State Key Laboratory of Atmospheric Boundary Layer Physics and Atmospheric Chemistry, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100029, China.
J Sci Food Agric. 2012 Jun;92(8):1643-52. doi: 10.1002/jsfa.5523. Epub 2011 Dec 20.
Negative climate impacts on crop yield increase pressures on food security in China. In this study, climatic impacts on cereal yields (rice, wheat and maize) were investigated by analyzing climate-yield relationships from 1980 to 2008.
Results indicated that warming was significant, but trends in precipitation and solar radiation were not statistically significant in most of China. In general, maize is particularly sensitive to warming. However, increase in temperature was correlated with both lower and higher yield of rice and wheat, which is inconsistent with the current view that warming results in decline in yields. Of the three cereal crops, further analysis suggested that reduction in yields with higher temperature is accompanied by lower precipitation, which mainly occurred in northern parts of China, suggesting droughts reduced yield due to lack of water resources. Similarly, a positive correlation between temperature and yield can be alternatively explained by the effect of solar radiation, mainly in the southern part of China where water resources are abundant.
Overall, our study suggests that it is inter-annual variations in precipitation and solar radiation that have driven change in cereal yields in China over the last three decades.
气候变化对作物产量的负面影响给中国的粮食安全带来了压力。本研究通过分析 1980 年至 2008 年的气候-产量关系，调查了气候对粮食（水稻、小麦和玉米）产量的影响。
结果表明，在中国大部分地区，变暖是显著的，但降水和太阳辐射的趋势并不具有统计学意义。总的来说，玉米对变暖特别敏感。然而，温度升高与水稻和小麦的低产和高产都有关，这与目前认为变暖会导致产量下降的观点不一致。在这三种粮食作物中，进一步的分析表明，在北方地区，由于水资源短缺，较高温度与较低降水同时导致产量下降，这表明干旱减少了因缺乏水资源而导致的产量。同样，在水资源丰富的中国南方地区，温度与产量之间的正相关关系也可以用太阳辐射的影响来解释。
总的来说，我们的研究表明，过去三十年来，中国粮食产量的变化是由年际降水和太阳辐射的变化驱动的。
