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  International Reseach Journal,November,2010ISSN-0975-3486 RNI: RAJBIL 2009/300097 VOL-I *ISSUE 14 67RESEARCH ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION Research Paper—Economics 1234567890123456789012345678901212345678901234567890123456789012123456789012345678901234567890121234567890123456789012345678 1234567890123456789012345678901212345678901234567890123456789012123456789012345678901234567890121234567890123456789012345678 1234567890123456789012345678901212345678901234567890123456789012123456789012345678901234567890121234567890123456789012345678 1234567890123456789012345678901212345678901234567890123456789012123456789012345678901234567890121234567890123456789012345678 1234567890123456789012345678901212345678901234567890123456789012123456789012345678901234567890121234567890123456789012345678 1234567890123456789012345678901212345678901234567890123456789012123456789012345678901234567890121234567890123456789012345678 1234567890123456789012345678901212345678901234567890123456789012123456789012345678901234567890121234567890123456789012345678 November, 2010 Introduction Warming of the climate system is unequivocal- saidtheIntergovernmentalPanelonClimateChange (IPCC) in this latest assessment report, pointing to increased global air and ocean temperature, widespread melting of snow and ice, and rising sea level.Theintergovernmentalpanelscientistfoundsome agricultural practices, and changes in land use have beengeneratingGreenHouseGases(GHG)likecarbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide that trapped heat and produced runaway global warming. GlobalTemperature In the 1880-1935 periods, the global temperature anomaly was consistently negative. In contrast the 1980-2005 periods has had a consistently positive temperatureanomaly.The1917temperatureanomaly (-0.47° Celsius)wasthelowestyearonrecord.Since 1917,globaltemperaturehaswarmed,withthemost recent years showing the highest anomalies of +0.4/ 0.6° Celsius in the past 120 years.According to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the 1990s were the warmest decade; the 1990s were the warmestcenturyduringthelast1,000years.Thefive warmestyearsonrecord,inorder(warmestfirst)are 2005,1998,2002,2003and2004. Vulnerabilitie By virtue of demographics, topography and geography, India is ground zero for climate change. With over 1.13 billion people India hasthegreatestpopulationinthetropical,equatorial region in which it is located – far more than west Asia’s211million,south-eastAsia’s554million.Or evenallofAfrica’s922million(UnitedNations2009). India is also home to a third of the world’s poor, the population that lives on less than one dollar a day, which constitutes over 40% of India’s population (Shaohuna and Ravallion 2008). The poor are the CLIMATE CHANGE: IT’S IMPACT ON INDIA *Dr. V.J.R. Emerlson Moses A B S T R A C T most vulnerable to the effects of climate change, having the least recourse from the status quo and minimal physical protection from environmental shifts. Anomalous weather patterns such as floods, droughts, rising temperatures and heat waves, and river recession are among the environmental scenariosthatalreadyharmlargenumbersofIndians (Parikh2009). ImpactofClimateChange Worldwide it is agreed that on of the greatest challenges to sustainable development in the 21st century is climate change. Climate change poses a serious threat to developmentandpovertyreduction in the poorest and most vulnerable regions of the world.Itsimpactiaalreadybeingexperiencedacross theglobe.Thefirstandforemostchallengeofclimate change would be the rise in the mean sea level. According to the IPCC’s fourth assessment report that was released on 2nd February 2007, there has been acceleration in sea level since 1993. Between 1961 and 2003, the sea level had increased at an averagerateof0.18metersperyear.Butbetween1993 and 2003, the rate of rise had nearly doubled to 0.31 metersperyear.Thereportalsopredicatedsealevels wouldincreasebyupto0.38metersbythemidofthis centuryand0.59metersbytheendofthe21st century. ImpactonEcosystem The primary threats of global warming is that, the ecosystem services include habitat degradation or loss, changes in biodiversity and synergistic interactions between these factors and rapid climate change, release of toxic substance and stratospheric ozone depletion. A recent synthesis of information aboutecosystemservicesfromtheEcologicalSociety of America concluded that: Ecosystem services are essentialtocivilization.Ecosystemservicesoperate Worldwide it is agreed that on of the greatest challenges to sustainable development in the 21st century is climate change. Climate change poses a serious threat to development and poverty reduction in the poorest and most vulnerable regions of the world. Its impact ia already being experienced across the globe. The first and foremost challenge of climate change would be the rise in the mean sea level. According to the IPCC’s fourth assessment report that was released on 2nd February 2007, there has been acceleration in sea level since 1993. *Asst.Prof.P.G.&ResearchDept.of Eco.,MuthurangamGovt.Arts.College,Vellore
