Thinking about food crop production this year, will there the surplus or shortage as a result of the global pandemic?
The effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on increasing food crop production by farmers in this crop season is excluded due to funding reasons and costs.
Food production may be one of the surviving sectors in this crisis. In most countries farmers haven't stopped their activity. Nevertheless, this covid-19 issue raises strong challenges for food value chains, that will need global responses. Food VC show specificites regarding stocks handling and logistics, different from VC in other sectors. Sustaining production and food security is one of the challenges for the agsector right now.
I think this article provides good insights: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01181-3
Farmers in my country still do their activity in produce crop. The problem is how they will sell their product? because not all farmers can sell the crop to supermarket
COVID 19 has no direct impact on the crops, but it diverge concentration of farmers towrds its care due to low income and fear
It may be likely that there will be a positive impact on food production due to the following reasons:
1. Lockdown for almost three months enabled farmers and non-farmer rural households to concentrate on farming activities, though not so much from a commercial angle
2. Increased demand for fruits and vegetables due to lockdown and lack of adequate supply of the same during the lockdown, though transport of fruits and vegetables was considered as an essential service
3. People started thinking to avoid the local markets for fruits and vegetables, as the quality of the same was dubious
4. People who were eating more fish and meat earlier prefer to substitute the same with vegetables and fruits to a considerable extent
That said, the above reasons are just reflections based on happenings in the local village markets and cannot be generalised.
The impacts may likely be more negative than posive as the food chain is affected by restrictions on movement. As for food net importing countries like my own i pray this will bear positive results for future policy implications.
COVID 19 has no direct impact on the crops, but it diverge concentration of farmers towrds its care due to low income and fear.
the agricultural sector is in great demand right now, there is no other choice for those affected in the previous sector. all turned to food production both on a household scale and scale of farming
From what I am seeing so far in the United States, there seems to be a current bottleneck of raw materials (plant and animal based) and an insufficient system to get them to the supermarkets. What was once a large buyer proportion (food service and institutions like schools), are now being replaced by retail (supermarkets). Food is prepared differently for each location, so now we are seeing larger agri-businesses being stuck in the bottleneck, while smaller farms are able to pivot slightly to be able to accommodate local consumers. In PA, a dairy farm that typically sent milk to a larger facility to be pasteurized began doing that on it's own in small batches. The result was that anyone who could get to the farm, was able to purchase fresh milk at a lower cost per gallon than the food store and the farmer/family business is able to continue. If more small farms pivot into a local mindset like this, they and their local consumers will be ok and probably continue with normal production rates.
The larger farms that produce commodity crops, especially corn and soy meant for animal feed, will not likely be able to find a working solution. Those that are raising farm animals for meat production cannot afford to keep the animals until the bottleneck smooths over, and since they only get paid based upon the weight of edible meat, they may not be in a financial position to start over in the same way.
I feel like more insight is needed to determine to truly answer the question, however, it seems to be that those who are able to connect more easily to their local communities would probably continue as normal.
I think that agricultural production could be impacted by the Covid crisis, through the agricultural markets. Indeed, some crops are intensely linked to the world market (wheat, corn, ...) and therefore their prices are affected by what is happening now. It should be remembered that agricultural production does not adjust instantaneously to cyclical shocks, so we must wait and see the medium- and long-term effects of this pandemic. If this happens, I think that agricultural production that is highly integrated into the world market will be more affected than small-scale farming. In my opinion, the drought currently raging in the northern hemisphere could have a greater impact on agricultural production than the Covid. What is certain is that the current drop in prices could have a positive effect on production costs due to the drop in the price of oil and agricultural inputs in general.
First I would like to appreciate to Dear Adeoluwa Adewumi for asking such type of crucial question. Despite the government effort on combating corona virus made in Ethiopia the production level of food crop is expected to be low. The main reason for reduction of food crop are movement restriction, limited and/or no contact with development agent, lack of access timely information, limited access to modern ICT, lack of supply relevant improved seed, poor commitment of government to promote development agents through enhancing working facility like COVID-19 protective equipment. As to me the production and productivity of agriculture, livestock and labor will be very low due to the economic crisis in this novel corona virus age.
From my observation most farmers are so earger to resume farming activities even amidst the pandemic, bearing in mind the present impact and the aftermath the pandemic might cause upon their livelyhood (such as scarcity of food, sky rocketing on the available food commodity), if they fail to go back farm. So I strongly believed that the pandemic cannot inhibit food production as well as farming activities as long as the farmers get all the necessary support and subsidy on agricultural input/services from the appropriate quarters.@Adeolu
on question at , might be all food items will be increased since the production cost has been increasing
I do not know about other countries, but in India, we are now going through the world's largest lockdown. Agriculture was always gambling here, lack of advanced and early detection technology, poor communication with the farmers always lead a huge loss to the farmers in any disaster. This time when the whole country is under the lockdown farmers is not getting proper agri-inputs and advice. So I think it will hamper the production, later coming to the storage farmers are not going for storage nowadays. We don't have that much capacity so farmers mostly do the distress sell. So this pandemic will make this situation worse.
In countries like Nepal where lockdown is being continued since 50 days, the produced agricultural commodities are not getting desired market and production at these days by commercial farmers is being diminishing due to the fear among farmers and labour shortage. Although the vegetable farming in the kitchen garden by most of the household is being increasing, this will not boost the economy of the nation as a whole. Hence, for sustainability of demand and supply of agricultural commodities in coming days, all concerened authorities must work as a major unit of concern#
The question 'whether post Covid-19 scenario will inhibit or induce increased food crop production by farmers' by and large also depends on the monsoon that the entire country would receive this cropping season. My comments here are based on India. As we always say in India, 'Indian agriculture is a gamble and influenced by the vagaries of nature'. The other factors, like remunerative prices, changing demand conditions, availability of farm labour, the uncertainties caused by the lockdown are certainly important. Given the scenario and the extent of supportive measures being adopted by the national and state governments to combat food insecurity issues, it is quite likely that farmers (be small or large) get highly induced to produce more in anticipation of the increasing demand for food. We may also witness drastic changes in the food consumption styles of people, especially amonst the urban population, characterised by a major shift towards 'vegetarianism', from eating meat and meet products. That said, this is only an anticipation, needing proper investigation and empirical analysis in the post-lockdown context.
In Brazil, despite the potential incentive to increase exports (local currency devaluation), farmers are facing limited credit lines to finance their working capital needs, which are substantial. In Brazil, the agriculture market is mainly financed through short-term credit lines from banks (private and state-owned), trading companies and major clients. The lack of liquidity is very severe.
The latest reports from different parts of India show an increase in agricultural area and production during the Covid-19 lockdowns. This was achieved because of the increase in reverse migration of the people who had migrated (permanently and seasonal) to the cities and other states. The increasing demand for food from the local areas because of the mobility restrictions also caused such an increase. There are also reports even from urban areas as well as semi-urban and rural areas, where people were not at familiar with any farming operations, have started growing short duration crops, especially, vegetables in the tiny plots and spaces (terraces/ roof tops). National government as well as state and local governments also enunciated various activities to help the farmers engage in farming operations during the lockdowns, which also helped an increase in agricultural and food production.