IB+Geography+-+Patterns+(effects+of+global+warming)

Please add your effects below using your research. No in-text citations are needed although, ideally, you should add information in your own words:
 * Global climate change - consequences**

__**Effect upon vegetation**__

The effect of Climate Change on vegetation is one where plants are actually being aided by this change. For example, the Amazon rainforest is a case where the growth of plants is dependent on cloud cover. With Global Climate Change, cloud cover has declined, accompanied by an increase in solar radiation, says Ramakrishna Nemani, a climate change researcher at the University of Montana in Missoula who is in charge of the study.

The added sunlight in the Amazon has led to a drastic increase in the amount of photosynthesis and vegetation growth in the area. The Amazon basin alone accounts for 42% of the global increase in vegetation. However, this positive effect on vegetation is not out of the ordinary; it was essentially predicted, and according to Dave Shimel, an atmospheric scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, it was a result that adds a whole new perspective to climate change.

While the Amazon River Basin may account for 42% of the world’s increase in vegetation, other areas have been significantly affected by Global Climate Change. For example, areas such as Australia, India, and Southern Africa have all seen increases in vegetation. For those regions in particular, the main factor for vegetation growth is water, and with the climate change comes more rain which in turn has more vegetation growth.

For countries like India, climate change has a very positive impact. As a heavily agricultural state, India’s crop depends on the monsoons that occur seasonally. With an increase in this rainfall, crops are able to grow more efficiently, thus resulting in the country having, in essence, a really good food supply.

However, Global Climate Change is cyclic, meaning that the current trend in an increasing temperature leading to increased rainfall, decreased cloud cover, increase solar radiation, etc. could end very soon. This study that produced the previous data also shows that this recent trend is a stretch of time that could end in the near future. Some proof behind this is that the temperatures in Siberia are actually dropping, showing that in some parts of the world the temperature has begun to drop. (Owen: Effects of Climate Change on Vegetation)

**__Affects of Global Warming on the human food production- by CLEMENTINE__**

1) carbon dioxide, 2) water, 3) heat Researchers believe that global warming may have a potential positive effect on agricultural production because physically it is good, but economically, not really. Economic incentives are not there because increased production means lower prices. In fact, if farmers took full advantage of the opportunities afforded by global warming, it could as much as ** double global food production. ** One issue remains though- ** prices ** would plummet to the point where, no matter how many bushels they harvested, farmers couldn't make a profit. So many would go out of business, leaving fertile land unused. The potential for greater food production is there, and if the demand is there, the supply will be there too. So we don't have to worry about mass starvation. At least not because of a worldwide shortage of food. The only thing that is believed to be worried for is the loss of economic benefits for the farmers and different key roles in the food production industry. “The link between water and food is strong,” says Dr Lester R. Brown, president of Earth Policy Institute, also based in Washington, D.C. “We drink, in one form or another, nearly 4 liters of water per day. But ** the food we consume each day requires at least 2,000 liters to produce, 500 times as much. ** ” Without water, due to global warming, food production will become harder especially in warmer countries that already have water shortages.
 * __ POSITIVE: __** If global warming continues, ** food availability will increase **, because global warming increases crops yields. This is phenomenon is due to three things that crop need more than anything –
 * BOTH- ** In parts of ** Asia **, food production in more northern areas could increase because of the favorable soils. However, in ** North America ** the northward expansion of crop-growing regions from the Midwestern United States into Canada would be limited by the thinner and less fertile soils there.
 * __ NEGATIVE: __** Agriculture is a contributor to the global warming problem. ** Methane ** is a gas created naturally as a waste product of anaerobic bacteria (living with little or no oxygen). “An estimated 19 percent of the world’s methane production comes from rice paddies;” said Dr. Alan Teramura, “As population increase in rice-growing areas, more rice – and more methane – are produced.” Concentration of methane in the atmosphere has more than doubled during the past 200 years.
 * Water resources ** are especially vulnerable to climate change. “In a warmer world, we will need more water – to drink and to irrigate crops,” said the London-based Panos Institute. “Water for agriculture is critical for food security,” points out Dr. Mark W. Rose grant, a senior research fellow at the Washington-based International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

