Climate change to hit global food output: UN

“We foresee with high confidence in climate projections that intense precipitation in some parts of the world will be more intense,and drought will be more intense,” said Baddour,who has tracked the subject for more than two decades. Extreme heat waves “will also be more intense and more frequent.”

The UN food and sgriculture organization’s world food price index,which tracks 55 food-commodity items,rose nine times in the past 10 months,with the gauge peaking at 237.24 in February. The index climbed to 232.07 last month.

Baddour’s comments add to projections that more extreme weather may affect farm production. Sunny Verghese,chief executive officer at Olam International ,among the world’s three biggest suppliers of rice,forecast that food- supply chains face “massive disruptions” from climate change.

Drought in China has affected 6.5 million hectares of farmland,the office of state flood control and drought relief headquarters said on its website. China has ordered the operator of the Three Gorges Dam to release water to replenish the Yangtze River and counter the local region’s lowest rainfall in half a century.

The drought in China may cut early-season rice output if there’s no adequate rain over the next two weeks,according to industry researcher Cngrain.com. “If the drought doesn’t end in two weeks,the impact on the region’s rice will no doubt be significant,” said Zhang Lu,an analyst at the group.

Food costs are at “dangerous levels” after pushing 44 million people into poverty since June,World Bank President Robert Zoellick said Feb. 15. That adds to the more than 900 million people around the world who go hungry each day,he said.

“Climate change,high-and-volatile food and energy prices,population and income growth” will put intense pressure on land and water and challenge global food security as never before,according to Mark Rosegrant,director of environment and production technology at the International Food Policy Research Institute.Agricultural research is needed to adapt farming to climate change,Olivier de Schutter,the United Nations’ special adviser on the right to food,said at a conference on May 23.