We are Living in the Future: Reflections on a Changing Climate

One of my favorite artists is John Prine, a notable country-folk musician who was born in Illinois and had an amazing way of writing lyrics that make you think. Lately, I’ve been thinking about the chorus of his song “Living in the Future.”

“We are living in the future. I’ll tell you how I know. I read it in the paper, fifteen years ago.”

While John Prine probably had something else in mind when he wrote that song, I’ve been thinking about this in context of climate change. For how many years have we been reading about increased drought, floods, and catastrophic hurricanes? 

 

Jean Brokish, Deputy Director for the Midwest Region of American Farmland Trust and ISAP Board Member, shared insights from the agriculture sector with climate scientists at the recent Climate Data Summit.   

 

The term “Global Warming” was used as early as 1975, replaced largely by the term “Climate Change” in the early 2000s. But scientists first started warning about the impacts of climate change in the 1950s! While we can (and should) engage in healthy debate over the causes and solutions of climate change, it doesn’t feel productive to deny that it exists. Evidence that we’re living in the future is all around us.

Today’s Headlines

Hurricanes Helene and Milton are two prime examples. Warmer ocean temperatures increase hurricane strength, leading to more rain and higher winds.  Greater hurricane strength is pushing the effects of hurricanes further inland. The devastation in western North Carolina is evidence of this, as is the windy weather many Illinois communities experienced back in September. 

We’ve read that more extreme drought is likely, and we’ve read that some places will likely get wetter. And we’ve seen both happening – in the same year! Wetter springs followed by hot, dry summers are not unusual. At ISAP’s 2020 Risk Management Conference, Eric Snodgrass, Atmospheric Scientist at Nutrien, shared data suggesting that wetter springs are more often followed by drier summers. He also highlighted the shrinking number of days suitable for field work due to more frequent and larger rain storms during the spring planting season. 

Unpredictable Yields 

Farmers feel the impacts of changing climate as they try to get crops planted. They also feel the impacts on yield and profit, and are relying more and more on crop insurance to offset the economic losses. Since 2000, annual indemnity payments have increased on average by 19.6% per year, approaching a staggering $20B in 2022 (USDA Economic Research Service and USDA Risk Management Agency). Drought consistently was a leading cause of losses covered by crop insurance, followed by excess moisture.  

 

Since 2000, 43.7% of total indemnity payments were for losses attributed to drought or high temperature. Excess moisture is also frequently responsible for large indemnities—25.6% of total indemnity payments since 2000. Source USDA ERS.

 

Transportation Challenges 

Last month’s headline in an article published by the Associated Press read “The Mississippi River is running low again. It’s a problem for farmers moving beans and grain.” The article indicated that 2024 was the third straight year of low water levels, forcing barges to reduce loads, limiting how much grain can reach international markets, and ultimately cutting into farm profits.  

 

Recent headlines report that the third straight year of lower than usual water levels in the Mississippi River are impacting access to international grain markets.  (photo courtesy of Hoosier Ag Today)

 

I’m curious what water levels will be in 2025? 2026? 2030? 2035? At what point does this become “usual” and we need to start thinking about other ways of doing business?  

 

Fruit Crops are Suffering 

We’re all familiar with the impacts of a late frost on orchard crops – no peaches or oranges or apples. But how many of us are aware that many fruit crops require minimum chilling hours in order to set fruit? Milder winters are creating challenges for orchard crops per data shared by Bill Hohenstein, USDA’s Director of Energy and Environmental Policy, at a recent webinar hosted by Agri-Pulse Communications.

 

Peach orchards in the Southeastern US have not met the required chilling hours six of the last nine years, despite historical averages well above the minimum requirement. 

 

What does this mean for production and profitability of those farms? Do we need to be breeding new varieties that have lower chilling requirements? Do we need to be thinking about different crops altogether?  What do we need to be doing now to ensure that markets and infrastructure can support the future conditions? 

 

Multiple Impacts on Agriculture

Other impacts on agriculture include greater need for irrigation, increased insect and disease pressure, yield resiliency and profitability, livestock comfort, and the critical need to ensure  health and safety of people working on farms.

These are some of the many challenges I shared at a Climate Data Summit held in Champaign. I was invited to highlight some of the ways that climate data could be used to inform agriculture decisions now and in the future. I was in a room full of data scientists, computer modelers, engineers, meteorologists, and climate scientists. Every person in that room is committed to better understanding and predicting the impacts of climate change. I spoke with a lot of people who said I helped them understand some of the real-world impacts of climate change, and I left with a deep appreciation of the commitment to, and complexity of, the effort ahead. It will require all of us as individuals, communities, and countries to succeed.  What future can we begin writing today?   

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Jean Brokish