African Farmers Urged to Innovate to Offset Climate Change
By Sarah McGregor | Bloomberg | February 09, 2010
Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Africa’s failure to embrace modern farming methods is a greater impediment to food production than global warming, according to the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics.
Adopting this approach would help the continent offset possible temperature increases of as much as 3 degrees Celsius (37 degrees Fahrenheit), it said, citing conclusions made by computer modeling.
Africa emits less greenhouse gas than any other continent, though it will likely be the hardest hit by climate change because of its dependence on basic agriculture and a lack of funds to adapt to weather extremes.
The average global temperature is as much as 0.54 degrees Celsius higher than the yearly temperatures between 1961 and 1990, the institute said, citing the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report. Higher temperatures can stunt plant growth and result in reduced crop yields, it said.
“If governments can develop better agricultural policies they can improve livelihoods here and now, and adapt to climate change when it becomes a serious problem one day,” Peter Cooper, the report’s lead author, said in an interview from Kenya’s capital Nairobi, yesterday.
Double Production
“Even with a climate-change scenario, Africa could probably double food production with modern techniques,” Cooper said.
One key way the region can prepare for the future impact of climate change is by distributing government-subsidized fertilizer, said Cooper, a crop agronomist.
Fertilizer use in poor nations in Latin America and Asia grew more than 10-fold to 50 kilograms (110 pounds) per hectare (2.47 acres) over the past half-century, while in Africa it has stagnated at about 4 kilograms per hectare, he said.
“Increasing the availability and affordability of fertilizer would be a huge step forward,” he said.
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