Agriculture and Climate Change. Impacts on Livelihood Subsystems in the Central Andes of Peru

Abstract

Climate change is a process that is affecting the daily living of societies in the world, especially because it disturbs the behavior of the ecosystems that support life. Agriculture is central to our existence and the effects of climate changes on crop productivity are already being studied with specific recommendations such as those given by FAO for tropical and mountain regions. This time, a rapprochement will be made to the impacts of climate change on subsystems related to subsistence food production and strategies that could be adopted to improve the economic income of its practitioners. Reference will be made to what happens in the Central Andes, especially in Peru, where, according to the 2012 National Agricultural Census, there are 68% of agricultural units from 0.1 to 5.0 hectares affecting 1,231,000 households. The objective is to show that there is a significant number of rural families that must also be considered in efforts to improve their quality of life that can be homogenized with that of the rest of Peruvian society. The development policies of family farming do not take into consideration subsistence farmers with agricultural units under three hectares, however, they should be included in the development agenda to ensure their sustainability against risks, such as climate change. The methodology of this research is deductive-inductive based on written documents and field experiences in different parts of the Peruvian mountains.