(Paul Botes/M&G)
By the time the rain arrives on Emily Tjale’s farm in Ntwane village in Sekhukhune, it’s often too late to begin planting.
“I understand we have four seasons but we have different weather patterns every time,” said the pumpkin, legume and nut farmer. “Because of climate change, we no longer get our rainfall at the usual times of August.”
That it now only comes in late October or the beginning of November means that Tjale and her fellow farmers are no longer able to start planting seeds in September, negatively affecting their yield. “We used to share and exchange seeds in the first week of September where we knew there would be little rain and that rain would help us plough … Today, there is so much terrible drought, so much heat,” she said.
“We cannot plant as many crops under these harsh conditions. When it rains, there are extreme floods and we can’t farm when there’s too much water. Climate change directly means I can feed far less people in our community. People are going hungry due to climate change.”
Africa’s agriculture hit hard
Across the continent, agricultural productivity growth has been slashed by 34% since 1961 because of human-induced climate change, more than any other region, according to the Africa chapter of a new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
The chapter, the biggest assessment of its kind for Africa, details how future warming will cripple food systems by shortening growing seasons and increasing water stress. Current warming is at 1.1℃.
Maize yields in sub-Saharan Africa have already fallen by 5.8% and wheat yields by 2.3% because of climate change. “Global warming beyond 2℃ will place nearly all of Sub-Saharan Africa cropland substantially outside of its historical safe climate zone and may exponentially increase the cost of adaptation and residual damage for major crops.”
Agriculture will be hard hit by high temperatures, changing rainfall patterns and drought, as up to 95% of food production is rain-fed.
“Whatever happens with rain has implications on food production,” said Edmond Totin, of the University of Benin and a coordinating lead author. “We see that a major staple crop like maize will be affected … This can have implications in households, in terms of people’s incomes, and affect the capacity of households to send their children to school or face health challenges.”
Fifty-five to 62% of Sub-Saharan Africa’s workforce is employed in agriculture.
Declining maize, wheat yields
Without adaptation, the report found, global temperature rise of 2ºC will cause yields of maize across Southern Africa to plummet 25%, with higher losses if emissions are high.
Wheat yields will suffer losses of more than 50%, even with faster emission cuts that limit temperature rise to 1.5ºC, while high temperatures will make wheat less nutritious and pests will affect major crops.
“The changing climate is already affecting food production. These effects are worsening, affecting food production from crops, livestock, fish, and forests in many places where people already don’t have enough to eat. Food prices will be affected … with increasing risk that poorer people will not be able to buy enough for their families. Food quality will increasingly be affected too.”
Above 1.5°C, fish harvests will plummet by 40% in tropical Africa, putting 300 million people at risk of micronutrient deficiencies, especially pregnant women and children.
Climate risk hotspot
The IPCC report says the vulnerability of ecosystems and people to climate change differs substantially between and within regions, “driven by patterns of intersecting socio-economic development, unsustainable ocean and land use, inequity, marginalisation and historical and ongoing patterns of inequity such as colonialism and governance”.
Up to 3.6 billion people live in climate risk hotspots in Africa, South Asia, Central and South America, small island states and the Arctic. In these regions, deaths from floods, droughts and storms were 15 times higher than those in more resilient countries over the past decade.
“This is climate injustice, particularly for indigenous peoples and local communities,” said Inger Anderson, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme.
The chapter details how climate change is leading to “irreversible and existential impacts” across Africa, which breach “current and projected adaptation limits”. Many of its countries are projected to face compounding risks: reduced food production across crops, livestock and fisheries; increasing heat-related mortality; heat-related loss of labour productivity; and flooding.
“We’ve been used to experiencing droughts and floods but what we are seeing now and going into the future is that the magnitude and the amplitude of these droughts and floods are becoming much more extreme … and much more severe in their impacts,” said Professor Daniel Olago, of the University of Nairobi and a lead author.
Widespread harms
Africa has contributed among the least to historical greenhouse gas emissions and has the lowest per capita greenhouse gas emissions of all regions currently, the report said. “Yet Africa has already experienced widespread impacts from anthropogenic climate change.”
