In the last half decade since sustainable development became a serious objective, what have we achieved? Are livelihoods more secure? Are nations wealthier and more resilient? Is environmental quality being restored or maintained? These are essential questions of development. Their answers are many, varied between communities and regions, even between individuals. Two years ago, in the aftermath of the Earth Summit and ratification of the Framework Convention on Climate Change, but before the first Conference of Parties, I participated in a panel at the inaugural Oxford Environment Conference on Climate Change and World Food Security. The panel vigorously reviewed issues of resilient development and food security. This book is a product of the Oxford Environment Conference. It takes the essential questions of sustainability as a starting point to focus on present food security and its future prospects in the face of climate change. Why is this book important? First, I believe our goals to end hunger are under threat. We know what to do in many respects, but fail to generate the finances and political will to change the structures that thrive on poverty. Second, I believe concern about the environment has become dangerously separated from the fundamental issues of human deprivation. Third, I believe climate change is a serious threat and I am dismayed at the way nations dither over how to control greenhouse gas emissions and mechanisms to meet the challenge of adverse climate impacts.

Autorentext
Thomas E. Downing, promovierter Geograf, Direktor des Oxforder Büros des Stockholm Environment Institute, Gastprofessor an der Oxford University, Beiträger zum Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) und Berater des Klimaprogramms der britischen Regierung. Sein Forschungsschwerpunkt liegt auf der Abschätzung der Vulnerabilität und mögliche Strategien der Anpassung an die Klimarisiken.

Klappentext

The book addresses the threat of climate change to world food security, by providing an authoritative review of climate change and surprise, contrasting trends in world food security, case studies of food and the environment, and chapters on adaptive responses. It reviews: trends in agriculture and food security - projections of the incidence and distribution of hunger over the next few decades; the risk and global impacts of climate change on agricultural systems, relying on alternative models of world agricultural potential that have simulated the impacts of climate change; vulnerability and multiple threats to sustainable agriculture; studies of local impacts and responses; and strategies to limit climate change and improve food security.

Inhalt
Introduction: Climate Change and World Food Security.- I: Trends in Agriculture and Food Security.- Towards a Food-Secure World: Prospects and Trends.- Demand and Supply: Trends in Global Agriculture.- II: Risk and Global Impacts of Climate Change on Agricultural Systems.- The Future of Climate: Potential for Interaction and Surprises.- Impacts of Potential Climate Change on Global and Regional Food Production and Vulnerability.- Climate Change and Agricultural Trade: Who Benefits, Who Loses?.- III: Vulnerability and Multiple Threats to Sustainable Agriculture.- Climate Change and Food Insecurity: Toward a Sociology and Geography of Vulnerability.- Changing Vulnerability to Food Insecurity and the International Response: The Experience of the World Food Programme.- The Conjunction of Threats to Regional Food Production: How Serious Are Environment, Economy, Population and Climate?.- Climate Change and Involuntary Migration: Implications for Food Security.- Scenarios of Sustainability: The Challenges of Describing Desirable Futures.- IV: Local Impacts and Responses to Global Change.- Climate Change and the Agro-ecosystems in China.- Agricultural Vulnerability and Poverty Alleviation in Bangladesh.- Vulnerability of Bangladesh to Climate Change and Sea Level Rise.- Enhancing Food Security in a Warmer and More Crowded World: Factors and Processes in Fragile Zones.- Global Climate Change and Agricultural Productivity in Southern Africa: Thought for Food and Food for Thought.- Climate Change: Some Likely Multiple Impacts in Southern Africa.- Adaptation of Food Production to Drought in the Senegal River Basin.- Pastoralist Production Systems and Climate Change.- Agricultural Policy and Climate Change in Mexico.- V: Strategies to Limit Climate Change and Improve Food Security.- Implications of Policies to Prevent Climate Change for Future Food Security.- An End-Use Analysis of Global Food Requirements.- Policy Lessons from Communities under Pressure.- Climate Change and Food Security: Agriculture, Health and Environmental Research.- List of Contributors.