An article in National Geographic looks at possible changes in the climate of the Andes, how they will affect potatoes, and what breeders are doing about it. The wild relatives are very much to the fore:
“The crosses we are developing between wild, drought-tolerant varieties and modern potatoes now are for the future,” said Meredith Bonierbale, senior potato breeder at the International Potato Center in Lima.
The article also quotes our friend, colleague and occasional contributor Andy Jarvis, ((Andy works for CIAT and Bioversity in Cali, Colombia.)) who recently collaborated with others on a paper which concluded that some of those very same wild relatives are themselves threatened:
“Even if we halt habitat loss, in the next 50 years, climate change could undo all of the conservation that we already have,” said Jarvis.
Everything went wrong today. I stepped in dog shit. Was pushed out of the bus. Forgot to turn on the water while taking a shower. Had a flat tire. My wife shouted at me. And I was out of cat food.
All because of climate change.
And little wonder; there is lots of it: “The study of 268 mountain recording stations found a temperature increase of 32.2 degrees Fahrenheit (17.89 degrees Celsius) per decade, compared with the global average of 32.1 degrees Fahrenheit (17.83 degrees Celsius) a decade.”
Yeah, right, NatGeo, that should probably be a 100 fold less. And the difference between the two is ridiculously small.
Say it has gotten 2C warmer there. That is equivalent to about 250 m in elevation. That is not nothing, but does not strike me as huge either, for the vertical agriculture of the Andes. People would have been familiar with these plagues.
It is just too simple to attribute everything to climate change. What about changes in agricultural intensity, ‘modern’ varieties, cropping systems, you name it.
It is just too convenient and too lazy to attribute every perceived change in the natural order to climate change. But from Science to Nat Geo, the press loves it.