Essay by Eric Worrall
Smithsonian correspondent Sarah Kuta has discovered it might be possible to eat tropical staples like Bread Fruit in place of wheat, if the planet warms.
Is Breadfruit the Climate Change-Proof Food of the Future?
New research suggests it will fare better than our current staple crops under warming conditions
Sarah Kuta
Daily Correspondent August 30, 2022 11:11 a.m.Whether fried, fermented, roasted or eaten raw, breadfruit is a versatile food that’s played an important role in Oceanic cuisine for thousands of years. Now, as the climate continues to shift because of human actions, the fruit could increasingly play a role in addressing global hunger, according to a paper published this month in the journal PLOS Climate.
Past research has found that yields of staple crops like corn, soybeans, wheat and ricemay decline in the future because of climate change, especially in regions close to the equator. But the dimpled, lime-green crop of the breadfruit tree seems to be more resilient to rising temperatures and increased rainfall variability, the new research suggests.
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“Breadfruit is a neglected and underutilized species that happens to be relatively resilient in our climate change projections,” says Daniel Horton, an Earth and planetary scientist at Northwestern University and one of the study’s authors, in a statement. “This is good news because several other staples that we rely on are not so resilient… As we implement strategies to adapt to climate change, breadfruit should be considered in food security adaptation.”
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Read more: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/is-breadfruit-the-climate-change-proof-food-of-the-future-180980665/
Here’s another thought – now Earth and Planetary scientists have discovered people in the tropics can grow food, do you think it possible that the genetic engineers of the future might be able to transfer heat resilience to cold climate fruit, or cold resilience to warm climate fruit?
That way we could continue to enjoy all the foods we love, plus a whole lot more, regardless of what happens to the global climate.
Not only is it a poor, low protein substitute, but thnk of the carrying capacity of a breadfruit tree vs. miles and miles of “fruited plains” with two or three wheat crops on it. Substitute breadfruit trees on that land. What, a million times less yield? A billion times?
These are maybe woke victims of some weird schooling, like Waldorf Schools. Some flower power schooling must be the source of such convoluted, nonsensical, illogical thinking like this. No offense meant to German philosophical thought from the early 19th century. How’d that thinking turn out then? Bewteen WWI and WWII?
Anyone who gets most of their protein from wheat is already in a lot of trouble. Bread fruit is a good potato substitute, lots of vitamins and starch. Produces high yields. Pacific islanders have developed preservation methods, such as burying the fermented fruit in parcels wrapped in leaves, which apparently keeps it edible for months, sometimes years.
Fermented breadfruit, eh? When will we start seeing 18-year single malt breadfruit liquor in the craft distilleries?
Should Scotland be worried?
More blather about “climate change”. Which has not been proven to exist, except in the minds of the cultists who continue to fleece the citizens and governments for more money.
The world has definitely warmed since the mid 1800s. What is missing is proof we caused it, and evidence the warming is causing a problem.
So much yet to discover….There is another plant that I just heard about that provides significant food value and also does well in the tropics. It is Zea mays (sometimes known to the natives as “sweet corn.”) And I hear there is another, Oryza sativa, which also might have some potential as well in our warming world… providing it can find consumer acceptance.
“Past research has found that yields of staple crops like corn, soybeans, wheat and ricemay decline in the future because of climate change, especially in regions close to the equator.”
The only real current threat to staple food crops are idiotic climate change policies like declaring Nitrogen feritilizer a threat to the climate and banning/reducing its use, taking farmland out of production, growing food for fuel instead of for eating and so on.
See Sri Lanka and their disastrous experiment in organic fertilizer only and the Dutch Gov. trying to prevent farmers from farming, or billionaires like Gates buying up farmland in the US and elsewhere and taking it out of production so food cannot be grown. Then, there’s the asinine and totally avoidable war between Russia and Ukraine which has devastated their crop production and the sanctions against Russian gas which has, also, devastated fertilizer production.
But, let’s just blame the favorite boogeyman, climate change. Good grief, do you have to be a moron to become a journalist these days?
The more water vapor in the air, the less impact CO2 can have.
The tropics are the least likely places on the planet to “suffer” from CO2 because of this.
Breadfruit. The actual rational of the HMS Bounty voyage.
Ergo – Breadfruit leads to a break down in order and mutinies!
Get the Jan 6 committee onto this. It will probably explain the Buffalo Hat guy.
Probably 🙂
If the planet warms a bit, wheat farmers will either grow more wheat (warmer, wetter, and more CO2) or expand a bit farther north in Canada and Russia. I don’t see a downside to being able to better feed the world.
As the prediction goes, there no proof that they can achieve such a difference while maintaining or improving food quality.
Making that prediction a speculation at best. PopSci “what if”.
Her report is meaningless tripe.
1787 – Mutiny on the Bounty ring any bells? That journey was to transport breadfruit from Tahiti to the Caribbean. Slightly old news.
How about if we stop paying farmers to not grow crops? Wouldn’t that tend to ease any food shortages?
Er ever hear of HMS Bounty?
I’m pretty sure that would require “bread fruit” to be not only a nutritional replacement for wheat but also about 30x easier to grow than it is now.
ROFL
Of course.
Do note that many cereal grains grow over a wide range of climates.
Corn notably grows in Africa, Brazil, Mexico, Iowa, and now in southern Alberta (thanks to development of a strain that does not require as many ‘heat days’).
I read that tribal people grew corn in Manitoba long ago (I _guess_ during the Medieval Warm Period).
Other foods grow over a range of conditions, potatos I expect (for example).
Productivity of each crop will vary with location, hence some crops are more common commercially in some areas. But outside of prime areas, they grow and feed people.
Brazil is a tropical country and the world’s fourth-largest food producer. No breadfruit production there. It is the top ten exporter of grains like soybeans, corn, rice. Even wheat, which was only produced in the south, close to Argentina, is now moving to central west of the country. Average temperature varying from 18 C (64 F) to 33 C (92 F). Much higher than the catastrophic 2 C compared to north hemisphere top food producers.
Sh!t researchers and Smithsonian mag writer, can’t even do basic research. Crop yields have increased dramatically in the last few decades – plants love the heat and the extra CO2! Models predict the opposite – so the model output graphs can be cut up in 10cm wide strips and used appropriately.