Scientists Say Warming Could Cut Crops

Reuters ^ | Thu, Oct 02, 2003 | Alister Doyle

[presidio9]

Scientists said on Thursday that global warming could slash Russia's crucial grain harvests if President Vladimir Putin and other world leaders refuse to endorse the U.N. pact.

About 1,000 scientists at a World Climate Change Conference in Moscow ending on Friday were sharply divided over Putin's belief that Russians could benefit overall from a world with less bone-chilling winters.

But some experts say that agricultural output in the key southern grain areas could be hit by a forecast decline in rains even though a warmer climate will extend growing areas further north as the permafrost thaws in Siberia.

"Climate change will generally not benefit Russia," said Joseph Alcamo of the University of Kassel in Germany. Harvests in the south might be hit by more frequent droughts, he added.

Oleg Sirotenko of the All Russian Institute for Agricultural Meteorology said that Russian grain harvests would dip by about two percent in 2020-30 from current levels due to disruptions from global warming.

Fodder crops, however, would benefit, he added.

Putin said on Monday that he needed more time to decide whether to ratify the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol (news - web sites), which hinges on Russian ratification to take effect.

Kyoto seeks to rein in emissions of gases like carbon dioxide released by cars and factories. The gases are blamed for blanketing the planet and driving up temperatures.

And Sergei Shoigu, Russia's Emergencies Minister, said that climate change was likely to trigger more floods, forest fires and industrial emergencies. He said that thawing permafrost in Russia's north would destabilize buildings.

But others said that Kyoto is based on dubious science.

"I believe that the Kyoto Protocol was developed without sufficient scientific basis," said Yuri Izrael, director of Russia's climate institute.

Russia faces a choice between backing Kyoto along with its main trading partners in the European Union (news - web sites), or rejecting it like the United States. Kyoto will not enter into force without Russia's approval.

With bewildering predictions of the impact of Kyoto, Putin may instead be holding out for guarantees of cash from the EU and Japan.

Russia's smokestack industries have collapsed since Kyoto's baseline year of 1990, meaning that its emissions have fallen 30 percent when other rich nations are facing costly curbs.

Russia can hope to export some of its spare quotas in a market that could be worth billions of dollars a year, though a U.S. pullout has undermined likely prices.

And Russia may be worried that a shift to renewable energies under Kyoto would undermine the value of its oil and gas exports. Russia is the world's biggest oil exporter behind Saudi Arabia.

Russia has a veto on Kyoto because the pact will only enter into force if nations representing 55 percent of the emissions by developed nations sign up. So far, countries representing 44 percent have ratified, Russia has a 17 percent stake and the United States 36 percent.

[Sabertooth]

Scientists Say Warming Could Cut Crops

Will it mow the lawn?

[r9etb]

Fodder crops, however, would benefit, he added.

IOW, eat more meat, and less grain. Sounds like the Atkins diet has Mother Nature's endorsement.

[TMD]

Oh no, the sky is falling (again)!!

Some quotes from a "whacko environmentalist quotes" page
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/744607/posts?page=32

The continued rapid cooling of the earth since WWII is in accord with the increase in global air pollution associated with industrialization, mechanization, urbanization and exploding population. -- Reid Bryson, "Global Ecology; Readings towards a rational strategy for Man", (1971)


The battle to feed humanity is over. In the 1970s, the world will undergo famines. Hundreds of millions of people are going to starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. Population control is the only answer -- Paul Ehrlich - The Population Bomb (1968)


I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000 -- Paul Ehrlich in (1969)


In ten years all important animal life in the sea will be extinct. Large areas of coastline will have to be evacuated because of the stench of dead fish. -- Paul Ehrlich, Earth Day (1970)


Before 1985, mankind will enter a genuine age of scarcity . . . in which the accessible supplies of many key minerals will be facing depletion -- Paul Ehrlich in (1976)


This [cooling] trend will reduce agricultural productivity for the rest of the century -- Peter Gwynne, Newsweek 1976


There are ominous signs that the earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production - with serious political implications for just about every nation on earth. The drop in food production could begin quite soon... The evidence in support of these predictions has now begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologist are hard-pressed to keep up with it. -- Newsweek, April 28, (1975)


This cooling has already killed hundreds of thousands of people. If it continues and no strong action is taken, it will cause world famine, world chaos and world war, and this could all come about before the year 2000. -- Lowell Ponte "The Cooling", 1976


If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder by the year 2000...This is about twice what it would take to put us in an ice age. -- Kenneth E.F. Watt on air pollution and global cooling, Earth Day (1970)

---

I guess this time they must be right, mustn't they?

[uglybiker]

They're nothing if not consistent.

I can sleep soundly at night confident in the fact that, whatever they say will never happen.

[The_Victor]

Funny, regardless of the prediction, the solution is the same - government control of all aspects society.

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[Publius6961]

Scientists said on Thursday that global warming could slash Russia's crucial grain harvests if President Vladimir Putin and other world leaders refuse to endorse the U.N. pact.

I commute through the San Joaquin Valley in California daily. Arguably the most prolific food producing area in the world.

I would trust the jusgement of any one of those farmers picked randomly, than all these (*GASP*) so-called "scientists" put together.

Junk "scientists" are running a very close second to lawyers...

[FreeMeansNoID]

Some real up-to-date quotes there. I guess there's no chance scientists have learned anything new since 1976...

[Publius6961]

But some experts say that agricultural output in the key southern grain areas could be hit by a forecast decline in rains even though a warmer climate will extend growing areas further north as the permafrost thaws in Siberia.

Probably true, but irrelevant.

All their pontification is premised on the voodoo assertion that climate change is anthropogenic. A notion pretty well and conclusively debunked.

[presidio9]

there's no chance scientists have learned anything new since 1976.

Exactly.

[Eala]

B-b-b-b-ut it said on this thread posted today that we were going to lose massive amounts of crops to global cooling!

[TMD]

Since the nature of climate is to be in either a cooling cycle or a warming cycle (with periods of 10 to 10,000 years), I find the hysteria of "the sky is falling" environmentalists a little much. To change 180 deg from going into an Ice Age to catastrophic global warming over a period of 30 years does little to inspire confidence in "data" or trends then or now.

[presidio9]

Yeah, I think I saw that one...

[RussianConservative]

Ehh? Not this year, this year to much rain and bad crops....all this BS, no man so powerful can change climate...this again man try to make self on the level of God.

[Steely Glint]

This is a crock. Global warming is an unproven theory that has been embarced by those with an anti-industrial agenda.

[ido_now]

Come on presidio9, you have a post about cooling, more recently.

The planet is SHRINKING only!

[BushisTheMan]

Scientists say: Let me put my head up your butt.

Scientists say: Trust me...

Scientists say: Dems are PRO global warming BAD news.

Scientists say: Pubs are ANTI global warming laws.

[presidio9]

Come on presidio9, you have a post about cooling, more recently.

The planet is SHRINKING only!

All I know is that the world will be coming to an end very soon, and it is all our fault. Now please excuse me. I need to get back down to my basement and continue working on my rocket ship...

[BigBobber]

Yes folks, the country with the largest frozen land mass on earth will suffer greatly if we have a few degrees of warming. Liberal scientists do not want SIBERIA to get any warmer.

As Dave Barry would say "I am not making this up!"