Title : Impacts of climate change on agriculture and food security
Abstract:
Climate change has emerged as significant manmade global environmental challenge marked by rise in ambient temperature of the earth due to release of greenhouse gases in large proportion into the atmosphere by burning of fossil fuels, industrial processes, deforestation, and agricultural practices. Global mean temperature of the earth has increased by 0.8°C over the past century and is anticipated to raise another 1.5–4.8°C over the next hundred years. Rise in global mean temperature is supposed to alter climatic patterns like floods, draughts, and incidents of the El-Nino and La-Nina, thereby affecting human life supporting system and global food production leading to food insecurity in terms of food availability, accessibility, utilization, and food system stability. In the aforesaid backdrop, the present chapter provides an insight into the climate change and its causes, impacts on agriculture, including the implications for food security, adaptation, and strategies for its mitigation.