The potential for improvement in rainfed rice is much more
limited than for irrigated rice or rainfed maize (Table 11). As
for irrigated rice, nitrogen-efficient varieties show the most
potential across the country, but the gain is limited to 12
percent—much less than the 53 percent for irrigated varieties. It is not clear why there should be such a large difference, but it may have to do with the variety chosen within
the crop modeling software, and the variety’s ability to use
the nitrogen.
duce Philippine farmers to produce more. Higher food and
agricultural prices will still present challenges for the Philippine economy, however, because the country is a net food
SUMMARY
| APRIL
2010
importer. Higher prices also present
significant
challenges
for poor people given that a disproportionate amount of
their household budgets are spent on food.
Table 12. Climate impact on value-added growth by sector and exchange rate, 2011–2050
Climate shock
(yearly change from baseline)
THE FULL IMPACT OF CLIMATE CHANGE ON ECONOMIC GROWTH AND INCOME DISTRIBUTION
Productivity
effect
The dynamic computable general equilibrium model of the
Philippines (Phil-DCGE) was developed for this study for the
purpose of assessing the economy-wide impacts of climate
change in the agricultural sector and to explore policy options to offset these effects. Between 2011 and 2050, the
share of agricultural labor is projected to fall from 33.6 to
23.5 percent, reflecting a reduction in the importance of agriculture to the Philippine economy. Nevertheless, 23.5 percent is still a significant proportion of the population, and
many of these people will be among the nation’s poorest. As
a result, agriculture will continue to provide an important
source of both employment and food security among a
highly vulnerable segment of the society.
Total
effect
Percent (%)
Sectors
Agriculture
Industry
Service
Total gross domestic product
Real exchange rate
Global trade
effect
–0.02
–0.01
0.00
0.13
–0.05
–0.01
0.12
–0.06
–0.01
0.00
–0.01
–0.01
–0.03
–0.02
–0.04
Source: Calculated by authors based on Phil-DCGE model simulations results
For all regions, the direct effect of climate change is negative
(Table 13), although it is least negative in Mindanao. Once
global price changes from climate change are accounted for,
a large regional disparity in the impact on the agricultural
sector remains, with Mindanao gaining greatly, Visayas receiving a small gain, and Luzon experiencing relatively small
losses. Mindanao, however, experiences the most negative
impact of the three major regions for staple crops, primarily
through the global price and trade pathway, given that all
three regions are projected to be affected by comparable
staple crop productivity losses through the direct impact of
At the sector level, the largest quantitative economic impact
of climate change is on agriculture—and, surprisingly, the
net effect is positive (Table 12). The direct effect of climate
change, through productivity, is negative, but the indirect effect, through prices and trade, is positive because the higher
global prices of agricultural commodities is projected to in-
TABLE 11. Projected improvements in rainfed rice yields from various technologies, 2050
Region
Droughttolerant
varieties
Heattolerant
varieties
Nitrogenefficient
varieties
Precision
agriculture
Cropdisease
protection
Pest
protection
Weed
protection
Integrated soil
fertility
management
Percent (%)
1. Luzon
1.1 Luzon
1.2 CAR
2. Visayas
3. Mindanao
3.1 Mindanao
3.2 ARMM
Total
1.8
1.9
1.5
1.2
1.3
1.4
0.6
1.4
1.9
2.0
1.2
0.4
0.4
0.3
1.0
0.9
11.2
11.0
11.9
13.3
11.6
11.2
13.4
12.0
3.0
3.2
2.4
2.2
0.6
0.5
0.8
1.9
Source: Calculated by authors based on data from Rosegrant et al. (2014).
8
9.8
9.9
9.3
9.8
11.6
11.3
12.8
10.4
8.1
8.2
7.9
9.5
9.7
9.5
10.5
9.1
5.4
5.5
5.0
5.9
7.8
7.4
9.5
6.4
8.0
8.1
7.8
6.8
4.9
3.9
9.0
6.6