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  International Reseach Journal,November,2010ISSN-0975-3486 RNI: RAJBIL 2009/300097 VOL-I *ISSUE 14 68 RESEARCH ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION on such a grand scale and in such intricate and little- explored ways that most could not replaced by technology. ImpactonWaterResources Throughout the world, regions that have sustainable groundwater balance are shrinking day by day by the effects of global warming. Three problems dominate in groundwater use: depletion duetooverdraft;waterloggingandStalinizationdue mostly to inadequate drainage and insufficient conjunctive use and pollution due to agricultural, industrial and other human activities. In regions of India, especially with high population density area, dynamic tube-well-irrigated agriculture and insufficient surface water, many consequences of groundwater overdevelopment are becoming increasingly evident. ImpactonForestResources India is one of the few countries, which has had a diversifiedforest.Forestsarearenewablesourceand contribute substantially to economic development. They play a major role in enhancing the quality of environment. The total forest cover which includes dense forest, open forest and mangrove is estimated to be 63.73 million hectares. This constitutes 19.39 percentofcounty’sgeographicalarea.Outofthisthe dense forest accounts to 11.48 percent, open forest represents 7.76 percent while mangrove forest 0.15 percent and scribe area 1.58 percent. This has been drasticallydecreaseafter1999,becauseofthreatening by the natural and droughts. ImpactonDrinkingwater The watershed of the Himalayan Mountain chain provided the ecosystem service of water filtration and purification. Over time, this watershed system became overwhelmed by global warming and it increased the runoff at the particular point that impaired the water quality. These problem can be reduce include flood control, air purification, generationoffertilesoilandproductionofarangeof goodsfromtimbertomushrooms,aswellassitesfor recreation, inspiration, education and scientific inquiry. Even acknowledging that not all ecosystem servicescanbereplacedbyahumanmadesubstitute. ImpactonHumanResources Recent years have shown a slowing down in the declineininfantmortalityratesinIndia.Childmortality in India would drop by 20% if girls had the same mortality rate as boys between the ages of 1 month and 5 years. The factors contributing to this vulnerability is mainly by the wounded ecosystem. Half a million of pregnancy woman’s in a year are premature aborted in India (Jha et al., 2006). These numbers are alarming why women are and mire specifically Childs, more likely to die than men’s compared, the expected reason would be the non- availabilityandshortageofnutritiousfoodinchanging environmentalconditions.Infuture,femalepopulation may decrease drastically and it creates imbalance in socialorfamilylifeoftraditionalIndiansociety. ImpactonHumanHealth Climate change would affect human health in manyways.Warmertemperaturewouldincreasethe riskofmortalityfromheatstress.Itwouldalsoinfluence the incidence of diseases like malaria, dengue, yellow feverandcholera.AccordingtoWHO,thereisapotential forincreasedairpollutionrelatedmorbidityandmortality in world population due to the release of GHG. This couldresultin50to80millionadditionaldeathsperyear worldwide by 2100. Climate change also would have profound effect on aquatic fauna. ImpactonAgriculture Theagriculturesectorrepresents35%ofIndia’sgross National Product (GNP) and as such plays a crucial role in the country’s development. The impact of climatechangeonagriculturecouldresultinproblems with food security and may threaten the live hood activities upon which much of the population depends. It is widely believed that climate change could have a significant impact upon agriculture productivity, both positive and negative. Much researchefforthasbeenspentinconstructingmodels oftheagriculturalsectortoinvestigatevariousclimate change scenarios (Parry, 1990). Sinha and Swaminathan (1991) studied the impactoftemperatureriseonriceproductioninIndia. Average yields of rice in the coastal areas are less in theinteriorwhencomparedtothenorthernstateslike PunjabandHaryana.SeshuandCady(1984)estimated a decrease in yield at the rate of 0.71 ton.ha with an increaseinminimumtemperaturerisefrom18æ% Cto 19æ% C and a decrease of 0.41 ton/ha as temperature rise from 22æ% C to 23æ% C. There are several reasons for varying sensitivity of yields to temperature in different areas (Yoshida, 1981). Indian agricultural scientists attribute this sensitivity mainly to temperature conditions at the crop location. It is estimated that an increase of 2° C in the mean air temperature could decrease the rice yield of about 0.75 ton/ha in the high yield areas and only by about 0.06 ton/ha in the low yield coastal regions. During the winter season, wheat is a major crop in India. It contributes the bulk of the grain buffer stock which is distributed through the public distribution system to exercise price control during adverse periods of production. Any changes in wheat production,
