Hot meals: feeding a warming world.

• Author: Bailey, Ronald
• Position: Citings - Brief article

CLIMATE CHANGE pessimists frequently assume that farmers will not adapt to warmer weather and changes in rainfall. But according to a new Reason Foundation report, agricultural history suggests otherwise.

By shifting to high-field Green Revolution crops and technologies, note Reason Foundation Vice President for Research Julian Morris and Ohio State University natural resources economist Douglas Southgate, farmers around the globe have boosted grain production by more than 150 percent since the 1950s. Grain prices have fallen nearly 80 percent in the same period. The upshot: Even assuming that the warming projections of the computer climate models turn out to be correct, farmers will be able to adapt and feed the world's burgeoning population.

After a 2008 spike, food prices have settled back to their...