NEW DELHI: Unchecked climate change, scientists warn, will slow down economic growth, impact poverty reduction, lower food production and drive up food prices.
A leaked copy of the draft report of the Working Group II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), reviewed by ET, sounds the most urgent warning till date on the adverse impacts of unchecked climate change.
While poor African countries stand out as the likely worst victims, inaction on climate change would create serious problems for developing countries like India and China, which are trying to pull out millions of their people from poverty.
The draft report, which could be revised before it is finalised in March 2014, states that throughout the 21st century, climate change will slow down economic growth and further erode food security, and trigger new poverty traps, particularly in urban areas. Scientists say with "medium confidence" that the negative impacts of climate change on crops and terrestrial food production are more common than positive impacts.
In the recent past there have been rapid increase in food and cereal prices, which scientists say points to the fact that key production regions are sensitive to climate extremes. The draft report stresses that without corrective measures, temperature increases of 1 degree or more would "negatively impact" yield for crops like rice, wheat and maize. Projections suggest that unchecked climate change will reduce yields by as much as 2% every decade.
Simultaneously, demand for food grains is expected to rise by 14% every decade till 2050, resulting in a situation of spiralling food prices. Tropical countries would be the worst affected, especially because they are home to the world's poorest people. While a 2 degrees rise in temperature can be countered through effective measures to adapt to climate change, scientists warn such efforts will have no impact if local temperature increases by 4 degrees or more. It could make the gap between crop production and rising demand "increasingly large" in many regions, and pose significant threats to food security.
For India, such a situation will endanger the government's food security programme that seeks to provide food grains at a low cost to 67% of the population.
