Not trying to downplay extreme weather though!
Talking with small scale organic veg growers who are less dependent on russian oil, managing weather events is the hardest part of their job. Currently, the soil is as dry as it usually is end of august where i am.
That sounds apocalyptic given that these things have only just begun.
Bingo. Wars are already expanding, and the world is preparing for more. With food production suffering from climate change impacts, we are witnessing famine gaining ground in real time. The breed of politicians in power are doing their best to give pestilence a newfound hold on populace at large.
And the fourth horseman is comfortably trotting in the wake of the other three.
Most production of most staple crops are higher than they have ever been, and still increasing most years.
World bank data estimates for population growth is a 10% increase from 2020 to 2030, 26% from 2020 to 2050, and 42% between 2020 and 2100.
OECD (FAO Agricultural Outlook 2021-2030) estimates agricultural production to increase by 1.4% per year for the decade, which translates to ~15%.
So agricultural output is increasing faster than the population at this point despite the climate challenges.
But this increase itself creates risks (e.g. soil degradation, pressure on water supply) that is compounded by climate risks and creates variability on a regional level that absolutely will be a massive problem even though it could be "easily" protected against.
The famine risk largely comes down to pushing food out of economic reach of poor countries at points where local crops fail, and the very same economic conditions makes those countries less likely to be able to afford to maintain sufficient emergency stores.
Of course, that there's food elsewhere that is just too expensive will be of no comfort to those who end up starving.
That would depend on the country in question, and in some cases it can be both, with more land being used while production per hectare (or acre) increases too. From wht I know of most developed countries, it's a case of steadily less land used, but much more productively than ever.
For example, the United States today produces more food in absolute terms than at any time in its history (an increase of nearly 200% in the last 70 years alone), while land used for agriculture has at pretty much the same time steadily been decreasing since the mid-20th century. Forests are even growing back as a result, with total forest cover having been very gently increasing since 1910 (links below)
https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/legacy_files/med...
https://www.usda.gov/about-usda/news/blog/look-agricultural-...
While some of the increase would be used for other purposes, that increase is still available for food production, and so that also boils down to an economic/moral/political issue, which was the main point: We can feed everyone; it's not a given that we will choose to feed everyone.
I bet you're right. I'd just add that those are actually more difficult choices than technical ones. These are global issues and we don't have a global moral or political fabric to use, which means the best we'll come up with is a patchwork of competing ideas. If you think the Linux desktop is bad, wait until you see an attempt at a coordinated international response to drought.
For a microscopic view you could look at the U.S.A. and how much five western states fight each other over water rights for the Colorado River. Those states are all part of the same country and they can't even figure it out.
Also, famine isn't gaining ground in real time for the above reason, or at all for that matter. In absolute terms, more people today eat better than ever, and in nearly any case you care to look at of people starving, it's universally due to some regional political bullshittery instead of climate change. (case in point, children going hungry in Gaza right now)
Temporary, shifting price rises on food are not the same thing as famine conditions by the way.
Incredible how some people here just pull random claims out of their ass because they want them to be true as opposed to actually finding out if they have anything to do with reality.
I interpret this and GPs comment as the same: we have ways to solve these issues technically, but currently lack the other dimensions (trust, collaboration, incentives).
As climate change adds risk, cost, and complexity, we are increasingly further from a solution, not closer.
Your aggressive and dismissive rhetoric provides little in the way of substantive evidence or reasoning, either.
I worry that many of our solutions entail increasing exploitation on some other corner of the world. Like opening more mines for fertilizers. Eventually easily accessible fertilizers will run out too.
A doubling of crop failure rates in just 20 years is definitely not something that should be immediately blamed on global climate change. It's possible there's some local climate change for non-CO2 reasons. In 20 years there's been just 0.2 degrees of average warming, which is barely detectable (CIs on weather stations are often much larger!)
The UK is in a peculiar place for weather patterns though - we're pretty much on the cusp of five different weather systems, so we're kind of used to changeable/outlier weather events.
I expect things will be different if the Gulf Stream shifts and plunges Britain into a mini ice age.
