Impact of Climate Change on Food Security

Impact of Climate Change on Food Security
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Impact of Climate Change on Food Security
Climate change has severely impacted food security by disrupting the food production systems and agricultural activities. While the effects of climate change on food security have ranged from a reduction in agricultural produce to a significant decline in the nutritional value of food, the developing countries are the most affected. As a result of food insecurity, the populations in the developing countries have been subjected to severe hunger, undernourishment, and malnutrition, among other effects. Therefore, rapid climate change has significantly led to food insecurity due to increased drought and disruption of agricultural activities. This has greatly affected the developed and developing countries that rely on agriculture for food production.
One way in which climate change affects food security is by disrupting food production and agriculture. Increased temperatures, extreme weather conditions like droughts and floods, water scarcity, changing patterns of rainfall, and higher concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are already affecting the production of staple crops worldwide (Fawzy et al., 2020). Recently, there has been a decline in the production of maize and wheat as a result of extreme weather conditions, water scarcity, and plant diseases (Macdiarmid & Whybrow, 2019).
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), climate change has led to the unpredictable yield of cereal crops in the world’s semi-arid regions, such as the Sahel region of Africa. Currently, the unpredictability rate stands at about 80% (Masipa, 2017). In some coastal areas, the rising sea levels threaten food security differently. They pose risks of losing agricultural lands in coastal regions. For instance, in Vietnam, the probability of saltwater to flood coastal farmlands increases the likelihood of killing off rice cops (Onoja et al., 2011). Almost half of Vietnam's rice production takes place in the Mekong Delta, meaning a flood in this region could affect the country’s food security and economy.
Climate change also limits food access. The general idea is that the impact of climate change on food production is transferable to food access. In other words, the two are interrelated and suffer the same consequences of climate change. As Masipa (2017) puts it, climate change and extreme weather events lead to inflated prices for the available food, as already witnessed in most parts of the world. For instance, in some countries, fruit prices have risen by almost 3.5%, vegetables by around 4%, and meat by about 6% (Macdiarmid & Whybrow, 2019). These price spikes leave low-income consumers to spend up to 75% of their total income (Onoja et al., 2011). Since human food systems rely on each other, more frequent and extreme events in one region could alter patterns of food systems (Akudugu et al., 2012). Regions with a low capacity to adjust to a sudden event could suffer the most.
Another impact is a decrease in food nutrition and nutritional value. Nutr...