Egypt's agriculture sector at risk due to climate variability.

Climate variability is a term commonly used to describe any type of change in climate, whether natural or induced by humans, such as rising temperatures, unpredictable rainfall, soil moisture loss, and increased evaporation and transpiration.

Egypt, located in the Middle East and North Africa region, is regarded as a potential hotspot of climate change, with warming and an increase in the frequency of extreme temperatures occurring faster than on a global scale. Researchers have discovered that when comparing 2006-2015 extreme temperature data, hot days and nights are becoming more common at all sites.

Other researchers examined the meteorological conditions over Egypt's Safaga Harbour on an hourly basis from 2007 to 2017. The findings revealed a general trend of slight increases in mean annual air temperature and sea level pressure, but a decrease in mean annual relative humidity.

Agriculture at Risk
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) stated in 2017, "The manner in which human beings respond to climate variability is critical not only to survival but also to well-being." The IPCC highlights the expected effects of extreme weather events caused by climate variability on agriculture, causing crop yield instability and posing a high risk to global production, as noted in its 2011 report. Climate variability has posed serious challenges to Egyptian agriculture, resulting in significant negative impacts on crop yield and, as a result, food security.

According to academics, during the 1998 growing season, rice plants were subjected to a heatwave during the flowering and grain filling stages, leading to a decrease in national rice production. Similarly, wheat production was reduced in 2010 due to a heatwave that prevailed during that year, causing an average decrease of 15% across Egypt.

The World Bank Environment Department has highlighted the uniqueness of Egypt's agriculture sector, namely that all agricultural land is irrigated with Nile River water. With Egypt's population expected to double by 2060, increased agricultural production will be necessary, but the country remains vulnerable to climate change due to its reliance on natural resources.

Climate-Smart Agriculture
In 2010, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) introduced a climate-smart agriculture (CSA) approach with the goal of increasing agricultural productivity and incomes in a sustainable manner, building climate resilience, and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. CSA emphasizes the importance of changing agricultural management practices, including water and soil management, to ensure their efficient and sustainable use for producing more food and adapting to climate change.

Climate-smart agriculture has also been recognized as a strategy for transforming and reorienting agricultural systems to support food security in the face of new climate-change realities. Through four main action areas, CSA promotes coordinated actions by farmers, researchers, private sector actors, policymakers, and agricultural financiers towards climate-resilient pathways. These actions include building evidence, increasing local institutional effectiveness, fostering coherence between climate and agricultural policies, and enhancing agricultural financing.

References

1. FAO (2010). Climate-smart agriculture: Policies, practices and financing for food security, adaptation and mitigation. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

2. IPCC (2011). Climate change: Impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. J. J. McCarthy, O. F. Canziani, N. A. Leary, D. J. Dokken, & K. S. White (Eds.). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

3. Khalil, A. A., & Hassanein, M. K. (2016). Extreme weather events and negative impacts on Egyptian agriculture. International Journal of Advanced Research, 4(12), 1843–1851.

4. Lipper, L., Thornton, P., Campbell, B. M., Baedeker, T., Braimoh, A., Bwalya, M., & Torquebiau, E. F. (2014). Climate-smart agriculture for food security. Nature Climate Change, 4(12), 1068–1072.

5. Mostafa, A. N., Wheida, A., El Nazer, M., Adel, M., El Leithy, L., Siour, G., & Alfaro, S. C. (2019). Past (1950–2017) and future (−2100) temperature and precipitation trends in Egypt. Weather and Climate Extremes, 26, 100225.

6. Ouda, S., & Zohry, A. E. H. (2022). Climate-Smart Agriculture. Springer Nature.

7. Tonbol, K. M., El-Geziry, T. M., & Elbessa, M. (2019). Assessment of weather variability over Safaga Harbour, Egypt. Arabian Journal of Geosciences, 12(24), 1–8.

8. Yates, D. N., & Strzepek, K. M. (1996). Modeling economy-wide climate change impacts on Egypt: A case for an integrated approach. Environmental Modeling and Assessment, 1, 119–135.