FSI researchers strive to understand how countries relate to one another, and what policies are needed to achieve global stability and prosperity. International relations experts focus on the challenging U.S.-Russian relationship, the alliance between the U.S. and Japan and the limitations of America’s counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan.
Foreign aid is also examined by scholars trying to understand whether money earmarked for health improvements reaches those who need it most. And FSI’s Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center has published on the need for strong South Korean leadership in dealing with its northern neighbor.
FSI researchers also look at the citizens who drive international relations, studying the effects of migration and how borders shape people’s lives. Meanwhile FSI students are very much involved in this area, working with the United Nations in Ethiopia to rethink refugee communities.
Trade is also a key component of international relations, with FSI approaching the topic from a slew of angles and states. The economy of trade is rife for study, with an APARC event on the implications of more open trade policies in Japan, and FSI researchers making sense of who would benefit from a free trade zone between the European Union and the United States.
Growing evidence demonstrates that climatic conditions can have a profound impact on the functioning of modern human societies, but effects on economic activity appear inconsistent. Fundamental productive elements of modern economies, such as workers and crops, exhibit highly non-linear responses to local temperature even in wealthy countries. In contrast, aggregate macroeconomic productivity of entire wealthy countries is reported not to respond to temperature= while poor countries respond only linearly. Resolving this conflict between micro and macro observations is critical to understanding the role of wealth in coupled human–natural systems and to anticipating the global impact of climate change. Here we unify these seemingly contradictory results by accounting for non-linearity at the macro scale. We show that overall economic productivity is non-linear in temperature for all countries, with productivity peaking at an annual average temperature of 13 °C and declining strongly at higher temperatures. The relationship is globally generalizable, unchanged since 1960, and apparent for agricultural and non-agricultural activity in both rich and poor countries. These results provide the first evidence that economic activity in all regions is coupled to the global climate and establish a new empirical foundation for modelling economic loss in response to climate change, with important implications. If future adaptation mimics past adaptation, unmitigated warming is expected to reshape the global economy by reducing average global incomes roughly 23% by 2100 and widening global income inequality, relative to scenarios without climate change. In contrast to prior estimates, expected global losses are approximately linear in global mean temperature, with median losses many times larger than leading models indicate.
New research finds that without climate change mitigation, even wealthy countries will see an economic downturn by 2100.
When thousands of scientists, economists and policymakers meet in Paris this December to negotiate an international climate treaty, one question will dominate conversations: what is the climate worth?
A new study published in the journal Nature shows that the global economy will take a harder hit from rising temperatures than previously thought, with incomes falling in most countries by the year 2100 if climate change continues unchecked. Rich countries may experience a brief economic uptick, but growth will drop off sharply after temperatures pass a critical heat threshold.
The study, co-led by Marshall Burke, a professor of Earth system science at Stanford's School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences, provides a clear picture of how climate change will shape the global economy, which has been a critical missing piece for the international climate community leading up to the Paris talks. Understanding how much future climate change will cost in terms of global economic losses will help policymakers at the meetings decide how much to invest in emissions reductions today.
The work was co-authored by two researchers from the University of California, Berkeley: co-lead author Solomon Hsiang, the Chancellor's Associate Professor of Public Policy, and Edward Miguel, Oxfam Professor in Environmental and Resource Economics.
Heat threshold
"The data tell us that there are particular temperatures where we humans are really good at producing stuff," said Burke, who is also Center Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and fellow, by courtesy, at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment. "In countries that are normally quite cold - mostly wealthy northern countries - higher temperatures are associated with faster economic growth, but only to a point. After that point, growth declines rapidly.
That point, it turns out, is an annual average temperature of about 55 degrees Fahrenheit.
As average temperatures move past that mark, wealthy countries will start to see a drop-off in economic output. Poorer countries, mostly in the tropics, will suffer even steeper losses because they are already past the temperature threshold. This has the potential to widen the global inequality gap, said Burke.
A new approach
Looking at existing research, the team found a puzzling mismatch between micro-level studies, which show negative impacts of hot temperatures on output in specific sectors such as agriculture, and macro-level studies, which at least in rich countries show limited impacts on economic output.
"Many very careful studies show clearly that high temperatures are bad for things like agriculture and labor productivity, even in rich countries," Burke said. "While these relationships showed up again and again in the micro data – for example when looking at agricultural fields or manufacturing plants – they were not showing up in the existing macro-level studies, and we wanted to understand why."
The researchers suspected the problem was with the analysis, not the data, so they took a new approach.
Analyzing records from 166 countries over a 50-year period from 1960 to 2010, they compared each country's economic output in years of normal temperatures to that of unusually warm or unusually cool years. The data revealed a hill-shaped relationship between economic output and temperature, with output rising until the 55 F threshold and then falling faster and faster at higher temperatures. “Our macro-level results lined up nicely with the micro-level studies,” Hsiang said.
