Researchers predict that in the event of an unexpected disaster, crop yields may decline significantly, but we can get ready to fight.
In the twenty-first century, Humanity is facing a complex web of global issues that are interconnected, commonly known as “polycrisis”. A recent study conducted by a team of researchers from Germany, New Zealand, and the United States suggests that a major global crisis such as a nuclear war, solar storm, or large-scale cyber-attack could result in a significant decline in crop yields, with potential losses of up to 75%.
“This highlights how vulnerable modern agriculture is to a collapse in energy supplies,” Florian Ulrich Jehn, one of the study’s authors from the Justus Liebig University Giessen, stated in a press release. Jehn is currently a data science lead for the Alliance to Feed the Earth in Disasters (ALLFED), whose mission is “to feed everyone, no matter what”.
The severity of the damage to a crop or geographic area depends on a number of interrelated elements that can affect other parts of the world as well. A catastrophe in the “breadbasket” countries of the United States or Central Europe might easily spread to the rest of the world.
To what extent would yields from agriculture decline?
The researchers built a statistical model in their study to predict the impact of a major worldwide catastrophe on agricultural productivity. They calculated that crop yields would fall by around 37% on average in the first year following the calamity and as much as 48% in the second year, when all stocks would be exhausted.
“We applied a generalized linear model, a statistical tool for understanding how things affect what we want to predict,” Jehn explained in an email.
The majority of the protein and calories in the human diet are found in the yields of corn, rice, soybeans, and wheat, which they modelled. Following their investigation, which indicated that the usage of machinery, fertilizer, irrigation, and pesticides had the most effects on crop yields, they used information from publicly accessible databases to construct their model.
“We plugged in our data to create the model, helping us see how much each factor affects the predicted yield,” Jehn said. “Once we understand each factor’s impact, we can use the model to predict outcomes by adjusting these factors. As an example, we set the pesticide factor to zero to see how much yields might decrease without using pesticides.”
The aftermath of the disaster was split into two stages by the experts. They made the assumption that some industrial production would still be feasible during Phase 1, or the first year. Fertilizer and manure would be less readily available, but diesel fuel would still be available to run agricultural equipment.
Phase 2: They projected that all stocks will run out in the next year. People would switch to a mostly vegan diet and utilize livestock for labor and as a source of manure.
The aftermath of the disaster was split into two stages by the experts. They made the assumption that some industrial production would still be feasible during Phase 1, or the first year. Fertilizer and manure would be less readily available, but diesel fuel would still be available to run agricultural equipment.
Phase 2: They projected that all stocks will run out in the next year. People would switch to a mostly vegan diet and utilize livestock for labor and as a source of manure.
Soybean proved to be the most resilient of the four crops overall, especially during Phase 1. This is because, in the event that industrial fertilizers are no longer available, soybeans’ ability to fix nitrogen from the air may be crucial to preserving nitrogen availability in the soil. The most vulnerable crops were wheat, which depends largely on pesticides, and corn, which depends significantly on irrigation; in Phase 2, yield declines reached 48%.
How much corn yield decreased was also dependent on seed availability. “Corn, in particular, would be severely affected, as the majority of corn crops are grown from hybrid seeds specifically engineered for high one-year performance,” the authors noted in their paper.
Crop yield declines also differed per continent. Africa would be least affected, with an average yield loss of 26% over both periods, according to the study, followed by Asia at 32%. Phase 1 and Phase 2 crop yield declines in Europe and South America were comparable, at about 25% and 44%, respectively. The worst hit regions were North America and Oceania, which lost over 30% of their crop production in Phase 1 and 48% in Phase 2.
“These reductions closely correlate with the current extent of industrialization in agriculture,” the authors stated in the article. “However, yield reduction after a catastrophe would likely be larger than our estimate due to the lack of available data on some relevant factors,” they pointed out. These factors include seed availability, dominant crop varieties, food preservation methods, and farmers’ knowledge.
Decentralizing food production could help some areas recover by promoting the growth of smaller food manufacturing firms and distributing food more fairly across nations. What more can be done, though?
Stopping the World Famine
“If an event like the one outlined in our study occurred tomorrow, we would be largely unprepared,” Jehn said.
ALLFED is currently researching potentially helpful low- and high-tech solutions. This entails moving crops that can withstand cold temperatures, building more greenhouses, and increasing the growing of robust foods like seaweed. It’s also important to concentrate on alternate protein sources because they can be made from methane, carbon dioxide, and hydrogen, as well as taken from grasses and leaves.
Other precautions include building up the infrastructure of the electrical grid and simply storing more food, but the latter course of action may lead to a rise in global food costs and a worsening of the current state of food security.
To increase their degree of readiness, nations should also think about drafting emergency response plans and trade agreements in advance. on instance, Argentina has laid up plans on what to do in the case of a nuclear winter.
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In response to a question about what action to take in the case of a worldwide power grid breakdown, Jehn stated that timing is crucial. Many of our worst predictions won’t come true if we can recover it in a few months. We can resume producing goods like fuel and fertilizer. If that isn’t feasible, we need to prepare for a period when farming won’t use machinery or essential commodities like pesticides and fertilizers.
We may need to take a cue from small-scale farming practices of the past or present. Since more people would need to work in agriculture in order to ensure that there is enough food for everyone, a lot would change in our society.
Jehn is talking about more conventional farming methods that would lessen our dependency on machines, fertilizers, and pesticides, such as smallholder farming, organic farming, and permaculture.
Justus Wesseler, a professor at Wageningen University in the Netherlands and chair of the Agricultural Economics and Rural Policy Group; he was not engaged in the study, and he questions the viability of this strategy.
“Organic agriculture is not the solution,” he said. “What is more important is having an economic environment that allows new solutions to be developed. This will allow [us] to make agriculture more responsive to the local conditions.”
“Agriculture is not a command-and-control sector,” he added. “Farm households respond to economic incentives.”
The researchers believe that the first step is to collect more data, which would improve model accuracy. “Better data can help to bridge the knowledge gaps regarding missing factors and to gain a deeper understanding of how both the global food trade and production systems, as well as the economy, would react to such a substantial shock,” they stated in their paper.
This news is a creative derivative product from articles published in famous peer-reviewed journals and Govt reports:
References:
1. Florian Ulrich Jehn, et al., The Fragile State of Industrial Agriculture: Estimating Crop Yield Reductions in a Global Catastrophic Infrastructure Loss Scenario, Global Challenges (2023). DOI: 10.1002/gch2.202300206
2. A. Bernard De Raymond, A. Alpha, T. Ben-Ari, B. Daviron, T. Nesme, G. Tétart, Clim. Change Global Food Secur. 2021, 29, 100547.
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