Introduction

Our GIS project analysis is on the agricultural land reserves (ALR) in the Okanagan region of British Columbia. Our project analyses ALR areas in the Okanagan region in terms of its current soil capability and climate, which we then linked to current and future food security for residents in British Columbia.

Objectives

Based on future climate predictions for British Columbia we decided to examine the impacts of climate change on available ALR in the Okanagan and the soil capability in these areas. Our objectives are to:

• Identify Agricultural Land Reserve areas in the Okanagan and the magnitude of the effects climate change will have on these areas over the next four decades.
• Suggest changes in management and crop types that would be suitable for maximising food crop production.

Figure 1 shows a map, using ArcGIS, of the projects study area, the Okanagan region, within British Columbia.

Agricultural Land Reserves (ALR)

The mountainous landscape of the Okanagan limits its agricultural capacity and therefore the ALR that has been set aside is vital for future growth in the community. The ALR is designated by the provincial government and only covers about five percent of the land in British Columbia (Green, 2006). Out of the original ALR set aside in the Okanagan, twelve percent of that has since been transformed due to urbanization (Hessing, 2010).

In the last few years diminishing agricultural land has become a big topic in British Columbia due to population growth and high food prices. With the rising cost of land it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain small scale farming which in turn diminishes food security (Hessing, 2010). The importance of ALR land is reflected in the fact that agriculture supplies British Columbia with over half of its food requirements on top of the $2.4 billion annual revenue (Green, 2006). The economy is thus negatively affected through the loss of production, employment and even agro-tourism when this land is reduced. There are already increasing pressures on existing ALR land and the population in the Okanagan is anticipated to reach 450, 000 by the year 2031 (Hessing, 2010). Will the designated ALR in the Okanagan withstand climate change and increasing demands over time? This is one of the questions we intend to answer as we explore the future of climate in the Okanagan and predict the outcome it has on the current land reserve.

Food Security

Food security is defined as:

“when all people at all times have access to sufficient, safe, nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life.”  (World Food Summit, 1996)

It consists of four aspects (Schmidhuber & Tubiello, 2007):

1. Food availability
2. Access to food
3. Stability of food supplies
4. Food utilization

All of these aspects are predicted to be affected by climate change in the future. In our project we look specifically at food availability, involving the production of crops in the Okanagan region.

Food security has become more of a concern and priority in British Columbia in recent years as our reliability on imported food is highlighted more with fluctuations in food prices.

In 2007, 45% of the provinces food supply is imported from other provinces and countries, particularly from the US, China, Mexico and Chile (Provincial health services authority, 2010). With 95% of fruit and nuts and 75% of vegetables that we consume being imported from places such as California (Provincial health services authority, 2010).

In recent years British Columbia has seen increases in the prices of fruit and vegetables which are imported from California, such as lettuce, citrus fruits, berries and broccoli (CBC News, 2014).

This will be set to carry on in the future, with further price increases due to reductions in agricultural productivity from further droughts. Recent studies have shown that climate change, due to increased greenhouse gas emissions, has intensified the droughts occurring in California and will likely impact similar climatic areas in the world (Williams et al, 2015).

With British Columbia importing nearly half of the food they consume, food security is at risk in the future. Climate change is set to impact the agricultural conditions of not only this province but other areas of the world, including areas where British Columbia imports food, such as California. In order for British Columbia to be food secure, measures need to be taken in communities, such as (Godfray et al , 2010):

• Reducing food waste
• Increase productivity through adaptive agricultural land management
• Sustainable intensification
• Supporting local farms/agriculture
• Reducing reliability on imported food

Food security is an ever growing issue in communities in British Columbia, reducing reliability on imported food and relying more on the provinces own production will help establish a reliable food supply. As part of this, predictions of future changes in climate and adapting agriculture management strategies to those changes will help increase productivity to meet food demand.

For our project…

For our project we decided to look at the conditions that sustain the best agricultural land. Topography, climate and soil type are the three main limiting factors  used to determine agricultural potential, for this project we looked at the effects of climate and soil type (Provincial Agricultural Land Commission, 2014). Based on these agricultural parameters we designated soil classes, placed in order of their growing capabilities, ranging from 1 to 7. These vary from soils suitable to grow any crop type with low slopes and the ability to retain water well, to soils with no capability for arable culture or permanent pasture and are restricted to trees and native fruit (Provincial Agricultural Land Commission, 2014). We used climate models that dictate normal weather patterns and predicted the changes in 2025 and 2055. More specifically we compared changes in time using the annual frost free days, growing degree days, and mean precipitation, all of which are used to determine the climate capability (Provincial Agricultural Land Commission, 2014).

The sustainability of orchards and small scale farming in the Okanagan rely on the future availability of agricultural land. By looking at climate changes and soil type in the Okanagan we hope to determine the stability of ALR regions and provide educated choices towards maintaining food security.