If the increasing temperature and extreme weather patterns continue to persist, production of rice may fall by 10 per cent and wheat by one third in Bangladesh by the year 2050, reports BSS.

By that time total population of Bangladesh, one of the most seven populous countries in the world, is projected to increase by 130 million, posing a grave environmental, social and human disaster to the country.

The caution was raised in the ‘Climate Change 2007 Report’ of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a research organization established by WMO and UNEP to assess scientific and technical information on climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation.

The report said food and water shortages are likely to increase in Asian countries including Bangladesh unless action is taken to curb the rise in greenhouse gases.

Global temperatures can increase up to 5 degrees Celsius by 2080 unless emissions are decisively reduced, it said, adding future climate change is likely to put over 50 million more people at risk of hunger by 2020.

The report said a two degree Celsius increase in air temperature can decrease rain-fed rice yields by 5-12 percent in China. Net cereal production in other South Asian countries is projected to decline by 4 to 10 percent by the end of this century only due to the reason.

Citing the water stress as one of the most pressing environmental problems in South and Southeast Asia, the report said the strain is expected to increase substantially in future.

In India, gross per capita water availability will decline from around 1,820 cubic metres a year to as low as around 1,140 cubic metres a year by 2050, it said.

Some Asian regions including western China, the Changjiang Valley, the Arabian Peninsula, Bangladesh and the western coasts of the Philippines are likely to see more frequent and heavier rainfall, the report said adding this will lead to severe flooding and landslides in the regions.

Freshwater availability in Central, South and East and Southeast Asia particularly in large river basins is likely to decrease due to the climate change.

Himalayan glaciers are receding faster than in any other part of the world, the report said. Half a billion people in the Himalaya-Hindu-Kush region and a quarter billion in the downstream who rely on glacial melt waters could be seriously affected.

At current rates of global warming, the Himalayan glaciers can disappear altogether by 2035, it warned.

The Ganges, Indus, Brahmaputra and other rivers that crisscross the northern Indian plain and Bangladesh may become seasonal rivers in the near future due to the consequences of the climate change.

Sea level rise in Asia will be between 1 to 3 mm annually, higher than the global average, causing deluge to low-lying areas of South, Southeast and East Asia such as in Vietnam, Bangladesh, India and China, the report observed.

Almost 60 percent of the sea level increase will occur in South Asia (along coasts from Pakistan, through India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh to Burma), while 20 percent will occur in Southeast Asia specifically from Thailand to Vietnam including Indonesia and the Philippines, the report said.

The report called for the mainstreaming of sustainable development policies and including climate-proofing concept in national development initiatives to avoid the impending challenges.

Emphasizing taking international action to check climate change, the report said, otherwise the consequences of food and water scarcity in Asia, as for many other parts of the world, will be too alarming to contemplate.