Climate change affect food nutrition

Farmers in Indonesia used to be thinking about cropping plants based on two seasons, they were hot and rainy seasons. This calendar system was based on the natural process of raining and hot weather. But, today’s farmers would not crop their plant based on the weather as the climate change presents. The food productions particularly from carbohydrate-producing plants, fruits and vegetables are affected by the changing of climate change. Is this the only impact resulting from the greenhouse effect?

Global warming affects the humanity in all sectors

Talking about climate change, our topics comprise increasing of Earth’s temperature, changing of climate such as rainfall and humidity. Temperature, rainfall, and humidity are the main components in life. Subsequently, these three aspects influence the human, flora and fauna. In term of productivity, the climate change alters the health condition of agricultural and farming. The next disadvantages are increasing level of carbon dioxide and breaking the ozone layers in the atmosphere. Some overall estimates the potential impacts and the groundbreaking result is the Earth will be non-habitable planets in the future.

However, the criteria of non-habitable planets are not merely based on the temperature, CO2, rainfall or humidity or any others, but the domino effects which are the source of nutritional food. The climate change could affect the food security into low-level of nutrition, suggested by Myers et al., it is because the quantity of agricultural production depends on the availability of biophysical resources which are

1. Soil quality with micro and micro ecosystem
2. Water availability
3. Quality of sunlight
4. Carbon dioxide
5. Suitable condition and temperature
6. The presence of pollinator

Climate change affects the production of food

The global temperature has been elevating in the last ten to fifteen years. It has been estimated the elevation of temperature around 1 centigrade for every 10-15 years. By calculating it linearly, we can predict that in the next century the temperature will be 7-10 centigrade hotter than today. This calculation is not only based on the mere multiplying, but the consideration based on our activity in generating the greenhouse gases.

The scientists from Harvard University suggested that either oceans and land has been affected by CO2 and high temperature, so subsequently, followed by the acidification happened in the oceans floor, meaning the habitats of the fish are disturbed. Corals reef is the main source of food for marine life. The degradation in amount will influence the nutrition content of fish since corals are the primary producer of food in marine ecosystem. On the other words, the disturbance occurring in ocean alters the nutrition within fish.

In the meantime, the weather is also affected by the changing of temperature and the higher of temperature creates stress either for animals – such as livestock – and plants particularly for fruits and vegetables. Technically speaking, the animals will demand more water resources as the same as the plants. If the competition of consuming water is not balance, so neither animals or plant could grow optimally. In the causal conclusion, both impacts cause unstable price and productivity in food preservation and security, which economically means the price will be higher but the nutrient contents are low.

Primary resources of food will be affected by climatic change

Water availability and extreme weather are the main impacts caused by global warming. Crops that need much water for consumption will be yielded particularly rice, wheat and maize. Whilst the others crops that demand much sunlight, such as wheat, rice and soybean for their photosynthesis process will be disturbed. Since those crops are the main sources of carbohydrate, our food security is in danger.

Food sovereignty must be achieved and the way to address that is by preventing the Earth becoming warmer. The level of carbon dioxide airborne which can cause broken in the ozone layers on the atmosphere must be reduced. However, the increasing level of carbon dioxide will give positive effect as crops also demand the gas for fuel. Nevertheless, the future scenario when the alternating of climate provides agricultural issue on maize and wheat which are consumed by many people either in northern parts of America and Europe. On the contrary, the rice will be “okay” as it is less sensitive to be affected.

Conclusion

The indirect cause of global warming indicates the disturbance in food security. The preservation of food will be fluctuating while the productivity of several primary foods, such as maize and wheat are predicted to be in small number. Furthermore, the main concern is concentrated in the nutrition contents within those crops because the climate change disturbs the biological process of the crops which is the diffusion of minerals with water.

References
[1] Myers, S. S. et al., 2017. Climate change and global food systems: Potential impacts on food security and undernutrition. The Annual Review of Public Health, Volume 38.  Doi: 10.1146/annurev-publhealth-031816-044356

[2] Image is downloaded from www.cdc.gov