IT’S 2050, and the world is on the cusp of a global food crisis. Struggling with escalating food security issues, extreme weather, price fluctuations and population growth affected by political upheaval and the never-ending enticement of people into big cities, countries are scrambling to feed the additional 2.5 billion people added to the earth’s seven billion inhabitants since 2016. Already half a million people have died from climate-related events…thanks to food availability reducing by a third. The countries worst affected are those of low-income and middle-income, including some of New Zealand’s closest neighbours in the South Pacific. But even we are starting to feel the effects. Western and southern regions are wetter and warmer than ever before, and drought has tripled in frequency in eastern and northern areas. New Zealand is more arid, with water scarcity a reality in 12 SEPTEMBER 2016 Canterbury, Marlborough, Hawke’s Bay, Waikato and Northland. The warmer and wetter conditions have encouraged the spread of new pests and diseases, as well as animal production levels. Cattle in the northern Bay of Plenty are suffering under a doubling of days of temperatures soaring above 25 degrees Celsius, and changes in productivity and profitability are affecting meat and wool, dairy, arable, horticulture, viticulture and forestry. The New Zealand Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Research Centre says whilst changes here are less severe than those experienced by some major food-producing nations overseas, our returns are less due to costs for the Emissions Trading Scheme draining profits. We have, however, often benefited from production losses caused by predicted climate change in other world regions. But climate change is already affecting our ability to grow food and feed an overflowing world population. As United Nations’ secretary-general Ban Ki-moon says, “The heat is on. We must act.” Dr Alexandra Macmillan is a senior lecturer in environmental health at the University of Otago and co-convenor of Ora Taiao: The New Zealand Climate and Health Council. “New Zealand will not be immune from the negative impacts, which are already being felt in the form of greater frequency and severity of extreme weather events, ocean warming and acidification,” she says. “They are already having direct impacts on people’s health and wellbeing, as well as threatening the building blocks for good health. “On the other hand, there are exciting opportunities in New Zealand for health and fairness gains from well-designed climate action in areas such as transport, housing, energy and food production. “(However), in a uniquely powerful po- Feeding the Globe as the Earth Cooks “…And we’ll learn how to get fresh, tasty 3D printed food at the touch of a button, perhaps even delivered to us by a robotic chef.”
FT-Sep16
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