Effect of Climate and Agricultural Land Use Changes on UK Feed Barley Production and Food Security to the 2050s

Abstract

Currently, the UK has a high self-sufficiency rate in barley production. This paper assessed the effects of projected climate and land use changes on feed barley production and, consequently, on meat supply in the UK from the 2030s to the 2050s. Total barley production under projected land use and climate changes ranged from 4.6 million tons in the 2030s to 9.0 million tons in the 2050s. From these, the projected feed barley supply ranged from approximately 2.3 to 4.6 million tons from the 2030s to the 2050s, respectively. The results indicate that while UK spring barley production will thrive under, and benefit from climate change, total land area allocated to barley production will ultimately determine self-sufficiency. Without expansion in the area of land and/or further significant increases in yields, the UK may face large deficits in domestic feed barley production and, for that matter, meat supply in the future. Hence, agricultural and food security policy needs to consider, principally, the effect of agricultural land use change on key crops, such as barley. Even though the UK can import feed barley or meat to address the deficits observed in this study, the question that needs to be addressed is where all that import will come from.

Virtual water flows under projected climate, land use and population change: the case of UK feed barley and meat

“…Barley yields in the UK are projected to increase, or barley production would remain viable under projected climate change (Yawson et al, 2016). It is noted, however, that the UK would face huge deficits in feed barley supply in the future, driven mainly by the respective effects of population growth on demand and land use limitations on supply due to climate mitigation efforts (Tables 1 and 2; Yawson et al, 2017). The study assumed that the UK would import feed barley or the equivalent of meat that could be produced with the barley in any given feed mix.…”

“…Land use and population change will also have direct and indirect effects on global food and water demand and supply (Huang et al, 2010;Thomson et al, 2013;Foresight, 2011). Because crop yields and water use efficiency cannot be increased infinitely, total land area allocated to crop production would be a major determinant of future food availability even in environments where climate change could be beneficial (Yawson et al, 2017). Based on population projections, global food demand will rise sharply up to the 2050s (Spring, 2009).…”

“…Currently, the UK has a high rate of self-sufficiency in barley production but has trade deficit in meat and aggregate feed (Defra, 2011). While climate change could be beneficial to UK barley production (Yawson et al, 2016), the UK could face substantial deficit in feed barley supply from domestic production, with adverse implications for meat production (Yawson et al, 2017). This deficit could be offset through import of either feed barley or feed barley equivalent meat, resulting in virtual water flows to the UK and potential impacts on the water resources of exporting countries.…”

Impacts of climate change and mitigation policies on malt barley supplies and associated virtual water flows in the UK

“…Climate change presents geographically varied risks to barley production. Due to the large proportion of barley used for animal feed, it is not surprising that the effect of future shocks to supply has been assessed mainly from food security or feed use perspective 10 . Globally, net barley production is projected to fall due to temperature and water stresses, with adverse implications for malting industry and its downstream industrial chains 4 .…”

Interactions between Food Security and Land Use in the Context of Global Change

“…Normally, as editors, we would seek to provide some level of synthesis from the findings presented herein, as a contribution to the effort to generate generalized knowledge. However, we find ourselves hampered in this endeavor by two issues that are emblematic of the land change field as a whole.First, while the Special Issue consists of a very small sample of the rapidly growing literature on land change, the contributions nevertheless address a wide array of land systems and focal processes, including agricultural intensification through the lens of telecoupling [16], the socioeconomic impacts of increasing production of a single crop commodity [17], spatial co-occurrence of food insecurity and biodiversity [18], increasing food security through the use of conservation agriculture [19], assessing whether food production can meet future needs [20,21], and developing strategies for modeling land use, food production and trade [22]. Furthermore, the studies address these issues across several continents (i.e., South America, Europe and Asia) and concern varying agricultural systems (i.e., focusing on the production of vegetables or grains, with the latter destined either for direct human consumption or for livestock production).…”