Chapter Two - Impacts of Changing Climate and Climate Variability on Seed Production and Seed Industry

Abstract

Abstract Agriculture is extremely sensitive to climate and weather conditions. The resilience of our crop production systems to changes in climate can be enhanced by improved understanding impacts and responses of crops to changing climates. Several countries in Asia and Africa are at the risk of losing about 280 million tons of potential cereal production as a result of climate change factor, particularly increasing temperatures and prolonged dry periods. The most significant negative changes for developing countries in Asia, where agricultural production declines of about −4% to −10% are anticipated under different socioeconomic and climate change scenarios. Rising temperatures will reduce the amount of fertile farmland, and by 2050, the amount of maize grown is expected to decline by 6–23% and wheat by 40–45%. The majority of the world’s food supply comes from the consumption of seeds from grain crops (wheat, rice, maize, soybean, barley, and sorghum), which are most vulnerable to changing climates. The growth in food production is lower than the population growth; therefore, there will be challenges of food security. Major impacts of climate change will be on rain-fed crops that account for nearly 60% of cropland area. As predicted, South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa will be highly vulnerable to climate change. Crop production can be increased by the use of quality seeds of high-yielding stress-tolerant varieties, combined with judicious use of inputs, particularly water and nutrients. Climate changes affect all four dimensions of food security, that is, availability, access to food, stability of food supplies, and food utilization. The seed industry plays an important role in increasing food production. It provides high-quality seeds of high-yielding varieties in adequate quantities at the right time and right place. Climate change influences the population dynamics of insects, emergence of new pests, changing status of pest and disease development, and evolution of new races of pests. Quality seed production is also affected by crop/weed interactions, loss of pollinator biodiversity, and genetic diversity. The seed crop is also affected by climate change regarding change in crop phenology, reproduction, flowering, anthesis/pollen viability, and pollination/fertilization, length of seed-filling duration, seed setting, seed size, seed dormancy, seed yield, and ultimately seed quality. Therefore, the cost of seed production is likely to increase in changing climate due to scheduling of operations, land and water management, herbicide/insecticide applications, pollination management, and postharvest seed management. Issues regarding intellectual property rights (IPR) related to seed, including patent infringements, prevalence of monocultures, consolidations of transnational corporations through acquisitions and mergers, and biodiversity and pollinator-loss related issues further complicate the problem. The lack of trained conventional plant breeders, crop physiologists, and seed technologists and stronger interdisciplinary collaboration between agronomists and biologists need attention. Further, acceptance of engineered crop or seed, increasing cost of genetically engineered (GE) seed as compared with conventional seed with no yield advantage, increasing number of herbicide applications, culminate in loss in net farm income in developed countries. In this article, the issues regarding the impact of climate change (particularly increasing temperature and carbon dioxide concentrations) on seed production, the present trend of the global seed industry, are discussed.