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  International Reseach Journal,November,2010ISSN-0975-3486 RNI: RAJBIL 2009/300097 VOL-I *ISSUE 14 69RESEARCH ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION therefore, strongly influence national food security. The crop is mostly grown in the latitudinal belt of 22°N-33° N.itisalsogrownbetween11° Nand21° N, though productivity is low. Sinha and Swaminathan (1992) estimated that a 0.5° C increase in winter temperature would reduce crop duration by seven days and yield by 0.45 ton/ha. In other words, an increaseof0.5° Cinmeantemperatureinthehighyield states of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh would reduce the production by 10% In the areas of less productivity will be still higher. These results, however,needfurtherexaminationinthelightofthe possibility of related changes in local precipitation patterns, developments in fertilizer and pest control technologies, and so on. It is evident that the agricultural sector in India mayexperienceconsiderableadverseimpactsdueto anincreaseinatmosphericgreenhousegaslevels.The primary causes of decreases in simulated yields are foundtobedueto:(i)shorteningofthegrowingperiod; (ii) the decrease in water availability; and (iii) poor vernalization (theminimumtemperaturerequirementto startthefloweringprocess).Highertemperatureduring the growing season speeds annual crops through their development (especially at the grain filling stage), allowinglessgraintobeproduced.Theriseintemperature isalsolikelytoresultinanincreaseinevaporationrates, thereby enhancing losses of soil moisture. This would be aggravated by any decrease in precipitation under the climate change scenario Studies by Indian Agriculture Research Institute indicate that Indian agriculture would face many challenges over the coming decades by climate change. Higher temperature,shiftingmonsoonsanddriersoilswould influence production patterns and reduce yields of food grains such as rice and wheat. Recent Media reportssaythatIndiaislikelytobedeprivedofsouth- west monsoon in 150 years. Plant growth and health mightgetdamagebyhighertemperature,particularly if combined with water shortages. ImpactonFoodProduction By 2020, the food demands for India will increase by about70percentfromthepresent,notsimplyonaccount of increase in population, but also due to increased per capita demand by virtue of economic growth. Demand will go up not only in the all- important area of cereals, but also in milk, fruits and vegetables, animal products etc. To meet the requirement is a stiff challenge, but it seems to be achievable, when we able to maintain the balance environment through Biotechnology, tissue culture andthepropagationofsuperiorcultivarsinallareas. ImpactonFoodPrices According to the report, irrigated rice yields are expectedtofallby15withtheclimatechangescenario. It noted that even without climate change, food process will still raise, but that climate change will maketheproblemworse.Forinstance,withoutclimate change, wheat prices will increase globally over the next 40 years by almost 40 per cent. With climate change,thepriceswillincreasebyupto194percent. Withoutclimatechange,riceandmaizeareprojected toincrease60percent.Thefirstofitskind,thisstudy combines climate models that project changes in rainfall and temperature and a crop model to capture biophysical effectswithIFPRI’seconomicmodelof world agriculture.The latter projects changes in the production,consumption and trade of major agriculturalcommodities. ImpactonFoodSecurity Theaccentuatingpressureexertedbyclimatechange and its likely impact is expected to affect all the four dimensionsoffoodsecurity-availability,stability,use, and access.Climate drivers such as changes in temperature, precipitation, increased CO2 levels, and extreme weather events and socioeconomic drivers, such as increase in population, act on physical conditions (for example, agro-ecological conditions) andsocioeconomicconditions(forexample,thebaseline sanitation infrastructure or lack of it) to cause impacts that manifest as one or more of the four dimensions of foodsecurity.Moreover,theimpactscanbedirectsuch aseffectoftemperatureonsoilmoistureorindirectsuch as climate change,which adversely affects water availabilityforirrigationbroadlydepictsclimatechange andfoodsecuritylinkages.Assessmentsoftheimpacts of climate change on food security have largely been focused on the ‘availability’ dimension and up to a limitedextent,onthe‘access’dimension.Veryfewstudies assess the impact of climate change on food ‘use’ and food ‘stability’. RegionalClimateImpact Regional climate model projections indicate that besides rise in sea level and melting of mountain glaciers and polar ice caps, climate change would also lead to arise powerful cyclones, hurricanes, droughts, floods, heat waves, storms, heavy rainfall and many other natural disasters which would occur morefrequentlyinmanypartsofIndia.Accordingto India’s National Communication (NATCOM) to UNFCCC, a trend of increasing monsoon seasonal rain has been found along the west coast, northern AndhraPradeshandnorth-westernIndia(plus10per centtoplus12percentofthenormaloverthelast100 years)whileatrendofdecreasingmonsoonseasonal
