5 ms·

> More farmland is lost to desert than gained to warmth Would you be able to explain why that is, or link to something that can? It's not immediately obvious t

• Chris_Jay 9y ago
  just recalling what a professor said on the subject - in the short term, those areas that gain a suitable climate for agriculture will take decades to build soil up to what agriculture requires. Places where it was too cold to grow crops won't have had enough wild biomass to build a strong soil base, so there will be a 'gap' where many places that had a climate suitable to producing a lot of biomass no longer do but places that gained a climate suitable for producing a lot of biomass don't yet have the right soil ecology. Of course, human activity could speed up the transition for these areas, but soil building is a quirky technology that's hard to scale up.
  • nickik 9y ago
    But climate change is a gradual process. Some land is lost in X, and gained in Y. That land in Y will be close to where farming currently happens and with a delay of a couple of years the farmers can extend northwards a little bit. I can't see how such a slow process could lead to a 'shortfall'.