Chocolate Shortage May Lead To Disappearance Within 40 Years

[nec209]

 

 

(International Business Times) Chocolate could reportedly vanish as early as 2050. This revelation has led scientists from the University of California at Berkeley to work with Virginia-based manufacturer Mars, Incorporated to save the cacao plant from disappearing. 

 

Warmer temperatures and drier weather conditions are expected to be the root of the cacao plants' potential disappearance, according to Business Insider. New technology, known as CRISPR, is being used by UC Berkeley scientists to modify the DNA of the plants. The crop's tiny seedlings would be able to survive in different climates if the experiment is proven successful.

 

Cacao plants originated millions of years ago in South America. The crop is only capable of growing in the lower story of the evergreen rainforest, where warm temperatures and rainfall are plentiful. It's also frequently victim to fungal disease and climate change. More than half of the world's chocolate now comes from two countries in West Africa, being Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana.

 

However, these regions will soon become an unsuitable host environment for the cacao plant. 

 

Joseph Boahen Aidoo, chief executive of Ghana's cocoa board COCOBOD, specifically addressed the Cocoa Swollen Shoot Virus (CSSVD) infesting farms throughout the country in addition to ongoing pest problems wreaking havoc on the cocoa farms. Speaking with GhanaWeb Saturday, Aidoo detailed his recent tours of the country's Western South and North cocoa growing fields. Aidoo called upon Ghana health officials and accompanying government economic directors to collect samples of the current diseased pods for study on how to rehabilitate the country's infestation issues.

 

https://www.ibtimes.com/chocolate-shortage-may-lead-disappearance-within-40-years-scientists-say-2635577?utm_source=internal&utm_campaign=most_read&utm_medium=most_read5

 

 

 

 

 

 

Other sad one.

 

New Study: Eat Your Strawberries Before Climate Change Wipes Them Out

(Mother Jones) With its year-round sunshine and vast tracts of fertile land, California is one of the jewels of US food production, providing a third of the nation’s vegetables and two-thirds of our fruits and nuts. As the climate warms, can we continue to take this $50.5 billion bounty for granted? 

 

That’s the question posed by a team of University of California researchers in an eye-opening new paper published in the journal Agronomy, in which they digest recent research to “document the most current understanding on California’s climate change trends in terms of temperature, precipitation, snowpack, and extreme events such as heat waves, drought, and flooding, and their relative impacts” on the state’s agriculture.

They address these topics one by one, and the results are hardly comforting to US eaters

 For one thing, the scientists found, a temperature change of just a few degrees is “closely related to yield reductions” in some of the most cherished California crops: almonds, wine grapes, strawberries, walnuts, freestone peaches, and cherries. Avocado production could plummet by the middle of the century. Because of fewer winter chill hours, by the end of the century, the paper suggests, only 10 percent of the Central Valley will remain viable to grow fruits like apricots, kiwis, peaches, and nectarines

 

https://www.motherjones.com/food/2018/03/strawberries-almonds-climate-change-drought-snowpack-california-yields/

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 11, 2019 by nec209