Impact of Climate Change on Yields of Major Food Crops in India: Implications for Food Security (original) (raw)

Climate Change Impact on Agriculture and Food Security in India

2018

in the world. Increased occurrence of temperature extremes, increase in the number of warm days and nights, altered rainfall patterns, increased frequency of deficit monsoons and heavy precipitation events have been observed in the country. Further, these trends are projected to continue. In this context, the study discusses the climate change trends and their impact on agriculture and food security in the country. The empirical analysis using Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) and Instrumental Variables ((IV) regressions shows that climate especially temperatures adversely impact both agriculture and food security. The importance of promotion of appropriate strategies to address agricultural productivity especially enhanced irrigation facilities, infrastructure and adoption of direct interventionist measures addressing food insecurity in the country is underlined by the research article.

Impact of Climate Change on Indian Agriculture – A Scenario with Reference to Rainfall in India

The growth rate analysis indicated that area, production and productivity of cereals, pulses and total food grains have been increased except in the case of area under cereals. The results of instability analysis should be seriously taken into consideration because pulses show a higher variability over the years compared to that of cereals. It could found from the correlation analysis that there exists positive correlation of rainfall with area, production and productivity of food grains. And correlation coefficient is much higher for area compared to other two aspects. From the field survey conducted it can be concluded that as per the perception of farmers on impact of climate change the major three impact factors are change in climatic and rainfall patterns, erratic rainfall and land is becoming unsuitable for cultivation.

Impact of climate change on Indian agriculture: A review

Climatic Change, 2006

During the recent decade, with the growing recognition of the possibility of climate change and clear evidence of observed changes in climate during 20 th century, an increasing emphasis on food security and its regional impacts has come to forefront of the scientific community. In recent times, the crop simulation models have been used extensively to study the impact of climate change on agricultural production and food security. The output provided by the simulation models can be used to make appropriate crop management decisions and to provide farmers and others with alternative options for their farming system. It is expected that in the coming decades with the increased use of computers, the use of simulation models by farmers and professionals as well as policy and decision makers will increase. In India, substantial work has been done in last decade aimed at understanding the nature and magnitude of change in yield of different crops due to projected climate change. This paper presents an overview of the state of the knowledge of possible effect of the climate variability and change on food grain production in India.

Climate change and food production in North West India

Indian Journal Of Agricultural Research, 2015

At present, climate change is one of the most challenging environmental issues as it poses potential threat to different sectors of economy at global level. Agriculture being an open activity is primarily dependent on climatic factors and change in climatic conditions affects the production, quality and quantity of crop production in an area. This paper attempts to study effects of only two parameters of climate i.e. temperature and rainfall on agricultural production in northwest region of India. Northwest region comprising of Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Jammu Kashmir states is the greatest food bowl of India contributing to its food security. The analysis of mean monthly rainfall and maximum and minimum temperatures (1901-2006) shows no significant change in temperature and rainfall conditions from 1901 to 1960; but afterward the change is more pronounced. On the whole any significant change in climatic conditions will not only challenge the food production of the region...

Impact of Climate Change on Foodgrain Yields in India

2016

In India, agriculture accounts for about sixty percent of employment. How would climate change, that is expected to hit agriculture in poorer countries very hard, affect India's agriculture? We study the impact of climate change on the mean and variance of yields of three food grains — rice (India's major crop), sorghum and pearl millet — at the district level using a panel data set for 1966-2002. An agricultural production function is estimated with exogenous climate variables -- precipitation and temperature -- controlling for other non climate inputs. To capture the impact of climate extremes, climate variables are modelled as anomalies. The results show that climate change adversely affects mean and variance of crop yields. Rice yields are found to be sensitive to rainfall extremes, extremely high temperatures increase sorghum yield variability, with pearl millet yields invariant to both rainfall and temperature extremes.

Effect of Climate Change on Crop Production in India

International Association of Biologicals and Computational Digest

Agriculture and climate change are deeply intertwined. Crop production is highly sensitive to climate. It is affected by long-term trends in average rainfall and temperature, inter-annual climate variability, and extreme weather events. Climate change induced increases in temperatures, rainfall variation and the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events are adding to pressures on global agricultural and food systems. Climate change is expected to negatively affect both crop and livestock production systems in most regions, although some countries may actually benefit from the changing conditions. The changing climate is also adding to resource problems, such as water scarcity, pollution and soil degradation. Climate change is likely to contribute substantially to food insecurity in the future, by increasing food prices, and reducing food production. Climate change is already affecting agriculture, with effects unevenly distributed across the world. Future climate change will...