Two possible future. Colors are 2100 temperatures under “business as usual” climate change (left) and aggressive climate policy (right). This image shows a simulation of future nightlights, as seen from space, since richer economies tend to glow brighter. A hotter world is a more unequal world, with the north benefitting and tropical economies declining. A cooler world leads to more equitable global growth, offering regions like Africa the chance to “catch up”. Courtesy of Marshall Burke.
Two possible future. Colors are 2100 temperatures under “business as usual” climate change (left) and aggressive climate policy (right). This image shows a simulation of future nightlights, as seen from space, since richer economies tend to glow brighter. A hotter world is a more unequal world, with the north benefitting and tropical economies declining. A cooler world leads to more equitable global growth, offering regions like Africa the chance to “catch up”. Source: Burke, Hsiang and Miguel.
Higher temperatures, lower growth
The team then sought to understand what this historical pattern might mean for the future global economy as temperatures continue to warm.
“Many other researchers have projected economic impacts under future climate change,” Hsiang said. “But we feel our results improve our ability to anticipate how societies in coming decades might respond to warming temperatures.”
Projecting future changes in economic output under climate change was challenging.
“Even without climate change, there are a lot of possible ways in which the future economy might evolve,” Burke said. “We start with a few different baseline scenarios and then we bring in our historical understanding of the relationship between temperature and economic output to better understand how these economic trajectories might change with warming temperatures."
The researchers’ findings were stark.
In a scenario of unmitigated climate change, the team’s model shows that by 2100 the per-capita incomes of 77 percent of countries in the world would fall relative to current levels. By the team’s main estimate, global incomes could decline 23 percent by 2100, relative to a world without climate change. Other estimates are twice as high. The likelihood of global economic losses larger than 20 percent of current income is at least 40 percent, and much higher in some scenarios.
These estimates are substantially larger than existing models indicate, a difference the research team attributes to their updated and data-driven understanding of how countries have historically responded to temperature increases.
Rich countries not immune
A common assumption among researchers has been that wealth and technology protect rich countries from the economic impacts of climate change, because they use these resources to adapt to higher temperatures.
"Under this hypothesis, the impacts of future warming should lessen over time as more countries become richer," Burke said. "But we find limited evidence that this is the case."
Burke's team found that, historically, rich countries did not appear to respond any differently to temperature change than poor countries.
“The data definitely don’t provide strong evidence that rich countries are immune from the effects of hot temperatures,” said Hsiang. “Many rich countries just happen to have cooler average temperatures to start with, meaning that future warming will overall be less harmful than in poorer, hotter countries.”
Paris climate talks
From Nov. 30 to Dec. 11, France will host the 21st Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP21/CMP11).
More than 40,000 delegates from national governments, private companies and civil society will meet in Paris to hash out an international agreement aimed at keeping global emissions low enough to prevent warming of more than two degrees Celsius.
On the table are three key issues: climate adaptation, mitigation and financing.
"We don't want to rule out that we could see unprecedented adaptation to hotter temperatures in the future, and we certainly hope we do see it," Burke said. "The historical evidence, though, suggests that this is not something we should count on."
The team says that mitigation, and how to pay for it, should be at the forefront of discussions in Paris.
"Our research is important for COP21 because it suggest that these economic damages could be much larger than current estimates indicate," said Burke. "What that means for policy is that we should be willing to spend a lot more on mitigation than we would otherwise. The benefits of action on mitigation are much greater than we thought, because the costs of inaction are much greater than we thought."
Note for reporters: The research team has created a website about their research results and methodology, including an interactive map showing country-by-country GDP projections through 2100 under a scenario of unmitigated climate change.
This project focuses on private and public sector strategies for promoting sustainable palm oil, with sustainability defined by environmental, social, and economic objectives. The main goals are:
Abstract: Globalization and commodity exports have a long history in affecting land use changes and land rights on the tropical forest frontier. This paper reviews a century of social and environmental discourse around land issues for four commodities grown in the humid tropics—rubber, cocoa, oil palm and bananas. States have exercised sovereign rights over land and forest resources and the outcomes for deforestation and land rights of existing users have been quite varied depending on local institutional contexts and political economy. In the current period of globalization, as land use changes associated with tropical commodities have accelerated, land issues are now at center stage in the global discourse. However, efforts to protect forests and the rights of local communities and indigenous groups continue to be ad hoc and codification of minimum standards and their implementation remains a work in progress. Given a widespread failure of state directed policies and institutions to curb deforestation and protect land rights, the private sector, with the exception of the rubber industry, is emphasizing voluntary standards to certify sustainability of their products. This is an important step but expectations that they will effectively address concerns about the impact of tropical commodities expansion might be too high, given their voluntary nature, demand constraints, and the challenge of including smallholders. It is also doubtful that private standards can more than partially compensate for long standing weaknesses in land governance and institutions on the forest frontier.