MAIN FACTS

 * ==== Climate change affects the fundamental requirements for health – clean air, safe drinking water, sufficient food and secures shelter. ====
 * ==== Many of the significant killers such as malnutrition, malaria, diarrheal diseases, and dengue are highly climate-sensitive and are expected to worsen as the climate changes. ====
 * ==== Areas with weak health infrastructure, mostly in developing countries, will be the least able to cope without assistance to prepare and respond. ====
 * ====Extreme weather events, such as more storms, floods, droughts and heat waves, will affect the basic components of health: air, water, food, shelter, and freedom from disease. Scientists say that the effects will not be evenly distributed and the developing countries and small island nations will be hit initially. “Although the carbon footprint of the poorest billion people is about 3% of the world’s total footprint, loss of life is expected to be 500 times greater in Africa than in the wealthy countries. ====
 * ====The agricultural sector is sensitive to climate variability and rising temperatures and more frequent floods can compromise food security. Malnutrition will probably rise and mostly hurt large populations depending on rain-fed subsistence farming. Malnutrition, alone, causes approximately 3.5 million deaths each year. ====
 * ====The more extreme weather events will cause more deaths and injuries caused by floods and storms. Flooding can also lead to more outbreaks of diseases, such as cholera, when the sanitation and water services are damaged or destroyed. Floods and storms are already deadly, extreme weather events. ====
 * ====The scarcities of water, essential for hygiene, and the excess water due to more frequent and rainfall will increase the burden of diarrheal disease, which is spread through contaminated food and water. Diarrheal disease is the 2nd leading infectious cause of childhood mortality and accounts for a total of approximately 1.8 million deaths annually. ====
 * ====Heat waves, in urban “heat islands” can increase morbidity and mortality, mainly in elderly people with cardiovascular and/or respiratory disease. Apart from heat waves, higher temperatures can increase ground-level ozone and hasten the onset of the pollen season, contributing to asthma attacks. ====
 * ====Lastly, changing temperatures and patterns of rainfall may alter the geographical distribution of insect vectors that spread infectious diseases. Malaria and dengue fever are the greatest public concerns. ====
 * ====Citizens need to be more informed so that they are more equipped to make decisions and take the right actions. Reducing carbon emissions would encourage people to cut use of vehicles, and if that led to more walking and cycling it would tend to lower stress levels, reduce obesity, and lessen heart disease, lung disease and stroke risks. ====

REGION EXAMPLES

 * ==== Climate-induced disease and heat stress in Central, East, South, and South-East Asia has increased with rise in temperatures and change in rainfall variability. In East, South, and South-East Asia, morbidity and mortality are expected to increase due to diarrheal disease due to the projected changes in hydrological cycle associated with global warming. Increases in coastal water temperature would exacerbate the abundance and/or toxicity of cholera in South Asia. ====
 * ==== In parts of Africa, changes in rainfall will affect the presence and absence of water-borne pathogens. For example, Small changes in the temperature and precipitation will boost the population of disease-carrying mosquitoes and result in increased malaria epidemics. Increased flooding could make the breeding of these malaria carriers easier in formerly arid areas. In many African urban settlements, population expansion has surpassed the capacity of authorities to provide health and sanitation services. ====

__ Effects of Global Warming on Oceans __

Global warming is an increase in the Earth’s average atmospheric temperature that is caused by a large influx in greenhouse gases. The increase in the release of greenhouse gases such as CO2 and methane creates a shield around our Earth, causing heat to be trapped inside of our planet, thus causing a warming effect. Unfortunately, oceans include one of the most impacted territories because the oceans receive the CO2 remains from the atmosphere.

__ Effects: __
 * The temperature of the oceans increase
 * As the temperature of oceans increase, the amount of excess CO2 absorbed decreases
 * A rise in sea levels (through thermal expansion and ice melt)
 * The Intergovernmental Panel on climate change estimates the global average sea level will rise by 18 -59 cm by 2100.
 * Increase in air temperature impacts the physical nature of oceans
 * Changes in natural habitats for marine animals
 * Ex. The increase in the ocean acidity threatens marine life, which may lead to the extension in these organisms (ex. Corals and shellfish)
 * Change in food supply for marine animals
 * Changes in ocean acidification
 * The CO2 that is released into oceans changes the ocean chemistry tremendously
 * An increase in CO2 concentration causes an increase in the acidity of the ocean
 * Ex. As the acidity of the ocean increase, Phytoplankton is reduced.
 * Result: less ocean plants able to uptake greenhouse gases

