porary Indian context. There is no suggestion that this chapter alone can give justice
to this rich and complex topic. However, at the very least, it can establish key lines
of enquiry in which more detailed, local studies can follow.
In the debate on food security and climate change, sometimes there is a tendency
towards production-centric perspectives. This means that the impacts of a changing
climate on crop and livestock production are given analytical priority over the
effects of climate change on other food system aspects (such as social and economic
access, and nutrition utilization). Without wanting to diminish the undeniably
important effects in the production sphere, an important emphasis of this chapter is
that the effects of climate change spread well beyond the direct effects on crop and
animal systems. This emphasis corresponds to a similar line of argument made by
the IPCC in AR5-WG II, which assessed the climate change-food security relationship holistically.
A holistic perspective is best pursued using the ‘four pillar’ concept of food
security. This approach owes its genesis to the World Food Summit (WFS) of 1996
and subsequent efforts by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). At the
1996 WFS, food security was seminally defined in the following terms:
Food security, at the individual, household, national, regional and global levels [is
achieved] when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient,
safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and
healthy life (FAO 1996)
The four pillars that underpin this aspiration are food availability, access, utilization and stability. Climate change has potential ramifications on each of these,
both in the global and Indian contexts. The magnitude of its effects will depend on
the pace of warming. Global temperatures are currently approximately 0.8 °C above
the pre-industrial period. The scientific consensus is that accumulated stored energy
from previous and current warming—most of which is in the oceans—will ensure
the warming trend continues for some time. The pace and duration of this increase
will be shaped by temperature forcing through continued expansion of greenhouse
gas emissions, offset by mitigation measures. Ongoing global commitment to
mitigation is difficult to assess. Moreover, it brings politically difficult issues to the
fore, such as the extent to which developing countries should be held account for
mitigation responsibilities. The intractability of these problems, given the continuing centrality of growth as a mantra for the world economy, suggests that the
world may be heading towards a scenario of dangerous climate change. This would
pose massive implications for the capacities of present food systems to maintain
their essential logics. We return to this issue later in this chapter. In the following
sections, the relationships between climate change on the one hand, and food
availability, access and utilization on the other, are successively addressed. In each
case, the issue is presented at the global scale prior to consideration of the Indian
context.
12
B. Pritchard
to this rich and complex topic. However, at the very least, it can establish key lines
of enquiry in which more detailed, local studies can follow.
In the debate on food security and climate change, sometimes there is a tendency
towards production-centric perspectives. This means that the impacts of a changing
climate on crop and livestock production are given analytical priority over the
effects of climate change on other food system aspects (such as social and economic
access, and nutrition utilization). Without wanting to diminish the undeniably
important effects in the production sphere, an important emphasis of this chapter is
that the effects of climate change spread well beyond the direct effects on crop and
animal systems. This emphasis corresponds to a similar line of argument made by
the IPCC in AR5-WG II, which assessed the climate change-food security relationship holistically.
A holistic perspective is best pursued using the ‘four pillar’ concept of food
security. This approach owes its genesis to the World Food Summit (WFS) of 1996
and subsequent efforts by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). At the
1996 WFS, food security was seminally defined in the following terms:
Food security, at the individual, household, national, regional and global levels [is
achieved] when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient,
safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and
healthy life (FAO 1996)
The four pillars that underpin this aspiration are food availability, access, utilization and stability. Climate change has potential ramifications on each of these,
both in the global and Indian contexts. The magnitude of its effects will depend on
the pace of warming. Global temperatures are currently approximately 0.8 °C above
the pre-industrial period. The scientific consensus is that accumulated stored energy
from previous and current warming—most of which is in the oceans—will ensure
the warming trend continues for some time. The pace and duration of this increase
will be shaped by temperature forcing through continued expansion of greenhouse
gas emissions, offset by mitigation measures. Ongoing global commitment to
mitigation is difficult to assess. Moreover, it brings politically difficult issues to the
fore, such as the extent to which developing countries should be held account for
mitigation responsibilities. The intractability of these problems, given the continuing centrality of growth as a mantra for the world economy, suggests that the
world may be heading towards a scenario of dangerous climate change. This would
pose massive implications for the capacities of present food systems to maintain
their essential logics. We return to this issue later in this chapter. In the following
sections, the relationships between climate change on the one hand, and food
availability, access and utilization on the other, are successively addressed. In each
case, the issue is presented at the global scale prior to consideration of the Indian
context.
12
B. Pritchard