Experts: Ag climate change policies important, but impacts still uncertain (The Fence Post)

The Fence Post published an article about an AEI conference on agriculture and climate change. Climate change is important to agriculture because it has reduced yields, but it is unclear yet whether the current policies will achieve the goals of governments to hold back temperature increases, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and assure food security. Research Fellow Emeritus Mark Rosegrant said that rising temperatures have reduced yields, but the impact has been more significant in tropical areas than in temperate climates, and wheat yields have actually risen in higher latitude areas. Senior research fellow Will Martin noted that there has been a large-scale increase in food productivity in the last 60 years, but that recently productivity has been slowing down, and there is more volatility. Martin noted that China is now by far the largest provider of support. While many scholars have criticized subsidies that address commodity prices, Martin said shifting subsidies around won’t have much of an impact unless “green innovations are introduced.”