The Impacts of Climate Change on Agricultural Trade in the MENA Region

Abstract

Human-induced climate change has been one of the most widely discussed issues of scientific and political spheres in the recent decades, and it has been overwhelmingly agreed that climate change poses a very serious threat for the environment and the economy. It has been observed that increasing temperatures and extremities in weather patterns create a serious challenge for agriculture and food security especially in various disadvantaged regions. Even in the most optimistic scenarios, where global mean temperatures rise by around 2°C by 2100, serious negative effects are expected on agricultural production and crop yields over the next century.The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is one of the most vulnerable regions as one of the most food-import dependent region in the world. Water resources are scarce and irrigation is not sufficiently developed in the region, and climate change hurts the already vulnerable agricultural supply, where on the other hand increasing population continuously fosters the demand for agricultural products.The aim of this paper is to examine the impacts of climate change on agricultural trade in the MENA region. The indicators for climate change includes variables such as precipitation patterns and temperatures, and the effect of the change in the climate change indicators on agricultural exports and imports will be analyzed through a panel data analysis, where the impacts of GDP, per-capita oil use and trade integration will also be added as variables.