NEW DELHI: India could lose a significant share of its land, crop productivity and nutritional quality due to climate change-induced rising temperatures, particularly in dryland regions, Indian agricultural scientists warned at an international conference, while cautioning that ongoing geopolitical conflicts are diverting global attention from the growing food security crisis.
Citing studies by the Delhi-based Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), scientists said rice productivity could decline by up to 15% and wheat yields by up to 20% over the next 25 years under business-as-usual conditions, a trend that would severely impact farmers’ incomes.
Dr Himanshu Pathak, Director General of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and former Director General of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), said analyses show that climate change could reduce yields of major crops by nearly 20%.
“Traditional crop-growing areas will shrink by 15–20% due to salinity and land degradation. This means the productivity and quality of food crops will decline, and micronutrient levels such as zinc and iron will be drastically reduced. Increasing biotic stress on crops leads to pest attacks, which ultimately reduces farmers’ income,” Pathak said while addressing the International Conference on ‘Climate Resilient Agriculture for Sustainable Development: Innovation and Solutions’.
The conference was organised by the Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, with the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), Philippines, as the technical co-organiser.
Emphasising that climate change has already become a global reality, Pathak said it now poses a serious threat to food security, especially in the country’s dryland regions.
“Last year, the parched Bundelkhand region recorded a temperature of 49 degrees Celsius. In the previous year, 307 mm of rainfall was recorded in just one hour in an area that usually receives only 30–40 mm of rainfall in an entire month. This is not an isolated case. Media reports show the region is now regularly witnessing heavy rainfall, leading to floods in villages and agricultural fields, sometimes washing them away. At the same time, long dry spells have wilted crops. All this proves that climate change is a reality,” said Pathak, who was the chief guest at the conference.
He also underlined that the global war against hunger has been sidelined in recent years as international leaders focus on gun wars, territorial disputes and energy conflicts.
“These developments have pushed the fight against hunger to the back burner, forcing agricultural research to focus primarily on producing climate-resilient seeds. Ironically, poor people across the world contribute very little to greenhouse gas emissions, yet they are the worst affected by climate change. Their food security is under serious threat,” he said.
Citing the example of the Maldives, Pathak added, “An island nation like the Maldives has virtually no role in greenhouse gas emissions, yet it faces the threat of submersion. It is like the victim has no resources to fend off the impacts of climate change, while the culprits do not care about their actions.”
Dr Raman Meenakshi Sundaram, Director of the ICAR-Indian Institute of Rice Research (ICAR-IIRR), Hyderabad, said climate change has dramatically increased disease pressure on crops.
“A few decades ago, rice crops faced around three major diseases. Today, climate change has resulted in nearly 22 major diseases across different agroclimatic zones,” he said.
Prof. Shravan Singh of Banaras Hindu University said the conference helped generate ideas and strategies aimed at building a resilient food system capable of withstanding the impacts of climate change.