Good morning. My mum is a livestock farmer in Kent. This year her hay crop was down by 50% because the spring rains never came. She’s not alone – up and down the UK, farmers have watched their fields turn brown and their hay crops collapse.
Hay keeps animals alive over winter (when there is no fresh grass outside) and some farmers are already selling off cows because they can’t guarantee they will be able to feed them. From extreme drought to biblical floods, more than 80% of UK farmers are worried wild swings in weather are affecting their ability to earn a living.
Globally, farmers are on the frontline of climate change and livelihoods are on the line. Last year, heatwaves wiped out onions in India and cocoa in Ivory Coast. Most recently wildfires and heatwaves have driven losses of olives, citrus fruits and vegetables across Europe.
Not only is this bad news for farmers, but supply chains are buckling under the pressure, driving an increase in the cost of food for consumers. For today’s newsletter, I spoke to Dr Maximilian Kotz, a Marie Curie postdoctoral research fellow at Barcelona Supercomputing Center, about “climateflation” and how environmental breakdown affects the cost of what we eat. That’s after the headlines.
Five big stories
Israel-Gaza war | Israel bombed the main hospital in southern Gaza on Monday and then struck the same place again as rescuers and journalists rushed to help the wounded, killing at least 20 people including five journalists, health officials said.
UK news | Schools will need to give democracy lessons to children from the age of 11 and ask teachers to leave their politics at the classroom door to help prepare for votes at 16, the head of the UK elections watchdog has said.
Health | People using the weight loss jab Mounjaro have been warned against switching to black market sellers or bulk buying after its manufacturer announced the UK will get a significant price rise this autumn.
US news | Some national guard units patrolling the US capital at the direction of Donald Trump have started carrying firearms, an escalation of the president’s military deployment that makes good on a directive issued late last week by his defence department.
UK news | Ministers are introducing a clearer legal definition of “honour-based” abuse in an attempt to catch more perpetrators and protect women and girls from violence and coercion.
In depth: ‘Consumers are starting to see these things directly for themselves’
It has been known for a long time that the amount of food a farmer produces is linked to climate conditions (hence why farmers are usually clued up to the forecast). This is of course natural – weather fluctuates. However, in recent years temperature extremes have become stronger, and records are being broken across the globe. As a result, a new area of research has started to evolve over the past five-ish years: how the climate crisis is affecting the price of food.
“In the last year or two there have been many widespread examples of this phenomenon playing out,” said Maximilian Kotz. “It’s something that people are really noticing – not just researchers who look at the data in detail, but people in the industry, and even consumers, are starting to see these things directly for themselves.”
What are the effects of wildfires and heatwaves across Europe?
We’ve all read about wildfires and heatwaves ravaging southern Europe. Not only has this had a devastating impact on people’s lives but it has also having an concerning impact on food, with farmers struggling to grow crops that their forebears did for hundreds of years.
This means the price of traditional Mediterranean produce such as olives, citrus fruits, vegetables and wine are likely to rise. In the UK, long dry spells have also affected the production of cereals, potatoes, carrots and broccoli. Britain’s largest retailers are warning food prices are already being driven up by hot weather.
This is not an isolated year, and crop losses are only set to increase in the coming years as the climate crisis gets worse. In the EU, the average annual loss is expected to increase by up to two-thirds by 2050, according to analysis by the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Commission.
And it’s not just in Europe where agriculture is being hit. Shrivelled cacao pods and failed harvests caused by extreme temperatures in west Africa have caused an increase in the price of chocolate. Even bananas are not safe – rising temperatures, extreme weather and climate-related pests are pummelling Guatemala, Costa Rica and Colombia, where the world’s most popular fruit is grown.
What are some examples of price spikes in recent years?
Kotz and his team looked at data from 18 countries to find examples of price spikes associated with extreme weather events.
They found that in 2022, vegetable prices spiked by 80% in Arizona and California after extreme summer drought. In the same year, a drought in the Horn of Africa – the worst there in 40 years – resulted in food prices being 40% higher in March the following year.
In 2024, global cocoa prices were 280% higher in April after a heatwave two months prior in Ivory Coast and Ghana (together, these two countries account for 60% of global cacao production). A heatwave in May of the same year caused a 80% increase in the price of onions and potatoes in India.
At its most basic level, this is an issue of supply and demand: if droughts and heat stress destroy crop yields, then prices of that crop go up.
Kotz said: “It is quite striking that very often the products that are most affected are fresh fruit and vegetable produce. There are obvious reasons why that could be the case – essentially those are products that are harder to store, and normally they have a shorter time span between production and going to the market.” The impact on the market is amplified as you can’t stockpile perishable produce, whereas grains and rice can be stored to buffer disruption.
How ‘climateflation’ will change the way we eat
The term ‘climateflation’ refers to the rising cost of living caused by the climate crisis. Fundamentally, disruptions to agriculture have an impact on how much people have to fork out for food. Extreme weather causes short-term price shocks, but hotter average temperatures cause food inflation spikes that can last up to 12 months, according to Kotz’s research from last year. “We were able to see that we really are going to be expecting persistently higher food prices under future temperature increases,” he said.
