Climate change is drastically affecting the ingredients in our daily meals, including the maple syrup on our pancakes, wine in our glass, chocolate in our desserts, and the salmon on our dinner plates.
The moister and warmer air in many of the Earth’s locations, mixed with extreme drought conditions in others, is wreaking havoc on food supplies everywhere. The primary culprit of all the mayhem is climate change, which is killing off certain crops already weakened by genetic tinkering and chemically-based farming.
Bacterial outbreaks are not unheard of. In fact, Florida’s citrus groves have been plagued with a bacterial outbreak causing oranges to turn bitter. Coffee crops are being affected and some banana plantations are being devastated. CO2 creates warmer and moister air which then creates the conditions that certain pathogens thrive on.
In America, corn and cows are being drastically affected by changing climate conditions. Spring rains have been far heavier than normal this year, putting corn crops behind schedule. According to the US Department of Agriculture, by this time in 2012, over 85% of corn crops had been planted. This year, only 28% have been planted.
In the Southeastern plains, the US calf and cattle herd is at its lowest since 1952, driving up the price of a USDA cut of choice beef to an all-time high.
Last week an air monitor station in Mauna Loa in Hawaii recorded the highest ratio of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere it ever had – 440 ppm. When the gauge was installed in 1958, the level was 313 ppm.
As populations rise so does the demand for food, so scientists stress the necessity of getting climate change under control in the first place to slow the domino effect rising CO2 levels are having on the world’s food supplies.
No-one is denying that the world has warmed by 0.6 degrees
in the last Century, although it is fair to point out that without Climate
Scientists measuring such a small change, no-one would have noticed.
It is also reasonable to ask, if CO2 is driving climate
change, why the warming stalled in 1998 and the temperature has not increased
for the last 15 years, in spite of record increases in CO2 output over the same
period. I know the 2001-2010 decade was warmer than the previous 1991-2000
decade, but that does not negate the fact that warming has halted; it just
hasn’t fallen to pre-warming levels. The fact that carbon dioxide levels in the
air has now passed 400 parts per million, just makes the lack of correlation
between CO2 concentration and temperature all the more obvious.
There is no evidence that extreme weather events are on the
rise, either – studies show Hurricanes, tornadoes and droughts have actually
dropped in frequency since 1950, it is just that there are more people living
in harm’s way now.
Warming would in theory result in higher evaporation rates,
leading to more cloud formation and therefore more rain, so a warmer world
would be a wetter world, and would have longer growing seasons in most parts of
the world. It is hard to see why this should necessarily lead to droughts and
famines. Wars, such as in Darfur, are caused by tribal and religious hatred,
not by global warming, but War does cause famine, and the breakdown of
infrastructure does result in countries being far less able to cope with
droughts and crop failures.
In the same way, deaths due to heat waves would be more than
made up by fewer deaths due to freezing in milder winters in a warming world.
Hysteria about an acknowledged, but so far insignificant warming
does not seem to be justified by the facts. The fact that 97% of climate
scientists agree that human action is warming the planet just says they agree
that the 0.6 degree warming is probably accurate, and probably caused by the
combustion of fossil fuels. So far so good, but it does NOT mean 97% of
scientists believe that the World is on the cusp of a so-called “Tipping
Point” which will see rapid disastrous warming, with doomsday outcomes for
the environment and human civilisation, and rampant warfare between climate
refugees and western economies.
Most indicators are that the warming so far has been
beneficial to the ecosystem, with accelerated plant growth due to warmer,
longer growing seasons and the beneficial effect of CO2 as a plant food.
The case for a draconian World Government to stifle and dismantle
our industrial civilisation in the name of Carbon reduction has NOT yet been
made, and it seems doubtful it ever will. No-one should ever believe anything
Al Gore or this site says on any topic, and Global Warming is no exception.
30 years ago it was global cooling, now global warming, lets wait another 30 years
We need to start boycotting the climate blame media and their lazy copy and paste news editors. Delete this site now!
Pure fear mongering!
Not one IPCC warning says it “WILL” be a crisis and not one IPCC warning isn’t drowning in “maybes”. Help my planet could be on fire maybe?
If the scientists can’t call their own crisis as real a crisis as they like to say comet hits are, it’s not a crisis and 28 more years of “maybe” a crisis from the scientists is unsustainable and proves it “won’t” be a real crisis. Deny that!
All science has to do is say it WILL happen instead of “could” happen and this costly debate will end.
Did you notice the picture with this article? Just exactly what crop did you expect to go in the desert? Notice the big sand dune in the background. Look you could blame climate change for everything from over ripe fruit to acne on your face. Give it a break the climate has always been in flux and will always be changing. However now for some magical reason we believe we are at the center of the universe all over again. We control the weather, continental drift, ocean levels, ice melt and the flow of water…..all pure poppy cock. If you removed all the people from the earth in an instant you would not stop climate change. If you could somehow stop all carbon emissions in an instant you could not stop climate change. People have found ways to exist in just about every climate on this planet from the far north to the driest places on the globe. So why do we expect to grow the same crops in the same place year after year it defies logic. Whole groups of people in the past have had to migrate away from areas because the resources have changed due to climate change. Why in the world would you think just because you noticed something happening (which has been happening since the earth was formed) that all of the sudden you could control it. Climate change and global warming are real, its nature. The attempt to use it for control of people through fear is the largest scam in the history of mankind to date. I don’t know if the species will survive its arrogance.
@Joe Matthis https://www.greenoptimistic.com/2013/05/17/climate-change-man-made/
OvidiuSandru Buzz words in that article include: “strong consensus” “strong conclusions”
All science has to do is stop saying maybe a crisis and start saying WILL be a crisis. Even believers should be insisting for a real warning of crisis. “maybe” is not a crisis.
Science is enjoying the ride while it lasts.
DavidNutzuki OvidiuSandru Ok David, let’s keep on burning coal and petrol and it’ll all be fine, like it’s starting to be… and pretend we don’t know a thing about anything – OH, did we just do that? Come on… there’s a reason why I can’t stay out in full sun for more than 20 minutes without getting burned this year… didn’t happen 10 years ago. Or maybe someone can explain why plants that once grew outside now die and have to be moved inside… why is that?
OvidiuSandru DavidNutzuki I will tell you, the sun is getting hotter, its a star and is dying