Plant pathogen infection risk tracks global crop yields under climate change

Thomas M. Chaloner, Sarah J. Gurr and Daniel P. Bebber ()
Additional contact information
Thomas M. Chaloner: University of Exeter
Sarah J. Gurr: University of Exeter
Daniel P. Bebber: University of Exeter

Nature Climate Change, 2021, vol. 11, issue 8, 710-715

Abstract: Abstract Global food security is strongly determined by crop production. Climate change-induced losses to production can occur directly or indirectly, including via the distributions and impacts of plant pathogens. However, the likely changes in pathogen pressure in relation to global crop production are poorly understood. Here we show that temperature-dependent infection risk, r(T), for 80 fungal and oomycete crop pathogens will track projected yield changes in 12 crops over the twenty-first century. For most crops, both yields and r(T) are likely to increase at high latitudes. In contrast, the tropics will see little or no productivity gains, and r(T) is likely to decline. In addition, the United States, Europe and China may experience major changes in pathogen assemblages. The benefits of yield gains may therefore be tempered by the greater burden of crop protection due to increased disease and unfamiliar pathogens.

Date: 2021
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-021-01104-8 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcli:v:11:y:2021:i:8:d:10.1038_s41558-021-01104-8

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/nclimate/

DOI: 10.1038/s41558-021-01104-8

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Climate Change is currently edited by Bronwyn Wake

More articles in Nature Climate Change from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().