Korea’s subtropical crop production triples over three years amid climate change

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The production of subtropical crops in South Korea has tripled over the past three years, driven by rapid climate change, an analysis showed on Thursday.

According to an analysis by Maeil Business Newspaper of subtropical crop cultivation data from the Rural Development Administration, the country’s cultivation area of 18 subtropical crops, including mango, papaya, banana, and coffee, has increased by 9.9 percent to 333 hectares (3.3 million square meters) last year from 303 hectares in 2019.

During the same period, the production volume of subtropical crops has increased dramatically to 14,600 tons from 5,575 tons, which is a 2.6-fold increase.

“The Korean Peninsula is rapidly becoming subtropical, and as a result, crops that were traditionally grown in tropical regions are now spreading quickly in Korea,” said an official from the Rural Development Administration.

According to the Korea Meteorological Administration, the country’s average temperature, which was 12.1 degrees Celsius in the 1970s, rose to 13.1 degrees Celsius in the 2020s.

The average maximum temperature soared to 18.6 degrees Celsius in the 2020s from 17.7 degrees Celsius in the 1970s. Higher temperature has led to a rapid increase in the production of tropical crops.

In the last three years, coffee production has jumped 137 times to 659.7 tons from 4.8 tons. Mangoes have increased 22 times to 8,695.8 tons from 399.3 tons, according to the analysis.

Gangwon Province has started to produce dragon fruits last year and South Gyeongsang Province pineapples. Mango farmers have also emerged in Gyeonggi Province and Incheon.

Coffee, which grows in particularly hot and humid environments, is a typical tropical crop that requires year-round temperatures not to fall below 5 degrees Celsius, but coffee farms are spreading rapidly in South Jeolla Province.

According to the South Jeolla Province Agricultural Technology Research Institute, the coffee cultivation area in the region covers 4.7 hectares, accounting for 49.5 percent of the national cultivation area last year.

“With the rapid sub tropicalization of the Korean Peninsula, apple production has already shifted from Daegu, North Gyeongsang Province, to Gangwon Province and mandarin orange production from Jeju Island to Naju, South Jeolla Province,” said Sung Jae-hoon, a research fellow at the Korea Rural Economic Institute. “We need to speed up systematic crop changes to prevent further damage from rapid climate change.”

It is also noted that the management standards for reservoirs and levees, which were mainly designed for drought response, need to be strengthened to focus on flood prevention.

In fact, natural disasters, which have become more frequent as air and sea temperatures have risen, have taken a heavy economic toll.

According to an analysis by the Ministry of Environment, economic losses from heavy rains, heat waves, and cold waves amounted to 3.7 trillion won ($2.8 billion) between 2012 and 2021. The ministry estimated that disaster recovery costs were two to three times the size of the losses.

Korea’s warming rate is considered fast even compared to the global average. The country’s temperature rose by 1.6 degrees Celsius between 1912 and 2020, much faster than the global average of 1.09 degrees Celsius.

The surface sea temperature has increased by 1.23 degrees Celsius between 1968 and 2017, which is 2.6 times faster than the global average of 0.48 degrees Celsius.