Lobell's research focuses on identifying opportunities to raise crop yields in major agricultural regions, with a particular emphasis on adaptation to climate change. His current projects span Africa, South Asia, Mexico, and the United States, and involve a range of tools including remote sensing, GIS, and crop and climate models.
"David Lobell's research on climate change and food security is truly global in scope, but his work also crosses academic borders," said FSI director Mike McFaul. "David's appointment as William Wrigley Senior Fellow recognizes his ability to connect the most pressing challenges in international development with critical questions of environmental sustainability, in a way that generates real solutions on both fronts."
The William Wrigley Senior Fellowship is supported by Mrs. Julie Ann Wrigley, AB '71 (Anthropology) and Ms. Alison Wrigley Rusack, AB '80 (Communication).
"The Wrigley fellowship recognizes the important contributions of our faculty to ensuring a sustainable world and is one family’s remarkable legacy to reshape the future of the environment on which we all depend," said Perry L. McCarty Director Barton "Buzz" Thompson, who co-leads the Stanford Woods Institute with Perry L. McCarty Director Jeffrey Koseff. "Both David and the first holder of the fellowship, Roz Naylor, are leaders in the effort to provide food security to the planet's growing population, perhaps the most critical challenge the world faces."
"David's work already transcends disciplines and departments through his work with the Center on Food Security and the Environment, a synergistic partnership between Woods and the Freeman Spogli Institute," Koseff added. "The Wrigley fellowship provides important support for this type of collaborative, cross-cutting research at Stanford."
Lobell was a Senior Research Scholar at the Center on Food Security and the Environment from 2008-2009 and a Lawrence Post-doctoral Fellow at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory from 2005-2007. He received a PhD in Geological and Environmental Sciences from Stanford University in 2005, and a Sc.B. in Applied Mathematics, Magna Cum Laude from Brown University in 2000.
Ambassador David Lane was nominated by President Barack Obama to serve as the U.S. Representative to the United Nations Agencies for Food and Agriculture and confirmed by the U.S. Senate on May 24, 2012.
Ambassador Lane has more than twenty years of experience working in leadership positions across sectors. Before coming to Rome, he served at the White House as Assistant to the President and Counselor to the Chief of Staff.
Prior to joining the Obama Administration, he served as President and CEO of the ONE Campaign, a global advocacy organization focused on extreme poverty, development, and reform. Before that, as Director of Foundation Advocacy and the East Coast Office of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, he helped lead that organization’s advocacy and public policy efforts.
During the Clinton Administration, he served as Executive Director of the National Economic Council at the White House and Chief of Staff to the U. S. Secretary of Commerce. He served as Vice-Chair of Transparency International USA, and he is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
Ambassador Lane earned his B.A. from the University of Virginia and his M.P.A. from the Princeton University Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.
Tannis Thorlakson, a first-year PhD candidate in the Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources (E-IPER) in Stanford's School of Earth, Energy and Environmental Science, has won a three-year grant from the National Science Foundation to support coursework and research on the palm oil industry in Indonesia. Thorlakson's proposed project, "Is Certification Enough? The socio-economic and environmental impacts of certified palm oil in Indonesia," was one of 2,000 awards selected from a pool of 16,000 applications.
Thorlakson's research interests include the interactions between farmers and the firms that buy their produce, as well as how firms' supply chain sourcing strategies impact socio-economic and environmental outcomes in the agriculture sector.
"I am thrilled, though not surprised, that the NSF selected Tannis for this prestigious award," said Professor Roz Naylor, one of Thorlakson's faculty advisors. "Her research on how multinational companies can make palm oil and other major agricultural commodities more environmentally sustainable is important and timely. It is a welcome addition to the work being done by many at Stanford to tackle the big social, economic and environmental questions about the fast-growing palm oil sector."
Thorlakson will spend the summer of 2015 in Cape Town, South Africa, working with a food retailer to understand the impacts of the company's sustainability initiative on the farmers in the retailers supply chain.
FSI researchers strive to understand how countries relate to one another, and what policies are needed to achieve global stability and prosperity. International relations experts focus on the challenging U.S.-Russian relationship, the alliance between the U.S. and Japan and the limitations of America’s counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan.
Two possible future. Colors are 2100 temperatures under “business as usual” climate change (left) and aggressive climate policy (right). This image shows a simulation of future nightlights, as seen from space, since richer economies tend to glow brighter. A hotter world is a more unequal world, with the north benefitting and tropical economies declining. A cooler world leads to more equitable global growth, offering regions like Africa the chance to “catch up”. Courtesy of Marshall Burke.