I'm talking about events not average. I'm also talking about facts. And if you really are in the uk you would know there has been lot of heatwave, intense rain and thunderstorm events in the uk the past few years.
Just to push back on your bullshit, you can have the same rain yearly avearge as every other year and have no rain during the whole year but one. Your average would look good but your agriculture certainly not.
Go bother someone else...
Look at the graphs in this report:
https://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2024/11/UK-Weather-2...
Pages 5 and 6 show annual rainfall. It increased a little around 1870, but today it's not much different to rainfall levels in the 1910s. Winter average is a little higher recently but only due to heavy rains in the winter of 2013, otherwise there'd be nothing to see. Rainfall in other seasons hasn't changed at all.
Page 7 shows just the most extreme years. "most of the ten wettest years occurred in the years up to and including 1960 (Figure 10a). The only two exceptions are 2000 and 2012. The situation regarding the ten driest years is even starker, with the most recent significant year being 1964 (Figure 10b)."
Nor are there more or stronger storms. Wind speeds have actually been falling over time (page 10). It's turning into a financial issue for wind farms. The British government itself says that, also for the whole North Atlantic:
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/climate/understanding-...
> The UK State of the Climate report states that there are no compelling trends in storminess when considering maximum gust speeds over the last four decades. More comprehensive studies across the North Atlantic region have reached similar conclusions.
You need to stop attacking people who are responding to your anecdotes with data. A lot of people believe untrue things about the weather because they struggle to separate predictions about the future vs statements about the present. It's certainly possible there are places where rainfall has become markedly more intense. But if so, it's not a global phenomenon.
Actual storm events (just scrolling gives an idea of the acceleration of the phenomena): https://weather.metoffice.gov.uk/learn-about/past-uk-weather...
Conclusion from a met office study around the direction we're going https://www.ukclimateresilience.org/news-events/climate-chan...
"... stop attacking people who are responding to your anecdotes with data. A lot of people believe untrue things about the weather because they struggle to separate predictions about the future vs statements about the present."
1. Stop attacking people. There are no "propaganda trolls" attempting to "lure" anyone to the wrong conclusions here.
2. Stop citing anecdotes. Your list is a set of case studies hand picked by civil servants based on no published criteria, so it can't be used to determine the frequency of anything. You need observational data, which I already linked you to. Go look at it.
3. Stop presenting predictions in a discussion about what is actually happening! Your second link is the exact kind of confusion I just called out. Why are you citing predictions about the future in a discussion about the past and present?
I'll ask again: where in the world are these farmers you talked to. Let us check the weather records and see if these farmers are simply confused in the same way you are.
We are talking about things happening now, I won't provide you studies from 20 years from now proving that it happened, I'm not from the future. This is about observation.
You want some other data? Just look around. Example in France, situation of water crisis over time https://www.notre-environnement.gouv.fr/themes/economie/l-ut...
Here's an article about water shortage in the UK https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/apr/01/why-uk-f...
In the UK at least the Riverford farm has been talking about it for years when I was living there.
So if we stop buying oil & gas from Russia, and instead buy batteries made in part out of "Russian" minerals from Eastern-Ukraine... yaay progress, I guess ?
[1] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/mapped-ukraines-mineral-res...
Russia also won't need more farmland. Russia has far more land. Especially as climate change if anything is likely to open up regions further north where farming has not been practical - in that respect, Russia is better placed that most other countries (including Ukraine) to see off the worst effects of climate change -, but also because their crashing population will reduce their agricultural demand.
Doesn't mean Putin doesn't also want the land and resources, but if taking over Ukraine were to shore up Russia's population and buy them decades to solve the demographic problem, I think that would be far more economically valuable to him.
See e.g. also the large-scale abduction of children from the occupied areas, that while a classic way to try to destroy an enemy is also a move that "makes sense" (though of course reprehensible) to someone who is worried about the very perpetuation of his people.
Of course, then he failed to get the quick win, and the potential win is literally bleeding away on the battlefield, to the point where there's every reason to question whether Russia will survive the after-effects of this as a country 20-30 years down the line.
No matter how you slice it, what you said just makes no sense.
