Climate change, Agricultural Practices and Food Security: An analysis of the Indian Scenario with Special Reference to the Food Security Act, 2013

Abstract

The undesirable effects of climate change are anticipated to affect the populations with the least capacity to adjust, but with the highest need for improved agricultural performance to achieve food security and decrease poverty. Food security is a condition related to the supply of food, and individuals' access to it. Concerns over food security have existed throughout antiquity. The necessity to challenge climate change while producing more food to feed the world’s growing population means that “climate-smart agriculture” (CSA) is one of the advocated ways forward. This method principally defends an agriculture that sustainably increases productivity, resilience. This will concurrently help meet the goals of food security and overall development. This also envisages transformation of agriculture to feed a growing population in the face of a changing climate without destroying the natural resource base pointedly and alleviate the negative effects of climate change. However, more productive and resilient agriculture will require improved management of natural resources, such as land, water, soil and genetic resources through practices such as conservation agriculture, integrated pest management, agro-forestry and sustainable diets. Climate change hovers production’s stability and productivity. In several areas of the world where agricultural productivity is already low and the means of coping with adverse events are limited, climate change is expected to reduce productivity to even lower levels and make production more irregular. Long term changes in the outlines of temperature and precipitation, that are part of climate change, are expected to move production seasons, pest and disease patterns, and modify the set of viable crops affecting production, prices, incomes and eventually, livings and lives. India is no exception to the changing climate patterns and global warming. With its ever-rising population the need for food security is a greater burden. India’s population and the enactment of Food Security Act, 2013 imposes obligation on the government to improve agricultural practices to feed billions of people. Unfortunately, the Act does not mention the concept of climate smart agriculture nor the ways to deal with food security in the light of climate change, to deal with the challenges which it must meet successfully. The purpose of this paper is to examine the concept and relationship between climate change and agricultural practices related to climate smart agriculture; to evaluate the concept of climate smart agriculture in the international context; to analyse the Food Security Act, 2013 critically from the perspective of climate change and productivity development; and finally, to put forth suggestions to deal with the challenge in the present day context. The study is purely doctrinal with material collected from primary and secondary sources.