Impacts of Climate Change on Agricultural Yield: Evidence from Odisha, India

This paper explores the impact of climate variables such as temperature and rainfall on yields of seven selected crops such as rice, maize, groundnuts, rapeseed & mustard, chickpea, Pigeonpea and sesame during the period 1970-2014. We used panel data for 45 years to assess the impact of climate change on agriculture yield. In the presence of auto-correlation and Heteroscedasticity we estimate the panel corrected standard error with a fixed effect panel regression. The regression results reinforce that crop yields of the selected crops are susceptible to climate change. The relative magnitude of rainfall and temperature changes appears to play a pivotal role in determining the direction of change in the yield. It is also observed that the rainfall has significant positive effects on the yields of all the selected crops under study. In case of temperature, we observed mix results for the selected crops under study. However, the extent of increase in the temperature appears to be more harmful for the crop yields. Further, the non-climatic factors like irrigation and fertilizers were found to be very instrumental in increasing the yields of the selected crops. In the light of negative effects of climate change, appropriate mitigation and adaptation strategies are required to delve with the deteriorative effects of climate change. 1. Backdrops Climate change is the buzz word which has received considerable attention in this century due to its potential impacts on the whole Earth system. It is the greatest challenge that the human civilization is ever facing in the 21 st century with various implications on agriculture, industry, natural resources, human habitations, and health status. Since the climate change alters temperature and precipitation worldwide with variation from place to place, these changes required to be quantified regionally and locally for its understanding and better management at local level. Odisha is one of the coastal states of India and its economy closely tied to its natural resource base and climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture, the state may face a major economic threat because of the projected climate change. Wide variability in rainfall has already brought about a significant level of instability in crop production in the certain region of Odisha with considerable effects on the income, expenditure and savings of rural households (Swain and Swain, 2006). Significant impacts of changing rainfall pattern and rising temperature on cereals, pulses and oilseed production in Odisha has observed in the last five decades (Das, 2016). Thus, in the changing climate as predicted it is bound to affect agricultural production and related sectors with concomitant negative implications for sustainable food security (Nelson & Mensbrugghe, 2014). Therefore, a proper understanding of the impacts of climate change on various crops yield is required to withstand adapt the concomitant negative effects of its on agriculture. On the above background, this paper investigates the impacts of climate variables such as rainfall and temperature on the yields of selected crops in Odisha. 2. Brief Review of Literature The effects of climate change are very pervasive and those in low-income countries who contribute least to climate change are most vulnerable to its effects. Climate impact studies have consistently predicted extensive impacts to the agricultural sector across the globe (Tol, 2009). Climatic changes and increasing climatic variability are likely to aggravate the problems of future food security by exerting pressure on agriculture. Agriculture is one of the sectors that are most likely to be sensitive to the primary effects of climate change, such as changes in growing season, temperature, and precipitation (Torvanger, Twena and Romstad, 2004). Climate change is expected to influence crop and livestock production, hydrologic balances, input supplies and other components of agricultural systems (Adams, Hurd, Lenhart, & Leary, 1998). There are evidences that global climatic changes are influencing agriculture through direct and indirect effects on the crops, soils, livestock and pests (Pathak, et al. 2012). The increase in temperature is reducing crop duration and crop

Analytical Study on Impact of Climate Change on India Agriculture

2017

Climate change is likely to directly impact food production across the globe. This paper estimates the economic impact of climate change on Indian agriculture. The largest known economic impact of climate change is upon agriculture because of the size and sensitivity of the sector. The climatic change could affect agriculture in several ways such as quantity and quality of crops in terms of productivity, growth rates, photosynthesis and transpiration rates, moisture availability etc. The consequences of agriculture's contribution to climate change, and of climate change's negative impact on agriculture, are severe which is projected to have a great impact on food production and may threaten the food security and livelihoods and hence, require special agricultural measures to combat with. The present paper focused on the current scenario of agriculture in India and the various implications of climate change on food security and livelihoods.

Climate change vis-a-vis Indian agriculture

2012

Climate change and variability are posing the serious challenges influencing the performance of Indian agriculture. The fourth IPCC report clearly brought out the global and regional impacts of projected climate change on agriculture. India being a large country with diverse agro-climatic regions is more vulnerable in view of huge population dependant on agriculture and poor coping mechanism. There are evidences already of negative impacts on yield of wheat, rice and other crops in parts of India due to increased temperature, increased water stress and reduction in number of rainy days which in turn would result in greater instability in food production. Researchers and policy framers should develop a comprehensive adaptation and mitigation strategies for coping the adverse impact of climate change. Changes in land use management, development of multiple stress tolerant varieties, efficient cropping systems that match with changed rainfall patterns, resource conservation technologie...

Climatic Effects on Food Grain Productivity in India A Crop Wise Analysis

Climate change is likely to affect the agricultural production adversely and becomes more serious concern for developing countries because they do not have enough resources to mitigate the adverse effect of climate change. Statistics show that the amount of undernourished people is still alarmingly in developing world, so as the case of India. In India more than 700 million populations directly depend on agriculture and allied activities of which 52% directly dependent on climate-sensitive sectors like agriculture, forestry and fishery for their livelihood. Agriculture sector is most sensitive to climate change and it affects the food security of India. This study estimates the impact of climatic and non-climatic factors on food grain productivity to facilitate the development of appropriate farm policies to cope with climate change. Cobb-Douglas production for a panel of 13 states have been employed during 1980-2009.Empirical results show that climatic factors have a statistically significant impact on productivity of most of food grain crops but this effect varies across crops. Productivity of rice, maize, sorghum, and ragi crops negatively influenced with increase in actual average maximum temperature. Actual average minimum temperature has negative and statistically significant effects on wheat, barley, gram, and rice crops. Productivity of barley, rice, maize, and ragi crops lead to declined due to excessive rain and changing in rainfall pattern. Estimates suggest that the agricultural productivity in India is sensitive to climate change which is adversely affecting the food grain productivity and it may become a serious threat to food security in India. Major finding of present study indicates a need to adapt separate policies for various crops to mitigate the adverse effect of climate change in India. The results also highlight the important of irrigation and optimum use of fertilizer to mitigate the adverse effect of climate change. The study also suggests that policy makers should ensure adequate and consistent pricing for the farmer's product during the harvesting season.