A nuclear conflict between India and Pakistan that uses less than one per cent of the globe's nuclear arsenal can have adverse consequences for global food security that will be unmatched in modern history, a research article said.
The article titled 'A regional nuclear conflict would compromise global food security' said while impacts of global warming on agricultural productivity have been evaluated extensively, the implications of sudden cooling for global crop growth are as yet little understood.
"While crop failures after historic volcanic eruptions are documented, a nuclear conflict can cause even more severe and longer-lasting climate anomalies," it said.
The article, published in the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) official journal The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), noted that India and Pakistan are "contributing to a de facto Asian arms race" and the political instability in South Asia increasingly imposes a global threat.
The study highlights the indirect food system consequences of a possible, limited nuclear war based on a previously published IndiaPakistan scenario, assuming 5 Tg of soot injection derived from a direct relationship between population density and target-specific fuel load.
Citing comprehensive climate and crop model ensemble simulations, the article said in the event of a nuclear war between the two South Asian nations, the sudden cooling and perturbations of precipitation and solar radiation could disrupt food production and trade worldwide for about a decade more than the impact from anthropogenic climate change by late century.
"A limited nuclear war between India and Pakistan could ignite fires large enough to emit more than 5 Tg of soot into the stratosphere. Climate model simulations have shown severe resulting climate perturbations with declines in global mean temperature by 1.8C and precipitation by 8 per cent, for at least five years," the article said.
"In view of increasing instability in South Asia, this study shows that a regional conflict using <1% of the worldwide nuclear arsenal could have adverse consequences for global food security unmatched in modern history," it added.
Evaluating impacts of such a war on the global food system, the study said harmonised state-of-the-art crop models show that global caloric production from maize, wheat, rice, and soybean falls by about 13 per cent, 11 per cent, 3 per cent and 17 per cent over five years.
Total single-year losses of 12 per cent quadruple the largest observed historical anomaly and exceed impacts caused by historic droughts and volcanic eruptions.
It added that colder temperatures drive losses more than changes in precipitation and solar radiation, leading to strongest impacts in temperate regions poleward of 30N, including the United States, Europe, and China for 10-15 years.
"Integrated food trade network analyses show that domestic reserves and global trade can largely buffer the production anomaly in the first year. Persistent multi-year losses, however, would constrain domestic food availability and propagate to the Global South, especially to food-insecure countries," it said.
By fifth year, maize and wheat availability would decrease by 13 per cent globally and by more than 20 per cent in 71 countries with a cumulative population of 1.3 billion people.
The article noted that climatic responses to large soot injections over South Asia have been studied systematically.
"The impacts of such low-likelihood but severe events require careful investigation to inform the public and policy makers in view of nuclear proliferation and conflict," it said, adding that quantitative agricultural and economic impact assessments are lacking.
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