It has reduced economic growth across Africa, increasing income inequality between African countries and those in temperate, Northern Hemisphere climates. Across nearly all African countries, GDP per capita is projected to be at least 5% higher by 2050 and 10% to 20% higher by 2100 if warming is held to 1.5°C versus 2°C.
Christopher Trisos, of the University of Cape Town and a coordinating lead author, said: “Limiting warming to 1.5ºC stands to substantially reduce the widespread loss and damages from climate change across Africa, which includes reduced food production and economic output, biodiversity loss and increased human morbidity and mortality.”
There are many accelerated opportunities for adaptation in Africa, “but these currently face severe financial, institutional and information and technology constraints”. And, more finance is required from rich countries to help the most vulnerable countries adapt.
An all-of-government approach to climate action is needed, “where climate change is a priority issue” for key ministries such as finance and planning, not just agriculture or environmental departments, he said.
Lethal heat
Most African countries are expected to experience high temperatures “unprecedented in their recent history” earlier in this century than generally wealthier, higher latitude countries.
Beyond 2050, in Central Africa and coastal West Africa, 10 months of every year will be hotter than any month in the period 1950 to 2000 under a high emissions scenario. The annual number of days above “potentially lethal heat thresholds” reaches 50 to 150 in West Africa at 1.6°C of global warming, 100 to 150 in Central Africa at 2.5°C and 200 to 300 over tropical Africa for 4°C.
Under 1.5°C, children born in Southern Africa in 2020 are likely to be exposed to three to four times more heatwaves in their lifetimes compared to people born in 1960.
At 1.5°C, the distribution and seasonal transmission of vector-borne diseases is expected to rise, exposing tens of millions more people to diseases, mostly in East and Southern Africa. At 1.8°C, many rapidly urbanising cities could battle 15-day heatwaves, with temperatures soaring above 42°C. Over Southern Africa, the number of heatwaves will increase by a factor of 12 if emissions are high.
“South Africans are already experiencing what it’s like to live with repeated conditions over the short term of 38ºC to 42ºC — and even warmer — in the western regions of the country,” said Dr Kevin Winter, of the University of Cape Town. “It’s impossible in a shack with no insulation … or to work in a school environment.”
More suicide, homicides
More than 40% of about 20 000 heat-related deaths in South Africa between 1991 and 2018 are attributable to climate change. The report found that in Africa, the risk of death from extreme heat will increase with further warming, especially in informal settlements, where temperatures can be 4ºC higher, and where more than half of Africa’s urban residents live. The urban heat island effect worsens current and projected heat stress in Africa’s fast growing cities.
In South Africa, high temperatures have been associated with poor mental health and suicide. “Exposure to extreme heat directly influences emotional control, aggression and violent behaviour, escalating rates of interpersonal violence with homicides rising by as much as 18% in South Africa when temperatures are above 30℃ compared with temperatures below 20℃.”
Increases in drought frequency and duration are projected over large parts of Southern Africa. Global warming has already increased the risk of a long-term drought over the south-western Cape by a factor of three, while the 2015 to 2018 Cape Town drought was made five to six times more likely by climate change.
Losing nature
For Africa, the loss of biodiversity is projected to be “widespread and escalating”. At 2°C, 7% to 18% of species are projected to be at risk of extinction, unable to migrate fast enough to track shifting climates.
Marine heatwaves have caused mass coral bleaching in East Africa and have doubled along Southern African coastlines where they are projected to intensify. Increased atmospheric carbon dioxide has caused shrubs and trees to invade grasslands and savannas, reducing grazing land, water supplies and harming conservation revenues.
Since the 1990s, extreme heat days have climbed across South Africa’s national parks and at 2℃, visitation rates, based on mean monthly temperatures, are projected to decline by 4%. At 2℃, over half of the dwarf succulents in the Karoo may lose >90% of their suitable habitat, while biodiversity in the fynbos vegetation of the Cape Floristic Region has fallen by 12% between 1966 and 2010 because of extreme heat, drought and wildfires.
“The web of our lives is provided by the elements of the ecosystems around us,” said Professor Guy Midgley, of Stellenbosch University and an IPCC lead author. “So what happens to biodiversity will most certainly impinge on our lives in some direct and some more less direct ways, which we probably don’t fully understand yet.”
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