How will Africa respond to the rapidly increasing temperatures predicted by climate models? The areas predicted to face the steepest declines in crop production are Central Africa, the Sahel (near the equator), Southern Africa, and West Africa. The results of one
recent study are shown in Figure 1. Yield losses in the hardest-hit regions range from 11% to 14.9% by 2050 [2].
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| Figure 1. Data provided by [2]. Central Africa, Southern Africa, West Africa, and the Sahel (near the equator) are expected to face significant declines in overall crop yield. |
Why are yields in North and East Africa expected to be higher than yields produced by the rest of the continent? One reason is that Central Africa, Southern Africa, and the Sahel region lie near the equator, and historically equatorial regions have experienced less temperature variability than other regions. For this reason, by 2050 the average growing season temperature in large parts of these regions is predicted to be surpass even the hottest growing seasons of recent years [6]. Crops in equatorial regions will have to deal with a climate that is essentially novel. This is a problem because most plants have evolved to have a fairly narrow window of tolerable temperatures, which are based on the temperature conditions of the region in which it evolved.
If plants are subjected to temperatures outside their thermal window (even for a short period), a decrease in performance will likely result [17]. Figure 2 shows how equatorial regions across the globe will have to deal with more extreme summer temperatures (compared with historical temperatures) than areas at higher or lower latitude.
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| Figure 2 [6]. By 2050, average summers in much of Africa will be hotter than the even the hottest recent summers, posing a major challenge to crop plants. |
I really liked your blog! You presented the topic and background very clearly and had really good research to back up your claims. It might be interesting to discuss a specific crop and talk about its reaction to the change in climate. To comment specifically on this page, I just have a few questions about the last paragraph. What if a farmer can't just pick up and move to a better suited region? It obtaining drought resistant plants easy?
ReplyDeleteYour information is well organized and flows very well from one paragraph to the next. The only suggestion I can come up with for this page is to give a brief captain about what exactly the reader is supposed to obtaining from the pictures/globe chart. I can tell you put a good amount of time and effort into this page alone. Along the lines of what Lindsay say about the last paragraph, you could also pose the question as to what might happen if farmers are unable to obtain a new crop species suitable for the climate at these later times?
ReplyDeleteGreat information and good research. I think you can structure the tab such that the your commentary guides what data is given and useful. Currently it feels more like the graphs are driving what you are arguing rather than supporting your own, personal argument. I feel the graphs should instead be embedded in and supporting information that you want to present. This can be a quick fix by just changing the language in the paragraphs as otherwise all the information you have presented here is great.
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