N. China Nexus, Agriculture-Climate change - Part 1

Agriculture is a vital industry in China, employing over 300 million farmers.  China ranks first worldwide for agricultural output, primarily producing rice, wheat, potatoes, sorghum, peanuts, tea, millet, barley, cotton, oilseed, pork, and fish. Although accounting for only 7% of the world’s arable lands agriculture in China feeds some 22% of the global population.

The northern China plain is one of china’s chief wheat-producing regions, a region where it has been discovered the water table is dropping at a shocking rate of ~1 m/yr! This disturbing fact is thought primarily to be a result of agriculture, and inefficient water drainage. 

This figure taken from S. Piao et al., 2010 shows an uneven spatial distribution of water resources between the water-abundant-south and the far drier north.  Water resources that lie in Transitional regions in between the two, could be affected either positively or negatively by climate change. Thereby having a knock-on impact on agriculture in those regions.

My next post will look into examples of the possible impacts of climate change on agriculture in China both positive and negative, and why there is so much uncertainty.