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  International Reseach Journal,November,2010ISSN-0975-3486 RNI: RAJBIL 2009/300097 VOL-I *ISSUE 14 70 RESEARCH ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION 1.Agence France Press(2009), “India Carbon Emissions to triple by 2030: Study”, Agence France Press, 3 September. 2.Aijaz, Rumi,(2009), “Personal Interview with Rumi Aijaz”, Urban Planning Expert at the Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi, 27 July. 3.Ananthapadmanabhan, G, K Srinivas and Vinuta Gopal,(2007), “Hiding behind the Poor: A Green- peace Report on Climate Injustice”, Greenpeace India Society, October.4.Bard Edouard; Frank, Martin (2006) “Climate Change and Solar Variability: What’s New Under the Sun?”, Earth and Planetry Science Letters, Vol: 248 pp. 1-14. 5.Barnett, Tim P.; J.C. Adam, D.P.Lettenmaier (2005) “Potential Impacts of a warming Climate on Water Aviability in Snow- dominated Regions”, Nature Journal, No: 438, PP. 303-309. 6.Chauhan, Chetan,(2007), “UN Targets Are Flawed, Says India”, Hindustan Times, 27 November. 7. Cowie, J. (2007) “Climate Change: Biological and Human Aspects”. Cambridge University Press, p. 3. 8.Gerald C.Nelson, Mark W. Rosegrant, Jawoo Koo, Richard Robertson, Timothy Sulser, tingu Zhu, Claudia Ringer, Siwa msangi, Amanda Palazzo, Miroslav batka, Marilia magalhaes, Rowena valmonte-Santos, Mandy Ewing, and David Lee (2009), “Climate Change: Impact on Agriculture and Cists of Adaptation”, International Food policy Research Institute, Wasington, D.C.9. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (2007), “Climate Change: Impacts, Adaption and Vulnerability”, (Cambridge Univ Press, Cambridge, (UK) in press. 10.IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), (2001), Special report on emissions scenarios, summary for policy makers Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.11.Macey, Jennifer (2007) “Global warming opens up Northwest Passage”, ABC News. 12. Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Division. Govt. of India (2006) “INDIA-2006”, Patiala House, New Delhi.13.Parikh, Jyoti,(2009),”Climate Imapct, Risk, Vulnerability and Adaption”, remarks at The Adaptive Respose to Climate Change, Global Summit on Sustainable Development and Climate change, Conference organized by the Observer Research Foundation and The Rose-Luxemburg Stiftung, 24 September. 14.Parry, M., (1990), “Climate Change and World Agriculture”, Earthscan, London 15. Rosenzweig, C. and Parry, M.L. (1994), “Potential impact of climate change on world food supply:, Nature 367: 133-138. 16. Seshu, D.V. and cady F.B (1984), “Response of rice to solar radiation and temperature estimated from international yield trials”, Crop Science 24: 649-654. 17 Shaohua, Chen and martin Ravallion (2008): “The Developing World Is Poorer than We Thought, But No Less Successful in the Fight Against Poverty”, Development Research group (DECRG), World Bank, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper No 4703. 18. Sinha, S.K. and Swaminathan, M.S. (1991), “Deforestation, climate change and sustainable nutrition security: A case study of India”, Climate Change 19: 201-209. 19. Yoshida, S. (1981), “Fundamentals of Rice Crop Science”, International Rice Research Institute, Los Banos, Laguna. R E F E R E N C E rainfall has been observed over eastern Madya Pradesh,north-easternIndiaandsomepartsofGujarat andKerala(minus6percenttominus8percentofthe normal over the last 100 years) ChangesinTemperature Changes in temperature and rainfall would bring out a change in the type of vegetarian in about 80 per cent of the existing forests in the country. Such changeswereboundtohaveaverysignificantimpact on the forests and the wildlife they supported.As the Indianforestswerealreadyhighlyfragmented,many species of plants and animals might not be able to cope with climate change and could therefore, face extinction.. Conclusion Since climate change and rising food prices not only affect agricultural issues, but also affect broader social, environmental, and security issues, the appropriate response should involve a combination of science, institutional, and policy innovations.Furthermore,accesstofoodisdecreased by climate change because lower agricultural productivity will increase food prices. Food consumption and nutrition are affected by climate change through its effects on health and the spread of diseases. Inadequate complementary services, such as health, education, and insurance services impair the adequate response of the ultra poor to these climate change threats Sustainable solutions to the impact of climate change on the ultra poor requires additional investment in these services, as well as in capacity, science, and research.