Climate Change and the Global Harvest

What are the impacts of rising global temperatures, altered precipitation patterns, and increased carbon dioxide levels on crop yields and agricultural productivity? In the 2025 Donald L. Sparks Distinguished Lectureship in Soil and Environmental Sciences, join us for an examination of potential adaptations and strategies for mitigating the adverse effects of climate change on agriculture, emphasizing the need for interdisciplinary collaboration in climatology, agronomy, and economics. Additionally, the lecture highlights the importance of global cooperation and policy changes to ensure sustainable food production in the future.

About the speaker
Cynthia Rosenzweig is a senior research scientist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and an adjunct senior research scientist at the Columbia Climate School. She is also a professor in the Department of Environmental Science at Barnard College. At NASA GISS, she heads the Climate Impacts Group whose mission is to investigate the interactions of climate (both variability and change) on systems and sectors important to human well-being. Rosenzweig has organized and led large-scale interdisciplinary, national, and international studies of climate change impacts and adaptation in rural and urban settings. In 2022, she received the prestigious World Food Prize for her contributions to understanding and predicting the impacts of the interaction between climate and food systems.

Doors open at 2:45 p.m. Lecture commences at 3 p.m. A reception will immediately follow from 4 to 5:30 p.m..