Part 2 Impact of Extreme Events on Agriculture and their Measurement
THAILAND. Dry lake and river in summer – impact of drought.
© iStock/piyaset
© iStock/piyaset
Key messages
- Disasters have inflicted an estimated USD 3.26 trillion in agricultural losses over 33 years (1991–2023), averaging at USD 99 billion per year, with cereal crops bearing the heaviest burden at 4.6 billion tonnes lost, followed by fruits and vegetables (2.8 billion tonnes), and with meat and dairy losing 900 million tonnes.
- At the regional level, Africa is estimated to bear the highest relative burden at 7.4 percent of agricultural GDP despite lower absolute losses. Lower-middle-income countries face the highest relative losses at 5 percent of agricultural agricultural GDP, exceeding both low-income countries (3 percent) and high-income countries (4 percent), revealing a critical gap where high exposure and vulnerability combine with limited resilient infrastructure.
- Losses in production resulting from disasters correspond to a reduced availability of 320 kcal per person per day globally, with iron losses corresponding to 60 percent of requirements for men and critical shortfalls in essential vitamins and minerals that have the potential to disproportionately affect vulnerable populations.
- Marine heatwaves alone are estimated to have caused USD 6.6 billion in fisheries losses (1985-2022), with 15 percent of global fisheries affected and production losses exceeding 5.6 million tonnes, demonstrating the severe yet largely unmeasured impacts on aquatic food systems. Still, fisheries and aquaculture remain largely invisible in disaster assessments, despite providing livelihoods for 500 million people.
- Disaster impacts on agriculture extend far beyond immediate production losses to include infrastructure damage, market disruptions, financial system failures and ecosystem service degradation that can persist for years after initial events. Current assessment tools must be extended to systematically capture both direct and indirect impacts and take into consideration non-economic values, differentiated effects on vulnerable groups, biodiversity losses and long-term ecosystem disruptions.
