--- title: How Climate Disasters Are Making Food Expensive Everywhere description: Food can be more climate resilient. But we have to work together, writes Himanshu Gupta. canonical: https://time.com/7010929/climate-disaster-food-cost-essay/ author: Himanshu Gupta article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2024-08-16T11:00:00.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:03:28.171Z article:section: Ideas og:title: How Climate Disasters Are Making Food Expensive Everywhere og:description: Food can be more climate resilient. But we have to work together, writes Himanshu Gupta. og:url: https://time.com/7010929/climate-disaster-food-cost-essay/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb19d56bb1298c4dc/698a59df86f68e19586f5771/Agrentina-Wheat-Environment-2023.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: ARGENTINA-ENVIRONMENT-WEATHER og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How Climate Disasters Are Making Food Expensive Everywhere twitter:description: Food can be more climate resilient. But we have to work together, writes Himanshu Gupta. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb19d56bb1298c4dc/698a59df86f68e19586f5771/Agrentina-Wheat-Environment-2023.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 --- # How Climate Disasters Are Making Food Expensive Everywhere > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. 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It explains how TIME's journalism is made, from the first pitch through the editorial decisions behind a finished story or cover. #### How can I read about how TIME chooses its covers? Inside TIME is the newsletter where TIME's Editor-in-Chief explains cover selection and the editorial reasoning behind major stories. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Who is the editor of TIME? Sam Jacobs is TIME's Editor-in-Chief. He writes Inside TIME, a twice-weekly newsletter about the newsroom's reporting and editorial decisions. #### Is Inside TIME free? Yes. Inside TIME is a free newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ## Video: Food Satisfaction Steady As Inflation Slows [Watch (HLS stream): Food Satisfaction Steady As Inflation Slows](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/BToXhOel.m3u8) (3:32)  _Published 2024-08-14. The annual inflation rate has cooled, new data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics revealed on Wednesday. And another report from Purdue University released in July says that 85 percent of Americans say they are happy with the foods they eat, despite high food inflation._ Aug 16, 2024 11:00 AM UTC  A harvesting machine collects corn in a field in Baradero, Argentina, on March 30, 2023\. Short of foreign exchange earnings, Argentina faced its worst drought in decades in 2023, with devastating effects on the soybean, wheat, and maize crops. A harvesting machine collects corn in a field in Baradero, Argentina, on March 30, 2023\. Short of foreign exchange earnings, Argentina faced its worst drought in decades in 2023, with devastating effects on the soybean, wheat, and maize crops. Luis Robayo—AFP/Getty Images by [Himanshu Gupta](https://time.com/author/himanshu-gupta-2/) ## Himanshu Gupta Aug 16, 2024 11:00 AM UTC In today’s climate-changing world, climate events thousands of miles away drive the cost of everything around us—from a flight ticket to a new piece of clothing to the market price of a meal at your favorite restaurant. Take olive oil and chocolate as examples. Severe droughts in the Mediterranean have slashed Spain's olive harvest by [40%,](https://www.foodingredientsfirst.com/news/olive-oil-prices-climb-as-production-falls-to-lowest-levels-in-a-decade.html) driving up prices by [27%](https://ycharts.com/indicators/olive%5Foil%5Fprice) in June compared to last year for American consumers. Similarly[, t](https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2024/04/04/cocoa-crisis-hits-chocolate-which-companies-will-survive)he price of some[ chocolates](https://www.foodnavigator.com/Article/2024/04/04/cocoa-crisis-hits-chocolate-which-companies-will-survive), such as Cadbury’s Freddo, are already [higher by 200%](https://www.newsweek.com/chocolate-prices-surge-cocoa-supply-1937973) this year in Australia with similar price rise expected in the U.S markets, driven mostly by the extreme weather impacting small-holder cocoa farmers in Ghana and Ivory Coast. Such climate disasters in wheat producing countries such as [Argentina](https://www.nasdaq.com/articles/argentina-drought-should-keep-wheat-soybean-prices-afloat) also impact essential food products such as breakfast cereal, pasta, and bread. The price of wheat—and wheat-based food products—has experienced some of its [greatest volatility in years](https://www.iatp.org/global-hunger-remains-intractable-food-price-volatility-accelerates) since 2021\. Why? Wheat production in Argentina was hit by drought in 2021and then in 2023, panicking global wheat supply chains already stressed by the Russia-Ukraine crisis. Food companies reacted to this volatility by preemptively increasing consumer prices. Wheat price spikes might mean an extra dollar for pasta for me as an Indian American now living in California, but for my cousins back in India, food inflation means cuts elsewhere, like [education budgets](https://www.globalcitizen.org/es/content/food-inflation-india-rising/). Growing up in countryside India in a joint family of 14, we often faced these challenges. When food prices increased, my three siblings and I had to switch to buying second-hand textbooks at the start of the new school year. A similar pattern [has been observed in low-income American households](https://www.minneapolisfed.org/article/2022/as-inflation-rises-low-income-households-grapple-with-particular-challenges), too, who switch to canned fruits and vegetables from fresh ones in response to rising food prices. Our planet is locked into several decades of climate change, regardless of our current mitigation actions. As an entrepreneur working to make food and agriculture supply chains more climate-resilient, I know we need to fundamentally rethink our approach to supply chains to ensure affordable, available food for all. **_Read More:_**[ _How to Feed the World Sustainably_](https://time.com/collection/davos-2024-ideas-of-the-year/6551977/food-supply-sustainability-glenn-denning/) Food supply chains are among the most critical in the world, and they face some of the biggest climate change-related threats, such as