Large-scale abduction of children.
With respect to assimiliation, you 1) assume rational people, 2) assume they accept that they will be unable to subjugate Ukraine the same way they're keeping control over a country where every single region have independence movements.
Again: They've already engaged in large-scale abduction of children - you're not dealing with a rational adversary.
As for people fleeing west, there is still substantial population in the occupied territories, as direct evidence that they'd still keep a substantial population.
I think your arguments makes just as little sense as you claim mine does.
HOW?! Ukrainians aren't bolted to that land you know. They can just leave for safety to the EU if Russia were to take over the whole country.
People aren't interchangeable cogs of equal usefulness. What would Russia do with millions of Ukrainian retirees as the youth flee?
>Large-scale abduction of children.
Can you share any sources of this "large scale abduction"? Are you saying the Ukrainian parents just left tens of thousands of kids behind for the Russians to abduct as they made their way through a few KM of countryside in the eastern part of Ukraine? Sorry, I'm not buying this without proper sources.
Not saying a few kids haven't been abducted in the war, I'm saying it's not enough for this to be the main reason Russia invaded as you originally claimed since if that were the reason, then it's a very bad return on investment to justify the exorbitant costs in money and bodies of a full scale war just to gain a few abducted kids added to your population.
Can they? How many more do you think the EU would take?
And where is the evidence from the occupied parts of Ukraine that the entire population would be able and/or willing to just leave?
But this is also besides the point. What is relevant to Russia's motivations would be what they believed was realistic when they invaded, and as we saw they totally miscalculated, so assuming they were enaged in rationally thinking this through is also flawed.
> Can you share any sources of this "large scale abduction"? Are you saying the Ukrainian parents just left tens of thousands of kids behind for the Russians to abduct as they made their way through a few KM of countryside in the eastern part of Ukraine? Sorry, I'm not buying this without proper sources.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_abductions_in_the_Russo-...
The article is well cited, including with statements from the UN and arrest warrants from the ICC.
This was literally one Google search away, and has been in the news repeatedly over long periods.
Nobody has suggested Ukrainian parents left them behind - you seem to believe Eastern Ukraine has been emptied of Ukrainians. It has not.
Contrary to your beliefs, there are still millions of people in the Russian controlled areas.
> Not saying a few kids haven't been abducted in the war, I'm saying it's not enough for this to be the main reason Russia invaded as you originally claimed
Total strawman. My argument has not been that the abductions are the main reason for the invasion, but that the war is likely to be motivated by the demographic crisis.
The abduction of 20k+ kids ("a few"...) was an example of how Russia has engaged in classic methods used in the past to seek to assimilate an occupied population, specifically given as one example of the ability to selectively drain Ukraine of people in ways that'd offset Russias own problems, without necessarily be willing to take on any responsibility for e.g. old people.
> then it's a very bad return on investment to justify the exorbitant costs in money and bodies of a full scale war just to gain a few abducted kids added to your population.
It was clear the original belief in Russia was that they could just drive to Kyiv, in which case the ROI might have turned out quite well for them. It is certainly the case it has a very bad ROI now, yes - I've pointed out several times in discussions like these that I think they miscalculated so catastrophically that I doubt Russia will survive as a country.
But it's entirely nonsensical to base any discussion about their original motivation on the outlook far into a conflict that already days into the conflict had gone far worse for Russia than Russia - and most Western observers - initially assumed it would. If Russia thought it'd go this bad, it's likely they'd never had invaded in the first place. There's a large degree of sunk cost fallacy and fear of looking weak in the ongoing warfare.
Have you put any genuine thought into what you're saying about that specific war? If any country on Earth aside from maybe Canada would benefit agriculturally from warming climate, it's Russia. I can assure you that despite its many problems, feeding its badly decreasing population isn't one of them even now, and especially not to the point of having to invade another state over it.
Let's not misplace blame here in ridiculous ways. Putin started that particular heap of idiocy, with zero climate-related need to do so. He did it for a bunch of half-baked political/social/historical reasons pulled right out of his own ass.
https://bsky.app/profile/prune602.bsky.social/post/3lulihhfj...