Draft 3 Essay

Submitted By agnesweng
Words: 1935
Pages: 8

ESLA 1900B

Climate change and the sustainability of food security in Africa

Summer 2012

Submitted to: Dr. Emese Bukor Submitted by: Jiayi Weng Student Number: 100870143 Due Date: August 1, 2012
Abstract:
The main focus of the reading was the connection of how climate change threatens the sustainability of food security by providing different aspects of influences in Africa, such as economic, environmental impact, nutrition and health. It will be explained that the increasing temperature reduces the rainfall in Africa and it causes the decrease of crop productivity due to water scarcity. The results of increasing temperature are argued by different conclusions. Some agree that climate change will reduce the crop net revenue. Others think that climate change has more beneficial impact and it increases the net revenue at the beginning of crop and it will come to drop dramatically by 2100. Those results both show that climate change will become a threat to the economics. Moreover those economic shifts will threaten food security and risk of health condition due to the challenge of lower income of crop productivity.

Introduction and Background: My research topic focused on the impacts of climate change connected to food insecurity and hunger. The research essay will focus on the relationship between climate change and food insecurity in Africa. It will explain how climate change affects agriculture and how it brings challenges to African People. The purpose of this research is to show the significance of sustainability by examining the connections between food insecurity and climate change. Climate change threatens the sustainability of food security. It makes an impact on agriculture and leads to food insecurity through different aspects, such as reducing the yield, the quantity of crops and increase of food price. Those impacts bring challenges to African people and threaten the stability of food security. Food science and nutrition is my field of study which is linked to food insecurity brought about by climate change. It is very essential to understand the various ways that climate change could affect the sustainability of food security.
First of all, the importance of water supply is shown by the connection between agriculture and rainfall. Then, the relationship between increasing temperature and reducing rainfall will be discussed. Besides, the reasons for global warming and contributors of greenhouse gas emission are provided to explain the unsustainability of food security and food rights. Moreover, the methods of calculating the crop net revenue are indicated to show the economic impact of climate change. Finally, two different conclusions for crop net revenue are presented. However, it has been concluded that climate change is a threat to the sustainability of food security.

Research Question:
My research explores the following research question:
How does climate change influence agriculture and how does it threaten the sustainability of food security in Africa? In my definition, the word “influence” shows the connection between the climate change and agriculture. The verb “threaten” indicates the negative impacts of climate change on food security. The noun “food security” means that people in Africa have access easily to the nutritional and adequate food.

Discussion: Hanjra and Qureshi (2010) believe that water plays an important role in supporting agriculture. Due to climate change, the decrease of rainfall influences the availability of water and shift to influence the crop productivity and crop yield. The water scarcity cuts the food production and leads to food scarcity. Hanjra