The Role of Agriculture in Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation

Agriculture contributes significantly to climate change through direct on-farm emissions and food systems, but is largely exempt from greenhouse gas emission reduction policies.

At our study site in Iowa, we surveyed farmer beliefs and perceptions to gain insight into attitudes toward climate change. Two items measured farmer support for responding to one of its major predicted impacts: increased precipitation.

Impacts of Climate Change on Agriculture

Agriculture is highly dependent on weather and climate conditions. Without the ideal temperatures, rainfall patterns, or pests in place, crops and pastures fail or become barren – leaving farmers no choice but to manage these situations through agricultural practices that impact soil, water, and air quality.

Agriculture contributes significantly to global warming through the emission of greenhouse gases, while its activities relying on fossil fuels for transport and power produce further GHG emissions.

Agriculture will generally face greater threats from climate change in countries with high hunger rates, declining yields, and most of their populations dependent on farming for income or survival.

Under low-warming scenarios, wheat and rice yields are projected to increase while those of sorghum and millet may decrease. Under higher warming scenarios, however, impacts are far more dramatic: in high warming scenarios all crops typically experience significant decreases as warmer climates push many past their optimal growing temperature and do not benefit as readily from carbon fertilization as would cooler environments.

Impacts of Drought

Agriculture involves harvesting crops such as cereal grains, fruits, vegetables, tree nuts and medicinal herbs from large plots of land. Farmers cultivate and fertilize these crops before planting and watering them prior to their reappearance for harvesting again.

Agriculture products are essential components of global food supplies, and their loss could pose hunger or health threats in affected regions. Drought has many ramifications on agriculture including crop loss and increased production costs.

Conventional farming practices, including frequent tillage, contribute to soil erosion and increase concentrations of airborne particles carrying infectious disease pathogens – leading to an increase in disease-causing infections among both livestock and humans.

Other crops such as sorghum and cotton consume less water than corn, making them potentially more resistant to drought conditions. Unfortunately, water shortages can still result in decreased crop production and higher production costs that can make farming unprofitable or make some types of crops unprofitable altogether.

Impacts of Excessive Moisture

Many crops require just the right amount of moisture in order to thrive; too little and it won’t grow, while too much could cause flooding or become waterlogged and delay planting as tractors cannot pass through fields easily and planting is delayed further. When harvest is also delayed significantly causing financial losses for farmers.

Climate change will have different ramifications on agriculture depending on both its region and crop. For instance, higher temperatures can help certain plants flourish while negatively affecting others that need cooler conditions to thrive; hence the necessity of predictive models to measure climate change’s effects on staple crop yields.

Regenerative practices like soil carbon sequestration, agroforestry and pasture restoration can significantly enhance agriculture’s capacity to remove CO2 from the atmosphere. Although not currently included as emissions reduction targets for agricultural industries, such practices could help address some of the impacts associated with climate change by helping mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.

Impacts of Atypical Weather

Increased summer temperatures may interfere with crop production if they exceed a plant’s optimal temperature range, and altering seasonal precipitation patterns, leading to irregular planting and harvesting schedules as well as interfering with nutrients levels and water availability.

Farmers must also contend with new pests and diseases that thrive in warmer, wetter conditions, such as weeds whose costs now total more than $11 billion each year and are shifting with climate change.

Deforestation, land clearing and intensive soil tillage are major sources of greenhouse gas emissions while excessive fertilizer use accelerates carbon runoff into freshwater systems. Regenerative agricultural practices like cover crops, crop rotations and diversified farming systems may help offset some of these negative impacts by sequestering carbon from the atmosphere and replenishing soil nutrients – but to do this effectively requires taking careful consideration to preserve ecosystem biodiversity without waterlogging and chemical leaching occurring simultaneously.