Asahi’s chief executive has warned that climate change could lead to beer shortages as warmer temperatures hit barley and hops supplies around the world. Atsushi Katsuki, who has headed the Japanese brewer since 2021, said analysis conducted by the company found that global warming was set to reduce barley yields and the quality of hops significantly over the next three decades, and warned of a beer shortage.
France’s spring barley harvest could decrease 18 per cent by 2050 under the UN’s 4 degree scenario, the most severe, while Poland’s harvest would shrink 15 per cent. The quality of hops, a key component for the preservation as well as the flavour of beer, would decline 25 per cent in the Czech Republic, one of the world’s largest hop producers.
Under a scenario of below 2 degrees, the French harvest is forecast by Asahi to decline 10 per cent, that in Poland by 9 per cent and the quality of hops in the Czech Republic by 13 per cent.
The world is headed for a temperature rise of up to 2.6C, the first comprehensive UN stock take of global efforts to limit warming recently concluded. “Although with hotter weather the consumption of beer may grow and become an opportunity for us, climate change will have a serious impact,” Katsuki told the Financial Times. “There is a risk that we may not be able to produce enough beer.”
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Well, at least I can still get high.
Maybe.
Cannabis growers are confronting the same issue that threatens to upend the wine industry and other agricultural-based businesses – shifting weather patterns and climate change.
Those shifts are forcing cannabis growers to rethink how to cultivate their plants.
Shorter growing cycles, for one, will help to ensure the growers can get their plants from seed to sale before disaster strikes by way of early freezes, fires or floods.
Another consideration for outdoor growers is that as climate change warms the planet, some cannabis strains will be better suited to places they have not typically grown.
For example, a recent study in the journal Earth and Space Science showed how parts of Colorado are becoming more arid because of climate-driven changes in stream flows and, over the coming decades, will look more like Arizona.
That could impact how both marijuana and hemp are grown in the future.
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Cannabis growers should learn from production agriculture when it comes to adapting to climate change, said Bryan McLaren, CEO and chair at Zoned Properties, a real estate development firm in Scottsdale, Arizona, that works with legalized cannabis.
“The cannabis industry as a whole needs to really learn the positive methodologies from industrial agriculture,” he added, including focusing on economy of scale while employing sustainable cultivation practices.
He pointed to how corn and wheat farmers were able to study genetics and improve the hardiness of their plants and, in turn, their yields many years before big, corporate agriculture firms took over seed production.
“(The cannabis industry) yields amazing economic returns and, if done right, hemp and marijuana has an amazing environmental regenerative opportunity.”
Terrifying.
And harshing my mellow.
Now it is getting really serious!
The price of beer will rise and guess what so will profits of breweries. Maybe a smart investment; Drink beer while you still can afford it. Enjoy yourself while you still in the pink. It is later then you think.