__** Effects of climate change upon land - Lizzy **__ **\Due to increased CO2 emissions, precipitation rates and patterns become altered, sometimes significantly, thus affecting the water levels and agriculture almost universally within the US. However, in certain agricultural realms, the hotter climate has been beneficial, such as in the vineries stretching across California and in France and Italy.** = =
 * **Climate change has "likely increased" the effects and prevalence of forest fires, insect plagues, and tree mortality. Climate change will also increase photosynthesis, due to the increased amounts of CO2; however, this will likely only affect young growth forests in fertile soil. Regardless, climate change will likely continue to increase not only forest growth, but general plant growth as well, thanks to the increased CO2 and generalized warmer temperatures overall.**
 * **Arid climates, namely deserts, may suffer at the hands of increased drought due to a loss of or shift in rain patterns, and to an overall loss of protective vegetation dead at the hands of extreme drought. Additionally, these same conditions may well lead to a proliferation of exotic grasses, which provide fuel for wildfires that inevitably spring up when water is scarce, vegetation is dry and temperatures are high. Deserts tend to not coevolve with fires, thus the loss of megaflora may be possible thanks to a lack of a predisposition toward fire tolerance. Deserts are also poor conservers of CO2, and thus are prone to greater loss of it as environmental disturbances increase.**
 * **In the Amazon, scientists estimate that much of the dense jungle will be replaced by savannah due to an overall diminishment in rain, resulting in an enormous loss of flora and fauna, not to mention one of the greatest storage spaces of C02, the Amazon rainforest.**
 * **Permafrost, common in tundras such as Siberia and northern Canada, is 'almost certain' to undergo a degree of melting over the next several decades thanks to climate change. Permafrost is an incredibly efficient conserver of CO2 along with methane, and its melting would result both in huge emissions of the gases into the atmosphere but a loss of one of the most effective storage spaces of them. Permafrost is also crucial for land stability, and its melting would result in accelerated erosion and general subsidence, wherein soil that was supported by the permafrost then collapses, wreaking havoc on the surface and the plants and animals, along with land formations and infrastructure, resting upon it.**
 * **Due to more extreme, sudden rainfall, universal soil degradation and erosion are foreseen; however, due to the nature of the relationship between carbon and nitrogen, where the ratio between the two is a constant, the increase in carbon would also mean an increase in nitrogen, increasing the fertility of soil while also possibly adding to the hydration of the soil.**
 * **One of the more publicized effects of climate change upon land is the melting and receding of glaciers and the ensuing influx of fresh water that would be introduced to the seas, along with possible landslides and floods caused by rushes of quickly melting water. In Montana’s Glacier Park, only a fraction of the glaciers that were historically there are left, and it is projected that they will have melted entirely in less than 50 years.**
 * **Increase in sea levels due to melting glaciers may harm some urban areas, namely New York and Venice, and already the island nation Kiribati has declared its islands uninhabitable due to flooding and rising sea levels, and had to ask for aid in evacuating its population from the submerged islands.**
 * **Oceans absorb much of the excess CO2 emitted by industrialization where, after reacting with sea water, turns into carbonic acid, which destroys coral reefs. This is a problem in areas where oceans and coral reefs specifically are part of the local economy – Australia’s Gold Coast, for example, is suffering greatly at the hands of the rampant coral bleach climate change is creating**

**The effect of climate change on war and conflict**

Researchers warned that global warming presents significant national security challenges to the United States. The United Nations Security Council held the first debate on the impact of climate changed on conflicts. The declining amounts of food, water and land may be leading to an increase in conflict and war. Scientists and military analysts suggest that climate change and its consequences such as food and water instability pose threats for war and conflict. Countries suffering from water shortages and crops loss become vulnerable to insecurity, such as regional instability and aggression. National security experts suggest that the roots of the current conflict in Sudan’s Darfur region are the impacts of climate change, specifically the reduction of available natural resources. The violence in Darfur broke out during a time of drought, after two decades of rain scarcity along with the rising temperatures in the Indian Ocean. In 2009, Marhall Burke, an economist at the University of California argued that higher temperatures increase the risk of civil conflict, and that the climate change predicted by 2030 could cause a 54% increase in armed civil conflict in Africa, leading to 393,000 additional battle deaths. Researchers from Princeton University found that the El Nino climate cycle had a big impact on civil conflict over the past 50 years. El Nino is a part of the El Nino-Southern Oscillation cycle, which involves the periodic warming and cooling of the tropical Pacific Ocean. The El Nino phase occurs every three to seven years and tends to bring unusually high temperatures and dry weather to tropical countries. The researchers found that the arrival of the El Nino phase doubled the risk of civil conflict across 90 affected tropical countries, and may help account for a fifth of worldwide conflicts over the past 50 years.

__The Effects of Climate Change on Human Migration__ Climate change impacts all aspects of human life but specifically in the past 10 years has also had a large impact on migration patterns throughout the world. Because global warming often times leads to hotter, drier climtaes food production and crop yeild is affected. As many people in LEDC's are completly dependant on agriculture a significant decrease in agriculatural yeild can force many to consider immigration from their land to nations or areas that have other job oppertunities or more ideal growing climate. One National Geographic study predicted that in the case of Mexico, over 7 million additional migrants will settle in the United States over the next 70 years if all other factors affecting migration stay unchanged. In the case of Uganda's Coffee Industry, new reports warn that any increase in temperature within the area could threaten to destroy Uganda's entire coffee bean crop which is repsonsible for half the country's revenue. The reason is that the crop now has less time to mature because rain is falling at the wrong times which affects the quaility. There have also been an increase in droughts in the past three years. "If the coffee beans face a lot of sunshine and less rain, the beans will be smaller and in lower yields, We are worried about the temperature, but we have limited resources," (Ronald Buule) National Geographic states that a rise in the national average temperature in Uganda makes most of the area unsuitable for agricultureal growth. Because of these factors and new changes in crop yeild, many Ugandans now are facing the possibility of migration from affected areas to more fertile land.