Joint FAO-WMO Report: Extreme Heat and Global Food Systems (2026)

Why in News?

A joint report released by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warns that extreme heat is primary threat to global food security.

Key Findings

• Most major food crops begin to suffer yield losses once temperatures exceed 30°C.
• Crop Yield Reductions (Per 1°C of Warming)
  • Maize: -7.5% baseline drop (with future projections modelling up to a 10% fall per additional degree Celsius).
  • Soybean: -6.8% drop.
  • Wheat: -6.0% drop.

• The report underscores that grain production has shown negligible adaptation or increased resilience to extreme heat over the last 50 years.
• Total Factor Productivity (TFP) Impact - Due to escalating heat stress on land, capital, and labour, global agricultural productivity has been slashed by 21% since 1961.
• It effectively erases nearly 7 full years of structural, technological and agronomic gains.

Specific Vulnerabilities of India’s Agrifood System

• The FAO-WMO report highlights India as a high-risk zone.
• Rice Crop Vulnerability - More frequent, intense heatwaves during crucial growth phases are destabilising rice yields.
• While Indian farmers are implementing adaptive manoeuvres such as altering sowing calendars, adopting heat-tolerant/early-flowering cultivars, and deploying surface-cooling irrigation these measures are hitting physical and biological limits.
• Severe Labor Deficits - India’s agrarian economy relies heavily on outdoor manual labour.
• Data reveals that in 2024, an average Indian agricultural worker lost 648 working hours (equivalent to 54 full working days) to dangerous heat stress.
• The Wet-Bulb Peril - Under high-emission trajectories, major portions of the economically vital Ganga and Indus river basins are projected to experience wet-bulb temperatures.
• It approaches or breach safe biological thresholds for human survival during outdoor physical activity.

Reference

Down to Earth | FAO-WMO report