Adaptation of Agricultural and Food Systems to a Changing Climate and Increasing Urbanization

Abstract

Climate change will pose risks for the world’s food supply in the coming decades; this comes at a time when the global demand for food is expected to soar based on 2050 world population estimates. It is important to recognize that climate change will necessitate temporal and geographical shifts in food production, but will most likely not result in the collapse of our food systems. However, because of differences in the severity of how climate change will affect agriculture, regional and temporal changes in production and harvest-time will challenge the existing and sometimes outdated agricultural infrastructure with respect to collection, storage, transportation, and distribution of food. Increasing regional and global urbanization will further perturb these systems. Adaptation to climate change with respect to crop and food animal production will have to occur at multiple temporal, seasonal, and geospatial levels. Other major adaptation measures will have to occur with respect to crop selection, genetics, CO2 and temperature sensitivity, and resilience of crops and food animals, water resources, and mitigation of invasive species. Technology, including sophisticated Geographic Information Systems (GIS)-based modeling, coupled with publically available soil and weather data that help farmers optimize production and conservation will be essential toward adaptation. Communication of this type of localized technical information to agricultural stakeholders by national, federal, and state entities is beginning to occur in order to help farmers adapt and prepare for extreme events associated with climate change. As the largest agricultural state in the USA, California has developed a robust mitigation and adaptation strategy that may be useful for other nation-states.