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DSSAT-estimated climate change impacts featured in National Geographic Magazine

The upcoming issue of National Geographic Magazine (November 2015) features a story describing DSSAT-estimated climate change impacts on four crops at global scale:

Change in potential average yields for corn, potatoes, rice, and wheat in 2050

Change in potential average yields for corn, potatoes, rice, and wheat in 2050

Change in potential average yields for corn, potatoes, rice, and wheat in 2050Climate change may actually benefit some plants by lengthening growing seasons and increasing carbon dioxide. Yet other effects of a warmer world, such as more pests, droughts, and flooding, will be less benign. How will the world adapt? Using an aggressive climate model known as HadGEM2, researchers at the International Food Policy Research Institute project that by 2050, suitable croplands for four top commodities—corn, potatoes, rice, and wheat—will shift, in some cases pushing farmers to plant new crops.

Some farmlands may benefit from warming, but others won’t, says IFPRI’s Ricky Robertson. Climate alone doesn’t dictate yields; political shifts, global demand, and agricultural practices will influence how farms fare in the future. The winners, researchers say, will be farmers who modernize their methods and diversify their fields.

 

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About Jawoo Koo

Research Fellow at International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Washington, DC. Working on the meso-scale crop systems modeling applicaitons for Sub-Saharan Africa region.

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