Abstract
This chapter reviews current knowledge on the potential effects of climate change on food and nutrition security in India. It finds that India’s food systems are highly vulnerable to climate change on a number of fronts. A key finding emphasized in the chapter is that these effects will impact not just on agricultural production arrangements, but on the wider food system through the impacts of climate change on food prices, the composition of the rural economy, and the potential effects of severe weather and sea-level rise. Despite efforts by the Government of India, the nation remains inadequately prepared for the magnitude of effects, should the worst effects eventuate. There is a profound need for further research in India regarding the full food system implications of climate change, particularly with respect to the adaptation needs of vulnerable communities.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Agarwal, B. (2011). Twelfth plan working group on disadvantaged farmers including women. Final report submitted to the Planning Commission of India, online. http://indiagovernance.gov.in/files/working_group-report-farmers.pdf. Accessed January 29, 2013.
Asseng, S., Ewert, F., Martre, P., Rotter, R. P., Lobell, D. B., Cammarano, D., et al. (2015). Rising temperatures reduce global wheat production. Nature Climate Change, 5(2), 143–147. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2470
Ayers, J., & Forsyth, T. (2009). Community-based adaptation to climate change. Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development, 51(4), 22–31.
Bhalla, S. (2012). Notes on land, long run food security and the agrarian crisis in India. IHD Working Paper Series, 02/2012, Institute for Human Development, New Delhi.
CFS (Committee on World Food Security). (2012). Coming to terms with terminology: Food security, nutrition security, food security and nutrition, food and nutrition security. Document CFS 2012/39/4. Rome: FAO. http://www.fao.org/docrep/meeting/026/MD776E.pdf
Cline, W. (2007). Global warming and agriculture: Impact estimates by country. Washington, D.C.: Center for Global Development: Peterson Institute for International Economics.
Collins, J. (2014). A rising tide in Bangladesh: Livelihood adaptation to climate stress. Australian Geographer, 45(3), 289–307.
de Janvry, A., & Sadoulet, E. (2012). Subsistence farming as a safety net for food-price shocks. In M. J. Cohen & M. Smale (Eds.), Global food-price shocks and poor people: Themes and case studies (pp. 18–26). London: Routledge.
Ericksen, P., Thornton, P., Notenbaert, A., Cramer, L., Jones, P., & Herrero, M. (2011). Mapping hotspots of climate change and food insecurity in the global tropics. CCAFS Report, 5.
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). (1996). Rome declaration on world food security and world food summit plan of action. Rome: World Food Summit, November 13–17, 1996.
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), World Food Program (WFP), & International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). (2015). The state of food insecurity. Rome: FAO.
Headey, D. (2014). Food prices and poverty reduction in the long run. IFPRI Discussion Paper 01331, International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington.
Hemming, D., Betts, R., & Collins, M. (2013). Sensitivity and uncertainty of modelled terrestrial net primary productivity to doubled CO2 and associated climate change for a relatively large perturbed physics ensemble. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 170, 79–88.
IPCC. (2014). Climate change 2014: Impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability. Part A: Global and sectoral aspects. In C. B. Field, V. R. Barros, D. J. Dokken, K. J. Mach, M. D. Mastrandrea, T. E. Bilir, M. Chatterjee, K. L. Ebi, Y. O. Estrada, R. C. Genova, B. Girma, E. S. Kissel, A. N. Levy, S. MacCracken, P. R. Mastrandrea & L. L. White (Eds.), Contribution of working group II to the fifth assessment report of the intergovernmental panel on climate change (p. 1132). Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA: Cambridge University Press.
Iwasaki, S., & Shaw, R. (2008). Fishery resource management in Chilika lagoon: A study on coastal conservation in the Eastern Coast of India. Journal of Coastal Conservation, 12(1), 43–52.
Jayasankar, C. B., Surendran, S., & Rajendran, K. (2015). Robust signals of future projections of Indian summer monsoon rainfall by IPCC AR5 climate models: Role of seasonal cycle and interannual variability. Geophysical Research Letters, 42(9), 3513–3520. doi:10.1002/2015GL06365
Knutson, T. R., McBride, J. L., Chan, J., Emanuel, K., Holland, G., Landsea, C., et al. (2010). Tropical cyclones and climate change. Nature Geoscience, 3(3), 157–163.
Müller, C., Bondeau, A., Popp, A., Waha, K., & Fader, M. (2010). Climate change impacts on agricultural yields. Washington, DC: World Bank. © World Bank. https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/9065
Myers, S. S., Zanobetti, A., Kloog, I., Huybers, P., Leakey, A. D. B., Bloom, A. J., et al. (2014). Increasing CO2 threatens human nutrition. Nature, 510(7503), 139–142. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature13179
National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO). (2006). Income, expenditure and productive assets of farmer households. NSSO Report, 497, Government of India, New Delhi.
Nuccitelli, D. (2014). IPCC report warns of future climate change risks, but is spun by contrarians. The Guardian, March 31, 2014. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2014/mar/31/ipcc-warns-climate-change-risks
Parth Sarthi, P., Agrawal, A., & Rana, A. (2015). Possible future changes in cyclonic storms in the Bay of Bengal, India under warmer climate. International Journal of Climatology, 35(7), 1267–1277.
Partnership for Maternal Newborn and Child Health. (2012). PMNCH knowledge summary #19 food security and climate change. http://www.who.int/pmnch/knowledge/publications/summaries/knowledge_summaries_19_food_security_climate_change/en/
Pritchard, B. (2014). The problem of higher food prices for impoverished people in the rural global South. Australian Geographer, 45(4), 419–427.
Renaud, F. G., Dun, O., Warner, K., & Bogardi, J. (2011). A decision framework for environmentally induced migration. International Migration, 49(s1), e5–e29.
Roxy, M. K., Ritika, K., Terray, P., Murtugudde, R., Ashok, K., & Goswami, B. N. (2015). Drying of Indian subcontinent by rapid Indian Ocean warming and a weakening land-sea thermal gradient. Nature Communications, 6. doi:10.1038/ncomms8423
Wang, B., Xu, S., & Wu, L. (2012). Intensified Arabian Sea tropical storms. Nature, 489(7416), E1–E2.
Wischnath, G., & Buhaug, H. (2014). Rice or riots: On food production and conflict severity across India. Political Geography, 43, 6–15.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Pritchard, B. (2016). The Impacts of Climate Change for Food and Nutrition Security: Issues for India. In: Nautiyal, S., Schaldach, R., Raju, K., Kaechele, H., Pritchard, B., Rao, K. (eds) Climate Change Challenge (3C) and Social-Economic-Ecological Interface-Building. Environmental Science and Engineering(). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31014-5_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-31014-5_2
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-31013-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-31014-5
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental ScienceEarth and Environmental Science (R0)