The latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicates that the rise in greenhouse-gas emissions is affecting food production, particularly in poor tropical regions (see go.nature.com/afvyfg). As director of the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security, I call for next month's session of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to act urgently on these findings (see go.nature.com/lrwfnw). Climate-change adaptation must become the priority for policy-makers around the world.
The UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) has confirmed that food prices are rising sharply (see go.nature.com/yavdzo). Recent geopolitical tensions, such as the ongoing situation in Ukraine, are partly to blame, but unusual adverse weather conditions are a main culprit.
Extreme climate events such as floods, tornadoes and droughts are becoming more frequent. Yields of wheat and maize (corn) are falling; warming oceans are wreaking havoc on fish harvests; and rising sea levels threaten to wash away fertile coastal regions. As the FAO report shows, these factors are increasing global food insecurity.
Governments have been too slow to react. Research and innovation should start now because it can take up to 20 years to see results. The UN must stop procrastinating on adaptation funding, and use the IPCC and FAO reports as an impetus for action against fractured food production (see also T. MacMillan and T. G. Benton Nature 509, 25–27; 2014).
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Campbell, B. Call for UN to act on food security. Nature 509, 288 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/509288c
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/509288c
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