Climate change significantly threatens food supplies around the world as storage becomes more difficult due to rising temperatures.
Globally, food is typically stored outdoors after harvest, before processing. However, as temperatures rise and weather patterns change, prices may increase as producers are forced to install expensive equipment to protect their food from spoiling.
For example, Brian Sackett, living in Mecosta, Michigan, had to spend $125K on a new refrigeration unit to protect what will become potato chips. From the September harvest to late spring, Michigan potato farmers have long relied on fans and cool air to keep their potatoes fresh.
In the next three decades, the annual period in which the region’s outdoor air is cool enough to store potatoes is projected to drop by 17 days. “Our good, fresh, cool air is getting less all the time; it seems like,” Sackett pointed out.
Meanwhile, in Sub-Saharan Africa, rising temperatures will make it much easier for mold and insects to destroy grain stores. The cocoa industry, which depends heavily on West African production, has already seen prices surge more than 400% as climate change devastated harvests, a crisis that the University of Reading’s first 100% British chocolate bar since 1932 was designed to highlight.
The deepest parts of the ocean are also warming, causing the sea level to rise. About 90% of the heat absorbed by the planet seeps into the oceans. According to climate models, the high levels of climate pollution will penetrate deeper into the sea by the end of the century. When that happens, it will threaten deep-sea creatures as well.
