed & transition
Impacts of change RESOURCES & ENVIRONMENT
Is there enough water?
Economic and physical water scarcity
Global Water Scarcity (2000)
What does agriculture contribute to GHG emissions?
Giga g CO2 eq 7000,000 6500,000 6000,000 5500,000 5000,000 4500,000 4000,000 GHG baseline, World: continuing a past trend vs actual projections to 2050 Hot Air Ambition Agriculture total, no Energy, no Savanna burning 1961-2050 Agriculture total, no Energy, no Savanna burning 1961-2011 Linear trend 3500,000 3000,000 2500,000 2000,000 1961 1965 1969 1973 1977 1981 1985 1989 1993 1997 2001 2005 2009 2013 2017 2021 2025 2029 2033 2037 2041 2045 2049
How does Climate Change affect agriculture and food security?
Percentage change in world food (cereal) prices in relation to changes in temperatures 50 40 Fischer et al. Food prices 30 20 10 0-10 Parry et al. Tsigas et al. Adams et al. Darwin Reilly et al. -20-30 1 2 3 4 5 Temperature 0 C Source: IPCC, AR4
1. Improvements over time 2. CC is bad for FS 3. SRES>>CC 4. CO2 fertilization is important
How do we model the impacts of Climate Change on agriculture and food security?
GCMs What we are modelling: 20 agro-meteorological to agro-ecological combinations Representative Concentration Pathways
How we are going to estimate impacts of Climate Change 1. Changing Climate 2. Changing agro-ecology 3. Changing agro-economy Mapping CC AEZ @2050 GCM variables Precipitation Temperature Agro-edaphic CO2 Many more GCMs/RCP Productivity Cropland and pasture suitability Mapping potential to actual yields/area GCMs/RCP Actual production, yields Incomes, consumption Hunger, undernourishment Dec 2014 June 2015 Dec 2015
CC and Food Security: The Stability Dimension How we are going to estimate impacts of extreme weather events? 1. Changing Climate 2. Changing agro-ecology 3. Changing agro-economy GCM variables Mapping CC Extreme weather events Droughts, Floods Hurricanes, Typhoons, Tornados Frequency, duration, severity GCMs/RCP AEZ Productivity, short and long-term Marginal land, short and long term Suitability, short term and long-term GCMs/RCP Competitive storage model Price volatility Volatility and production level effects Stocks, buffer needs Hunger, famine undernourishment June 2015 June 2016 Dec 2016
Overview and Summary 1. Global food demand will continue to rise, albeit at a slower pace (+60% by 2050) 2. In a BAU world, food security will continue to improve, the number of hungry will decline. Ditto for other forms of malnutrition (bar obesity). 3. Higher energy prices or massive climate change could worsen the outlook significantly, particularly for the poor and hungry. 4. The natural resources for such an increase are sufficient globally, but they are already now compromised locally. 5. The growth of GHG emissions from agriculture to decline with growing saturation, important for the definition of GHG targets 6. Climate change affects all dimensions of food security: Access and utilization: access to improve with poverty reduction, ditto for utilization, but later and with higher incomes only Availability: no global, but local challenges Stability: the most severe challenge of CC on FS, coping with extreme weather events needs early policy action and decisions, not only for FS
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