Climate change and agriculture : an assessment of migration an adaptation requirements from an EU island state

Abstract

The Earth's climate has undergone major changes over the course of its existence. This change has happened in two ways; naturally and anthropogenic which led that humanity has to face an ever growing problem of climate change and global warming. However, there is widespread acceptance among the scientific community that most of the Green House Gases (GHG) emitted results from anthropogenic emissions which included the burning of fossil fuels used for transport, energy as well as agriculture production. In fact, even though a lot of the population tend to believe that by planting trees and through agricultural practices, they could reduce global warming, this is not all the true. In fact, agricultural practices such as the use of fertilizers, irrigation, clearing forest land for grazing, the transportation of food using fuel powered resources on a broader scale, and other practices are all resulting in substantial impacts on climate change. The purpose of this dissertation is to show that climate change is one of the most serious challenges the world is facing and that some of the agricultural practices are contributing negatively to this impacts. However, the agriculture sector might also contribute positively towards reducing GHG emission and by implementing sustainable practices, through proper mitigation and adaptation actions. However there are problems to introduce these practices because for example adaptational methods would vary according to the region and the issue of cost vs benefit which means that adaptation and mitigation are difficult to be achieved. Even though the European Union (EU) has long been at the forefront in dealing with climate change, some countries will find it difficult to adopt measures that tackle climate change especially in the agricultural sector. Therefore, the dissertation analyses the performance of Malta's agricultural sector, in the context of the actions being undertaken at EU level in order to limit the GHG emissions and to implement adaptation strategies capable to cope with future impacts of climate change within the agricultural sector.