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How Climate Change Affects Fruit Production Essay

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THE FRUITS OF OUR CHANGING CLIMATE

How Climate Change Affects Fruit Production

INTRODUCTION

GLOBAL: THE APPLE

Apples, one of the most common fruits in the world, according to a study that was published in PLoS One, a peer-reviewed journal, may become more expensive or not possible at all in some areas, due to rising winter temperatures. Evan Girvetz, a Nature Conservancy climate scientist and co-author of the study, says:

“…many fruit and nut trees, such as cherries, apples, apricots, walnuts, and almonds, require cold weather during the winter and early spring time to cue the trees to flower and produce good yields of fruits and nuts. These trees have evolved in areas that freeze, and they go dormant during the …show more content…

The fact that rising temperatures could make apple trees flower earlier had been shown in previous work. Toshihiko Sugiura, a fruit-tree specialist of the National Agriculture and Food Research Organization in Tsukuba, Japan, and his colleagues Hidekazu Ogawa, Noriaki Fukuda and Takaya Moriguchi, chose to look at how this change affects the quality of the fruit. They then analysed four decades' worth of data gathered from two apple varieties – Fuji, one of the world's leading varieties, and Tsugaru, the second most common in Japan – that were grown in the Nagano and Aomori prefectures, the top two apple-producing regions in Japan.

According to their report that was published on nature.com, the team found during this period of apple cultivation that:

- The annual mean air temperature rose per decade by 0.31°C and 0.34°C in Nagano and Aomori, respectively.

- The dates of bud break and full bloom in both cultivars in both areas advanced earlier by 1.0 – 2.3 days.

- The fruits' acid concentration decreased by 0.16–0.20 g L−1 per decade, firmness by 0.04–0.33 kg and watercore rating by 0.17–0.38, while sugar concentration increased by 0.20–0.28°Brix per decade.

Sugiura stated that these changes may not have been too obvious to consumers as it occurred so gradually over decades, but also has said that “if you could eat an average apple harvested 30 years before

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