Published: September 6, 2021 6.04am AEST
Authors
- Andrew Wait Professor, University of Sydney
- Kieron Meagher Professor, Research School of Economics, Australian National University
Disclosure statement
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
The findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggest Australia may have to jettison tracts of the bush unless there is a massive investment in climate-change adaptation and planning.
The potential impacts of climate change on employment and the livability of the regions have not been adequately considered. Even if emissions are curtailed, Australia likely faces billions of dollars of adaptation costs for rural communities.
As the IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report (published last month) makes clear, the climate will change regardless of any mitigation actions taken now.
Even under its modest conservative projections, worldwide temperatures will rise by 1.5°C. That may not sound like much, but it will double the frequency of droughts — from once every 10 years to once every five.
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Worse still, a 2°C temperature rise — also a likely outcome without substantial emission reductions — will make droughts 2.5 times more frequent.
Farm profits are falling
Climate change is already hurting Australian farmers. Compared with historical averages, agricultural profits have fallen 23% over the 20 years to 2020. This trend will continue.
The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES) predicts a likely scenario is that overall farm profit will fall by 13% by 2050. There will be significant differences between regions. Cropping profits in Western Australia, for example, are predicted to drop 32%.
Effect of 2001-2020 seasonal conditions on farm profit
Comment by Nelle-climate change nonsense-this is usedto take people’s land -outright greed- Farmers are not making profits- this comes through the treachery and betrayal of govts- in the 1950’s Australia rode to prosperity on the sheep’s back and farmers became a threat that had to be dealt with and succeeding govts, both side of the centre did this – in the 60’s the price of products to keep sheep healthy went over the top and out of reach without going into debt -in the 70’s, in cohorts with the banks and in a two year drought -if you were pushed to borrow ( farmers held out as long as possible because once the banks got you were had it) interest rates for farmers were up around 23% a step too far to even think about getting on top of it so the banks took the land- the final blow came at the end of the 1990’s when Howard took the water off the farmers and they had to buy their own water back which was impossible because the prices were too high and our water became foreign-as for bloody droughts Australia is renowned for them there was even a 20 year drought back when- looking to make cash out of this phenomenon they brought in the climate change lark -how anyone can believe that man can change the climate is beyond commonsense thinking-as God created the climate and directed the sun and to a lesser extent the moon to control it -robbing countries of billions will do no good except to line the pockets of the perpetrators – our last property which had to be sold water was gold- we had a bore which pumped 50 gal an hour and an original water licence which together amounted to be worth $500.000 so we sold before govt took the water -the authors of this article are both academics so would have no on the ground knowledge-only what the books say
Nelle's journey 