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Climate change could be positive for Midwestern agriculture

Climate change is taking place, and it may be occurring at a faster pace than some expertshave previously estimated.

That assessment comes from Gene Takle, ISU agronomy professor and director of the ISU Climate Center. But Takle says that, in the short term anyway, climate change is not necessarily bad for Midwestern agriculture.

“Well, we are already seeing some changes,” says Takle. “Farmers are planting earlier in the spring. They’re able to use longer-season hybrids. Certainly in the Midwest here, the balance of changes are positive for agricultural production—so we shouldn’t overlook that and we should betaking advantage where we can.

“We expect to see more precipitation,” Takle explains. “We expect to see warmer winter temperatures. In the short term, anyway, we’ll see milder summer temperatures—or continuing mild summer temperatures. These are all good foragriculture.”

Takle says geneticists and plant breeders will need to modify crops to meet the new climate challenges. “If we could design crops that were drought tolerant, for those regions that will be drought-prone—but also are able to tolerate water-loggedsoils—those would be good,” he says. “Longer season hybrids should be available because our growing season is being extended, to a certain extent.”

Where climate change brings increased humidity and rainfall, Takle says, crops may also be subject to newpests and pathogens.

Takle made his comments in Ames Tuesday during the sixth annual symposium of Iowa State University’s Biosafety Institute for Genetically Modified Agricultural Products.