What weather characteristics greatly affect agricultural and food products?

What weather characteristics greatly affect agricultural and food products?

Changingweather patternsis one of the factors that profoundly affect agricultural production around the world. High temperatures, extreme drought, and other weather events may reduce production in some areas, but the effects are often volatile and unpredictable. However, many countries depend primarily on trade in agricultural and food products; To help mitigate the consequences of shifts in local production patterns caused byweather, as a new paper from the University of Illinois suggests.

For example, the 2008 drought in Middle Eastern and Central Asian countries led to a 22% decline in wheat production in that region compared to the previous year. As a result; The value of wheat imports increased by 224% compared to 2007, with most imports coming from the United States, Canada, Russia, and Ukraine.

Finding common factors between different studies

The research team conducted a statistical analysis known as meta-analysis, which is one of the types of statistical analyzes that are applied to the results of a group of studies, whether compatible or contradictory. In order to find the direction and similarities between these results, the team applied this analysis to academic studies examining the relationships between weather and trade in agricultural and food commodities. Their motivation was to know which weather characteristics were more important for exports versus imports.

«The main result we reached is that the main driver of trade, whether at the local or international level, is the temperature in the place of origin, as an increase in temperature negatively affects the country’s ability to export agricultural commodities. “Because it reduces productivity and reduces agricultural employment.” These statements came from the co-author of the study, Sandy Dalerba, a professor in the Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics at the university and co-director of the Center for Climate, Regional, Environmental and Trade Economics (CREATE) atUniversity. Illinois.

D'Alerba points out that higher temperatures in the destination location should lead to more imports, but the effect is not statistically significant. On the other hand, it was found that the period of rainfall is more ambiguous in both the place of origin and destination.

William Ridley, an assistant professor in the university’s Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, and the lead author on the research paper, says: “Trade is one of the main tools through which we can mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change, especially in agriculture. If a country is affected by adverse growing conditions, Like drought, the ability to import foreign substitutes for food and agriculture will act as a buffer against these types of shocks, and this should certainly not be relied upon as a permanent solution.”

Agreement on the negative impact of temperature

The researchers identified all academic studies on the topic, totaling 235 individual studies of the relationship between weather and agricultural trade. Some studies have looked at multiple commodities and multiple countries while others have focused on specific regions such as the Middle East and North Africa on trade between them and the rest of the world; Or domestic trade, including a study by D'Allerba that focuses on interstate flows of crops, fruits, and vegetables in the United States.

There is no doubt that the results of the original studies will differ depending on the study area, methodology, and data quality. However, they all seem to agree on a clear negative impact of temperature on the export of goods, and this impact is particularly severe in undermining development rates.

It should be noted that trade in agricultural commodities is usually driven by differences in the nature ofclimate, land and natural resources between places of origin and destination, and certainly human preferences in diversity when it comes to food have certainly made agricultural commodities commodities The first ever circulated. However, over recent years, we have witnessed many disruptions in the global food supply chain following the Corona pandemic and the outbreak of war in Ukraine.

Climate change and the increase in extremeweather phenomenathat accompany it constitute a more serious, longer-term, and more widespread threat. Because it has the ability to affect natural resources in places of production and to reduce productivity suddenly and over the long term.

There is no doubt that the steady increase in the population, which exceeded 8 billion people last November, necessarily means a continuous increase in demand for food. As a result, it is important to understand the role of weather and climate in trade, predict their impact, and evaluate the extent of the flexibility of the food supply chain to deal with crises, which can completely transform Ease into existential dangers.