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Get Used To High Food Prices, Water Shortages in US



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Shocked by rising food prices? Get used to it -- and be ready for water shortages, too, says a sweeping new scientific report rounding up likely effects of climate change on the United States' land, water and farms over the next half-century.

Some effects already can be felt, says the report released Tuesday, which synthesizes results of more than 1,000 individual studies.

And it's not just humans' food that's at risk, said witnesses at a congressional field hearing in Seattle on Tuesday. An intense and sudden acidification of the Pacific resulting from climate change presages a possible breakdown in the marine food web, experts said at the hearing, headed by Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.

"This is not a problem of tomorrow but a problem for today," said Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., noting that nearly 10 percent of protein in the human diet is from the oceans. "It just scares the heck out of me."

The U.S. Department of Agriculture report cataloged effects thought by scientists to be likely over the next 25 to 50 years on agriculture, land and water.

Even if greenhouse gas production stopped now, climate change already has been set in motion, said the review by 38 scientists, mostly from the federal government and universities. The panel included some of the nation's leading climate researchers.

"We have already observed the consequences," said David Schimel of the National Ecological Observatory Network, one of three lead authors. "We have a very clearly observed trend toward earlier snowmelt and more winter rain, both of which greatly complicate water management."
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