HEATING UP: Every 1-degree-Celsius increase in nighttime temperature led to a 10 percent reduction in rice yield over a 25-year experiment, according to researchers.
Image: ISTOCKPHOTO/vicnt
Climate change has made nights warmer in India over the past decade, an ominous sign for the nation's vital rice crop.
This development could have a far-reaching impact on the yield of rice, causing a shortfall in an important staple crop in a crowded country already grappling with food security and inflationary issues, said Krishna Kumar Kanikicharla, a scientist at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology in Pune, India.
A nighttime temperature increase of 0.20 degree Celsius has been seen in the past decade, said Kanikicharla. This is higher than the measured daytime increase of 0.16 degree Celsius over the same period. His findings will be published in the journal Climate Research shortly.
This is the first time that a nighttime temperature rise has been observed in India. The Earth radiates back heat at night, so a tight blanket of greenhouse gases and clouds in the upper atmosphere acts as a block to prevent radiation back into space. As a result of this blanketing, warmer nights can be an indicator of climate change, according to some experts.
South Asia's agriculture will be hard hit by rising temperatures and irregular rainfall associated with climate change, according to experts. Since witnessing a near tripling of yields between the 1950s and 2000s due largely to the technological advances of the first green revolution, India's yields of rice have leveled off in recent years, according to data from the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization.
The production of food grains, which are an important source of protein in the largely vegetarian nation, has been far outstripped by population growth, said R. Rukmani, director of food security at the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation.
Yields drop as nighttime temperatures rise
The effect of increasingly hot nights on rice cultivation has been measured in a controlled experiment in the Philippines by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI).
Researchers were serendipitously growing rice in a plot next to a weather station making detailed temperature measurements. The rice was given a stable amount of water and other nutrients, and the only variable factor was the sun.
After about 25 years, the researchers realized that the two data sets could be easily compared to figure out the effect of temperature on rice.
"Every 1-degree-Celsius increase in nighttime temperature led a 10 percent reduction in yield," said Kenneth Cassman, a professor of agronomy at the University of Nebraska and a co-author in the IRRI project.
That is a large amount because a major part of the projected 4-degree-Celsius increase in temperature due to climate change will happen at night, said Cassman. In a situation analogous to running a marathon on a hot summer day, the plant finds it difficult to respire and requires more energy.
The plant also releases large amounts of a reactive molecule called a "reactive oxygen species," according to Abdul Razack Mohammed and Lee Tarpley, agronomists at the Texas AgriLife Research and Extension Center. They tested rice at nighttime temperatures of 32 degrees Celsius and found that the released oxygen molecules damage the membranes of the leaf.
Ruling out other variables
The plants also have less pollen germination and can't reproduce as successfully, according to Mohammed. Their rice yields fell by 90 percent.
See what we're tweeting about
3 Comments
Add CommentAlong with obvious changes, like ice shelves disintegrating and glaciers retreating, the changing of plants is yet another warning about climate change.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPlants know no politics and when their boundaries shift, when they grow farther north than previously or do not grow as well in their current locations it will have an effect on the human population.
The growers who jump to believe urban legend of "springs arriving early" are faced with cold reality of plants don't buying global warming stories.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@Tegiri Nenashi -
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEven with your horrible grammar you post is still ridiculous.