extreme weather, rising temperatures, and water scarcity impacting crop yield and quality—all of which affect food security. But while climate change contributes significantly to this problem, other events such as wars compound it. Consequently, many governments enter “panic mode” and enact protectionist measures to protect their interests. However, this often has domino effects that add to the exact problem they intend to avoid—price surges across food supply chains disproportionately impacting lower and middle-income consumers, including farmers who [are net consumers themselves](https://www.ifad.org/documents/38714170/40237799/Higher+and+volatile+food+prices+and+poor+rural+people%5Fe.pdf/efdbb8ce-8d01-4027-96eb-a8b08f7ace26). Meaning, many farmers spend more money on food for their families than they make by farming crops. In theory, policies such as nearshoring (relocating supply chains to neighboring countries such as Mexico), friendshoring (relocating supply chains to ally nations such as India) and “America First” are helpful for semiconductor supply chains. But they can’t work in food supply chains. [Sriracha peppers](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/sriracha-shortage-expensive-bottles-selling-online/) can’t grow in Minneapolis, and [avocados](https://www.tpr.org/economy-and-labor/2024-06-21/u-s-halts-avocado-imports-from-mexico-after-inspectors-caught-up-in-violence) can’t grow in Canada. Even if countries succeed in diversifying their food supply chains with friendly nations, it doesn’t necessarily mean that supply chains on both sides won't be impacted simultaneously by climate events . Instead, we need a radical rethinking of our approach to building resilience in food supply chains. So far, all the approaches to climate adaptation are country or company-specific. But this global challenge requires a global solution: a collective, cooperative effort that is proactive rather than reactive from governments and companies on an international supply chain level to build resilience in the face of climate change. One of those global initiatives could be to launch supply chain climate adaptation plans (S-CAPs). These plans, similar to national climate adaptation plans, would be led by multilateral organizations—WTO or World Bank in collaboration with governments—and private sector companies in food, agrochemical, and transportation sectors. They would start by identifying vulnerable global food supply chains, focusing on essential foods like wheat and rice. They would map out areas prone to climate risks, critical transport routes, and important farming regions. Then, they would develop strategies and identify projects to reduce these risks, such as creating climate-resistant seeds, diversifying transport methods, investing in technology to detect hazards, and growing crops in safer areas. An effort like this would require funding—a combination of international funding and companies’ contributions to support assessments, R&D, and implementation. In fact, unlike initiatives for cutting carbon emissions, driven mainly by reputational and regulatory concerns, initiatives to protect our food supply chains could have[ 2 times to 10 times ](https://www.wri.org/initiatives/adaptation-finance#:~:text=There's%20a%20strong%20economic%20case,return%20between%20%242%20and%20%2410.)the return on investment in the short-to-medium term. For instance, Ethiopia's investment in drought-resistant crops and water management [increased yields by 40% and enhanced food security](https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/2023-12/FY%202022%20GFSS%20Implementation%20Report.pdf), returning $2 to $4 for every $1 spent. An international agreement might not sound like the most exciting climate change solution, but it can help keep food stocked and prices low for everyday consumers. When the COVID-19 crisis hit, the world came together and went from having no knowledge of the virus to developing and deploying 5 billion vaccines within 18 months. We can certainly replicate that for the food crisis. But a collaboration mindset, rather than an America-first isolationist mindset, is critical to succeed. ## Transcript In our July survey, we focused on two themes. The first is food happiness. We directly ask consumers how they feel about the food choices that are in front of them. And then the second theme in our July survey was access to and use of farmers markets. The key takeaway is that the vast majority of Americans, 85% of respondents in our survey tell us they're happy or very happy with their diets with the food that they eat. Interestingly, the share of Americans that tell us that they're happy with their food hasn't really changed much in the 2.5 years that we've been collecting this data. It remains at about 85%, even through a of really high food inflation. That's not to say that Americans like high food prices or like rapid inflation. But through that bout of inflation, Americans have remained happy with their diets. On food prices, food inflation in July was 2.2% on an annual basis. That's the lowest reading we've seen since we started collecting data in January of 2022, and Americans have noticed, and they're optimistic. They continue to tell us that they expect food inflation to be lower in the coming year than it has been in the past year. The other issue that we explored is access to and use of farmers markets. Summer, for many of us in the United States, is farmer market season. And so we ask consumers, one, do they have access, and two, do they shop at those farmers' markets? 82% of Americans in our survey tell us that they have access to a farmer's market. Of those four of five, 80% tell us they plan to shop for food at a farmer's market. And while there are some differences across income groups, what we find is that across the income spectrum, Americans plan to take advantage of the fresh produce local foods that are made available to them in our farmers markets. Prices of produce at farmers markets tend to be higher than at the grocery store. But you still see people choosing to do their shopping at farmers markets. And I think that's for a couple of reasons. One is because of quality. The tomatoes grown locally are often a better tasting, better looking, fresher than the ones you might find in the grocery store. And then I think also, there's an experience in the farmers market that you don't get in the grocery store, you come together people from across the community. 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