FAO Warns UN About Population Growth

Photo credit: FAO

The agriculture industry must adapt to climate change to avoid dramatic food shortages, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) warns at the latest round of climate talks in Doha, Qatar.

Agriculture production needs to increase by seventy percent by 2050 if global food demands are to be met. Climate change is threatening to derail this though with a recent World Bank report highlighting the risks associated with lower crop yields. Yield sizes for maize and other staple grains in Africa have been on the decline as temperatures increase.

Alexander Mueller, Assistant Director-General of FAO, believes that population growth combined with climate change will dramatically increase global hunger over the next four decades. Presently, there are already 870 million people going hungry.

“We have to recognise that climate change will increase the burden on already vulnerable populations,” Mueller told The Verb. “They will be impacted first by changing weather conditions and extreme events. Their livelihoods will suffer the most. Increasing resilience is critical.”

Agnes Otzelberger, from CARE International has been working on increasing the resilience of farmers in Niger through sharing weather information via text message to pastoralists.

Otzelberger doesn’t believe that there is a one-size-fits-all technical fix. “If farmers are able to adapt to the changing climate using techniques like these they stand a much better chance of maintaining food production, feeding their families and safeguarding their livelihoods,” she explained.

By Gabrielle Donohue, photo by FAO.