A report from the Autonomy Institute thinktank found that increasingly extreme weather could drive up food prices by more than a third by 2050 for British consumers.
The cost of living crisis is already squeezing UK household budgets with high food, energy and housing costs, while wages remain stagnant. Food makes up a large share of household spending – especially in emerging economies. Typically, healthy food (such as fresh fruit and vegetables) is twice as expensive per calorie as less healthy food. Research from the Food Foundation has shown that spending on healthy products is usually where people cut back in times of food price increases, particularly in low-income households.
This could exacerbate a range of health issues, from malnutrition to chronic diet-related conditions including coronary heart disease, type 2 diabetes and cancers. Poor diets have also been linked to poor mental health, according to the Food Foundation. “We expect this kind of food price inflation induced by climate change would most of all affect the poorest households,” said Kotz. “That then has many implications long-term for wider societal health.”
The trend with rising food prices is structural, so it will keep building as long as temperatures increase. “It’s clear that the main thing that we can do to reduce these impacts is just to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions,” said Kotz. “Even though it’s very obvious, I think it’s always important to bring people’s awareness back to the underlying driver.”
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What else we’ve been reading
Knesset member Ofer Cassif writes in the Guardian on army reservists refusing to take up arms as Israel’s anti-war movement grows bolder. “In private talks between family members or in public declarations of objection, more and more Israelis are realising that participating in military service is to be complicit,” he says. Charlie Lindlar, newsletters team
An interesting and potentially dangerous case of humans treating wild animals like pets is unfolding in Lyme Bay where Reggie the ‘friendly’ dolphin is apparently asking people for belly rubs, but also “trying to drown” female swimmers. Experts say neither is true and Reggie needs his space – for his own safety as much as anyone else’s. Phoebe
Peter Bradshaw’s look ahead to the best films coming this autumn is a solid way to feel better about the last few weeks of summer. One Battle After Another, the latest from Paul Thomas Anderson, seems like one of those ones where the less you know going in, the better. Charlie
The US used to be held up as an example of democracy, but now visitors are being advised to lock down social media, delete photos and even travel with ‘burner’ phones. This is a bleak look at precautions visitors are having to take to be safe in Trump’s America. Phoebe
An important investigation from Kate Lloyd for our Is it true that … series: does eating greasy food really give you spots? Sort of, it turns out. Charlie
Sport
Football | Teenage substitute Rio Ngumoha sealed a stunning 3-2 victory for Liverpool after Newcastle had come back from two goals down following Anthony Gordon’s red card.
Tennis | Venus Williams’ 25th US Open singles appearance ended at the first hurdle with defeat to Karolína Muchová who won 6-3, 2-6, 6-1.
Cycling | On the morning after Jonas Vingegaard took the leader’s red jersey at the Vuelta a España with a stage win in northern Italy, Team Visma-Lease a Bike said police in Italy are investigating the theft of “several bikes” from an equipment truck.
The front pages
The Guardian splashes on “Global condemnation after Israel bombs same Gaza hospital twice”. The Financial Times runs with “Wall Street calls for stablecoin rethink as friction with crypto industry builds”. Top story in the Metro is “Crackdown on honour crime” while the Mirror has “Schools racism crisis”. “UK prepares to send 100 small boat arrivals back” – that’s the Times while the Mail goes with “Farage unveils plan for ‘mass deportations” adding that the Tories say it was their policy first. In the Telegraph, the Reform UK leader is also setting out his stall on immigration and claims “Starmer ‘sides with courts over the people’”. “Flexible hours to menopausal women could keep them at work and boost the economy by £1.5bn” – that’s the top story in the i Paper.
Today in Focus
Missing in the Amazon: the journalist and the president – episode two
Revisited: What took the British journalist Dom Phillips from the club nights of the UK dance scene as editor of Mixmag to one of the most remote and dangerous corners of the Amazon rainforest? In 2022, Dom set off on a reporting trip with Bruno Pereira, a Brazilian expert on uncontacted tribes, into the Javari valley to investigate the criminal gangs threatening the region. And then they vanished.
Cartoon of the day | Ben Jennings
The Upside
A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad
When Louis Staples first saw the London Gay Men’s Chorus perform in Soho in 2016, little did he know that he would one day be standing alongside them – let alone on stages as impressive as the Royal Albert Hall and London’s Alexandra Palace.
In this week’s The one change that worked feature, Louis recalls how the group came into his life at a time of post-pandemic need, giving him a much-needed sense of community – and so much more. Performing with them, he writes, is “a testament to the power of being seen – and heard – for who you really are”.
“These moments have not only helped me to feel less self-conscious,” he says. “But they have also taught me that the things that bring us joy are never frivolous.”
Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday
Bored at work?
And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until tomorrow.
